18 ms·

Starting a food co-op: Year 1

234 points by qrush 4y ago

neilv 4y ago
This seems to be in the Boston, Mass., area. Some related local background is that there was the Harvest Co-op chain until a few years ago: https://www.boston.com/food/food/2018/10/04/harvest-co-op-markets-closing/ https://www.boston.com/food/food/2018/10/04/harvest-co-op-ma... There's also the Market Basket for-profit regional chain, where employees and customers successfully stood up against some family business maneuvers to force out the head, and it's once again generally well-regarded AFAIK (including profit-sharing for employees). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_Basket_(New_England)#2014_firing_of_Arthur_T._Demoulas_and_protests https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_Basket_(New_England)#20...
- AaronM 4y ago
  Vermont has a fairly successful Co-op in Burlington. https://www.citymarket.coop/ https://www.citymarket.coop/
  - twunde 4y ago
    Vermont has a number of successful co-ops. https://nfca.coop/vt/ https://nfca.coop/vt/ has a list of them. Most food co-ops belong to co-op partnerships and many will cross honor memberships at other co-ops ie the Putney co-op will give you a member discount if you're a Brattleboro co-op member
  - mym1990 4y ago
    I kind of love the old styler website and the .coop domain to booot!
  - DFHippie 4y ago
    The Brattleboro co-op is quite successful. A co-op has a lot of positive externalities: better customer experience, better benefits, pay, and job satisfaction for the employees than at non-co-op grocery stores, the community it fosters, etc. If these things matter to you, they can outweigh the premium the co-op has to charge to provide them. I worked in the Lexington Co-op in Buffalo back in the 90s. It was a great job despite the meager pay and benefits (at the time) because I didn't feel like I was the lackey of the customers or my bosses but their friend and neighbor. I was in graduate school, which was depressing and alienating. I found the co-op a far nicer place to live my life than academia. It's been many years, but it's still one of the best jobs I've had. I met my wife there. My pay is better now, but I still shop at co-ops when I can.
- jpm_sd 4y ago
  Given that Harvest shut down "after years of financial instability", what's the strategy for this new co-op to survive? If you can't run a successful co-op in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where can you?
  - socialismisok 4y ago
    Most places I've lived on the west coast have grocery co-ops. Often they stand out in the market by carrying high quality, locally produced, or "hippie" food. Some folks prefer to shop there because they like the model - co-op businesses generally seem to be more invested in local communities.
    - jpm_sd 4y ago
      Yes, you are accurately describing the Harvest Co-op which operated in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and failed to thrive. Aka "the People's Republic of Cambridge"? I dunno, maybe it was mismanaged due to excessive ideological community involvement? Or maybe operating costs were just too high in one of the most expensive cities in the nation?
      - seibelj 4y ago
        I went to the one in JP a lot before it closed. Our main issue was that the produce was often rotten / moldy and there were flies inside a lot. It's hard to justify higher fees and being "more healthy" when all your food is spoiled. We went because it was a 5 minute walk but now we use Whole Foods for everything.
      - KennyBlanken 4y ago
        Harvest's JP location was costing them an arm and a leg in maintenance and repair due to the building (an old mansion) being in very poor shape, and then Whole Foods bought up a property from a local ethnic 'super' market whose owners were done being in the grocery business. Harvest built out a very fancy new store very close to a major subway/bus terminus that was gorgeous but everyone went to the Whole Foods which was closer to the higher population-dense areas. Location, location, location - but also WF was very stiff competition. I never saw rotten produce. I have no idea what the other commenter is on about. Organic, locally-sourced, heirloom produce often isn't as pretty as the stuff genetically modified or bred to survive being shipped halfway around the world and stored in a warehouse for 6 months.
