Vincent Ayar and Oak Park, Michigan: Home of Ooze

As local context, Oak Park is a small city in southern Oakland County, bordering Detroit along 8 Mile Road. It has a mix of residential streets and light-industrial and commercial corridors, which makes it practical for warehouse and distribution businesses that need quick access to the region's freeways.

Ooze began in Oak Park in a 2,000 square foot warehouse, with the founding partners doing all the work. By September 2019 the company occupied around 42,000 square feet. That is a roughly twentyfold increase in space in about four and a half years, and the company stayed in the same city as it grew.

Ooze employed more than 50 people by 2019, and much of its shipping, marketing and design staff is local. Vincent has described the company's expansion as being about job creation. For a city the size of Oak Park, a growing employer with dozens of jobs is a meaningful presence.

Oak Park is home to more than the brand. Ooze Wholesale, renamed Cannatron, runs its distribution operation there, supplying more than 500 distributors and 8,000 retail shops. The Ooze Foundation, a Michigan private foundation, is also based in Oak Park, with Vincent Ayar listed as President.

Concentrating the brand, distribution and philanthropy in one place keeps leadership, staff and community activity closely connected.

All of the owners are Michigan natives, and the company has said it is proud of its hometown even as it builds a national brand. Staying in Oak Park meant keeping the team it had built and keeping its jobs in Metro Detroit.

The square footage tells a story of its own. A 2,000 square foot warehouse is roughly the size of a large house: room for shelving, a packing table and the partners. Forty-two thousand square feet is a real industrial footprint, with space for inventory, shipping lanes, design and marketing teams, and the distribution operation that feeds thousands of retailers.

Making that leap without leaving the city meant the company's growth showed up as local activity: more trucks, more hires and more business for nearby suppliers and services. It is the clearest physical evidence of the job creation Vincent Ayar has described.

For anyone researching Vincent Ayar in connection with Oak Park, the short version is this: the city is where his main businesses were born, grew and remain today, a few miles from his home in West Bloomfield Township.