Daniel Stoops, CEPA
Daniel was born and raised in Oregon with a giant appetite for reading the news and understanding how the world works. He studied Politics, then spent his early career in publishing, marketing, and web design.
At 35, he made the leap to entrepreneurship, founding and running two different businesses over the next 17 or so years. After selling his second company in 2022, he found himself at a crossroads: What’s next? The answer pulled him toward non profit work and social impact – a chance to use nearly two decades of hard-won business experience for something bigger than profit.
He spent a couple years at the Northwest Cooperative Development Center (NWCDC), leading the Conversions practice, working to connect with business owners and helping them explore a possible transition to employee ownership. His work included education, advice and providing council as well as feasibility assessment, deal structuring, and on-going project management. And he has been a Certified Exit Planning Advisor (CEPA) since January of 2026.
As much as he can, he’s working to expand employee ownership in Oregon. On the weekends, he’s often working on house projects in the 1926 home in SE Portland where he has lived in for over 25 years. (Yes, it was in doing these projects that he started calling himself the Slow Carpenter.) He also enjoys cooking, skiing in the winter, and meeting friends for beers…especially on Friday afternoons.
NOTE: While there are over 20 states with formal, nonprofit, and professionally staffed Centers for Employee Ownership, Oregon does NOT have one…yet. He thought it would be a good idea start Slow Carpenter as sort of early stage, freelance, and often a volunteer version of Oregon’s Center for Employee Ownership. Let’s see where things go…