- carride 4y ago
  Here are more details are the year before harvest shutdown. Summarized to say that all the unique organic and varieties of healthy food they were once known for, can now be found at most other grocery stores. https://archive.ph/NEc4o https://archive.ph/NEc4o
  - carride 4y ago
    This could have been pre-pandemic thinking in 2018
- jt2190 4y ago
  I mean… Stop and Shop is literally two blocks from where Russo’s was [1] so I’m not sure what relevance Harvest or Market Basket bring to this conversation. (Edit: I’m not trying to be dismissive, but it’s not really clear why these other stores are relevant. Are you suggesting that perhaps labor is being treated better than at the big chains?) Russo’s was definitely a high-end, premium prices place: Fancy imported cheeses, a large bakery, fresh-made pasta, and a large selection of fresh fruit and vegetables. I have no idea if the workers were paid better or treated better than anywhere else. A co-op feels like a different beast altogether, so I’m not sure that the patrons of Russo’s will suddenly just move to shopping there en masse, especially since the market for groceries around here is well served. It really feels like the coop would mostly not be about the food. [1] https://www.google.com/maps/dir/570+Pleasant+St,+Watertown,+MA+02472/Stop+%26+Shop,+Pleasant+Street,+Watertown,+MA/@42.3670568,-71.2128279,16z/data=!4m8!4m7!1m2!1m1!1s0x89e382b97833654b:0x1de8b99ca20d1052!1m2!1m1!1s0x89e382b880c1bf2d:0xcec21ef22f9bc39b!3e2 https://www.google.com/maps/dir/570+Pleasant+St,+Watertown,+...
  - neilv 4y ago
    I thought someone who's interested in new co-ops in this area would be interested in the history of a prior co-op that operated in this area. Also, one of the things that the co-op seemed to value was treating workers well, which overlaps with one of my favorite recent stories of people banding together (a little like a co-op), to succeed. And that store is known for better prices than the others, making it more accessible while a certain premium store has been gobbling up other ones, so there's another social justice angle that might be of interest.
- forgotmypw17 4y ago
  I was able to figure out it's in the Boston area by the 617 area code and the name, but after spending 5 minutes looking for its actual location, I still can't find it. It doesn't seem to be on the website, and it's not on Google Maps either. Does anyone know where this is actually located?
  - topaz0 4y ago
    If you go to the FAQ, they say that they are likely several years from opening.
dylan604 4y ago
As a kid, my family was part of a co-op. I grew up in the boonies, and there was one local grocery store that had horrible selection. The larger chains required long drives to get to, but even then they did not have the produce selections that is the norm now. Instead, each weekend a member of the co-op would visit the farmer's market in the Big City. We were no where near the size of the co-op in the TFA, but it made a big difference in the selection of produce we had. Now, that farmer's market is no longer, but now a series of condos with Farmer's Market as part of their name are there. I just never though that a co-op would be a viable thing in 21st century, so it was definitely interesting reading about how that's not the case.
- hinkley 4y ago
  Ace hardware is technically a co-op, but that would be a surviving one more than one for the 21st century. REI is also a co-op but I couldn’t explain how to save my life. However, Organic Valley definitely is a co-op, and while they started in 1988 they didn’t seem to get serious traction until around 2000, and now they’re everywhere on the west coast, which is not bad for a Midwest company.
  - dylan604 4y ago
    Interesting you mention Ace. It is truly one of my favorite places to visit in new cities. No two Ace stores are the same. One in my area focuses on homesteading, and is known as the place to get your baby chicks to start your chicken raising experiment. They also carry other items that are in this line vs just your typical selection of tools and what not. Then another Ace in Flagstaff saved my butt while on a video shoot as they had some items I had never seen in a local Ace, but were the perfect fit for the off the wall rigging I needed. Ace is the place!
    - xsmasher 4y ago
      There's one in Berkeley California with a fully stocked model train department filling 1/4 of the floorspace.
