Does anyone have experience in starting a co-op?

October 9, 2007 10:19 PM

How do I start a grocery co-op?

Do any mefites have experience with this? Here on the island of Key West, a crisis has developed. Our island's best grocery, Waterfront Market, supplier of fresh seafood and all sorts of goodies for Islanders, our boating communities and the dock workforce, is being by forced to close by a combination of bureaucratic greed and ineptitude. But there is hope!

A very solid group of neighbors and citizens has banded together with the idea of taking over the reigns of the market and transforming the successful business - 20 years with 45 employees - into a co-op. And I am spearheading the movement! Any insight or recommendations?

(My applicable background is in market research, organic farming, and ecology. I have done the google work, and come up with some very good/well-established groundwork. What I am looking for is recommendations and insight based on personal experience in starting a co-op.)

posted by humannaire to shopping (7 comments total)

BTW, this is the blog, seagrassroots, that has been reporting on the situation and uniting community support.
posted by humannaire at 10:22 PM on October 9, 2007

Here's a San Francisco grocery co-op's webpage: Rainbow. It has a fair amount of information about the operations.

Huh, there's a coop TLD. Neat.
posted by alexei at 11:03 PM on October 9, 2007

There's a grocery co-op in Salina, Kansas, that might be a model for what you're looking for, and the coordinator, Bette Sue Wachholz, has an email address. I'll bet they'd be happy to answer questions.
posted by amyms at 11:48 PM on October 9, 2007

SF's Rainbow has been one consultant in getting the forthcoming Mandela Foods Cooperative up. Since they are in the middle of forming, they might have some insights for you if you contact them, or at least some resources.

I work for a cooperative developer, but not in the grocery industry, so I only have very general Insights and Recommendations.

1. Have a solid business plan, and significant reserves for your first year+ of losses. 2. Understand that the actual work of running a store is different than the community organizing that you are involved in now, and recruit members willing to do the grocery work. 3. Choose your idealisms carefully in the beginning before you break even, and build more of them in once you are financially stable. 4. Be transparent and have excellent democratic process, but also have the zeal of the entrepreneur to excite and interest others.

Good luck with it. It can work.
posted by ioesf at 1:40 AM on October 10, 2007

Tom Gilpatrick or Lee Buddress at the Portland State University Food Industry Leadership Center might be good resources. Dr. Buddress focuses on purchasing and Dr. Gilpatrick has oodles and oodles of food industry supplier recommendations. The FILC certificate program is for students who want to go into the grocery industry. (Disclaimer: I have a FILC Certificate to go along with my supply chain degree from PSU.)
posted by SpecialK at 5:51 AM on October 10, 2007

You might contact The Park Slope Food Coop. The executive director's name is Joe Holtz and he's been a member since 1973. Their website is a good resource for general information on how the co-op works and may give you some ideas, as well.

By the way, this is such a great thing to do. Good luck.
posted by TryTheTilapia at 6:36 AM on October 10, 2007

The Park Slope Food Coop is run by a pack of Nazis and you need to have Stockholm Syndrome to work/shop there. Please don't model a new coop on that one.

I know that the food coops in Minnesota work together to help new coops organize and get started -- somewhere among them are people who could help you and/or tell you where to find their counterparts where you are. You might start by calling The North Country Coop, which is the oldest and still serves as a leader among them.

Good luck! Sounds like a great endeavor.
posted by gum at 9:06 AM on October 10, 2007