_chap 4y ago
What an incredible legacy you're creating Nick. Keep dropping those breadcrumbs for the rest of us to follow!
debacle 4y ago
There is a local group trying to "disrupt" coops in this way: find members to shell out $$, have a steering committee, do a lot of marketing, all before the coop even has a location in mind. Meanwhile there are actual coops (though they don't call themselves that) with skyrocketing membership who are doing, not planning, and slowly growing to encompass more than just produce. One of them now has a year-round greenhouse. I haven't been impressed by the style of coop the author writes about. It seems like the doers are much more successful. Just this past year a new farmers market started in an urban food desert with two vendors in a church parking lot. Now they are trying to find new space because they have 20+ vendors weekly. To my knowledge, they raised zero dollars to get started.
- socialismisok 4y ago
  Where do the "doers" get the capital to create greenhouses and raise vegetables?
  - phphphphp 4y ago
    Do you need to create greenhouses and raise vegetables from the start? My understanding is that a coop (like any business) is a means to an end and so you can start out by leveraging what is effectively group buying to source high quality fresh produce and then, once established, gradually iterate towards total self reliance. Does that not work for this model?
    - socialismisok 4y ago
      It could, but where do you get the capital to do the group buying? My point is that the parent is likely simply not aware of the organizing that went into creating the group of "doers" they are praising.
      - bombcar 4y ago
        Around here the "doers" (we have farmer's markets and similar) are spouses/children of actual farmers, and even though their main product may be fifty five billion bushels of ethanol wheat, the family grows some crops for personal use, and they have been "roadside standing" the excess for years; the farmers market starts as an extension of that and from there can grow. You'll note that they already were farming for the big players. The other half are often "hobby farm" hobbyists who may or may not grow to be an actual business (there are at least two or three honey providers that have done this around here - starting small and obviously not the primary income to being large enough to have employees).
socialismisok 4y ago
I love this! Thanks for sharing the details. The world needs more co-ops. The US needs to make it easier to incorporate co-ops. As someone who looked into building both a software co-op and a housing co-op, getting the paperwork in order was such a larger hassle than seeing up an LLC.
- the_lonely_road 4y ago
  What made it a hassle? I abandoned Ember for React even though I liked the former a lot more because the community was tiny meaning there were few resources and it was practically impossible to hire anyone that could hit the ground running. It turned out to be a great decision. I have set up a number of LLCs over the years and it’s dead simple, but I know nothing about setting up a co op. Seems like it shouldn’t be much more difficult except for how rare it is so I’m curious to hear your pain points.
  - davidjfelix 4y ago
    It depends a lot on the state that one resides (or incorporates) in. With LLCs they mostly all follow the same pattern and if you're the sole owner they can be done without charter, initial incorporation docs, etc. With coops, some states follow uniform common law LCA (limited cooperative association) laws and allow worker-owned coops pretty easily (although lawyers are generally less familiar as they're rarer). Other states only allow certain kinds of coops and require charters and organizational documents. Basically, any time you involve more than one person, there is some paperwork (LLC or otherwise). Coops have this, plus the added difficulty of not being uniform around the US. Last I looked, Colorado and IL had a lot of coop options to choose from, but nothing was as straight forward as an LLC where you just file 1 notice with the state and pay 100 bucks. LCA states are close, but you still have the "many people" issue.
    - socialismisok 4y ago
      Pretty much this. No one is familiar with any of this stuff, so you have to navigate off the golden path.
brnaftr361 4y ago
I'm kinda curious are there any protections in place to mitigate somebody (ostensibly nefarious) wresting control of the consumer-owner representatives? I know one of the aspects of Mondragon's foundation is that there is zero outside influence and all control is within the shareholders, which are exclusively workers because these sort of buyout risks have actually played out.
- bombcar 4y ago
  Co-ops themselves usually have a particular setup that's similar to a non-profit (and so they're not really "sellable" but can merge with other co-ops). The "nefarious" entities don't care; they will control the suppliers as that's where the money is made anyway; grocery stores are cost centers. The main protection I'd look for is avoid long-term and exclusive contracts. Anything that prohibits you from sourcing from other suppliers is highly suspect.
dugmartin 4y ago
The article mentions no open food coops in central or eastern Massachusetts but there are quite a few here in western Mass. Not sure why the difference but maybe it’s due to greatly cheaper rent?
- tacostakohashi 4y ago
  It tends to work in places where a for-profit supermarket would be marginal (at best), but people still need their groceries, fuel, etc.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    And look how much the land sold for - $36 million! In rural areas the land is basically free, and even then many of the "for-profit" grocery stores are just family owned businesses that have more in common with a coop than you might expect.
  - M2Ys4U 4y ago
    The vast majority of co-ops are for-profit enterprises, so I'm not sure why you'd phrase it like that.
    - tacostakohashi 4y ago
      Because their primary goal is to provide goods and services to their shareholders, rather than profits and dividends.
  - bbradley406 4y ago
    I'm not certain that's the biggest reason, I think it's more about the number of local farms, butchers, etc. Middle / upper-middle class health-conscious customers who are passionate about high quality food are a big part of it too, and there's plenty of them in Western MA and close-by NY towns. In GB (Western MA) the co-op competes with two other cheaper supermarkets. What sets them apart is 2 day old (max) Atlantic seafood and local produce that hasn't been subjected to long distance transit (and the flavorless ripening process). Not having the "beige tiles and fluorescent lights" atmosphere is a huge plus as well.
orzig 4y ago
I live in that area and would love to start getting involved. I’ll reach out! Anyone else who’s on the fence about getting involved: If you value building community (even aside from food in specific), your public involvement now will only snowball in impact; strike while the iron is hot!
the-printer 4y ago
This may be an ignorant question. I’m sure I can search for it myself. But the commenters here sound well informed and experienced. Here it goes. I understand the process of establishing the food co-op, but how did they get the food??
- qrush 4y ago
  Most co-ops pair with local distributors and national ones (the most prominent being National Co-op Grocers - https://ncg.coop https://ncg.coop) to actually get the food, but tons of steps to do before we are ready for this!
  - the-printer 4y ago
    Wow. So this is a process. I can understand that when the goal is likely sustainability, scale and longevity. Thank you for sharing this with us.
  - kjbreil 4y ago
    Just to clarify NCG is not a distributor but an overarching organization which helps Grocery Co-ops nationwide to run their business. A generally used distributer would be UNFI along with using local distributers.
ricardobeat 4y ago
Can anyone shed more light on why it takes 7-10 years to get to an actual store? In my head you’d start signing up suppliers / farmers, find a suitable place to rent, get some more funding, build out the store, hire, and start it up. What makes it slower than other businesses?
- sct202 4y ago
  There's a long capital raising period where the co-op will need to raise a substantial amount of capital in the form or preferred shares and owner loans. The co op near me says they need a certain percentage of capital to come from owners in order to secure commercial loans, and they've recently completed raising capital after signing up owners for the last 9 years.
- Kalium 4y ago
  Coops often find it harder to borrow and they cannot sell equity. This makes the every "get some funding" step harder than it sounds. Going over the list I see a lot of people-organizing and community-outreach efforts. These are definitely going to be more time-intensive than setting up an LLC owned by a single person and running with that.
  - luckylion 4y ago
    Why can't they sell equity? I live in a housing coop, and they do sell equity. I own 100 shares.
    - bombcar 4y ago
      The amounts they need are high. They’re trying to get 1000 people to kick in $100 so they can get a multimillion dollar loan. Trying to get that is hard enough, getting them to kick in 3-4K each is nearly impossible, even if you can sell “shares”.
    - Kalium 4y ago
      My apologies, I can see I was not nearly specific enough. In addition to needing to sell a lot of equity to get enough money, coops generally cannot sell equity to outside parties through general-purpose capital markets to raise funds. Living in a housing coop, you can buy shares as a resident-owner. I would guess your coop does not have many investor-owners who own shares while not living in the housing coop. Does this clarify my point for you?
wpietri 4y ago
I love the playbook mentioned here. I think it's part of this library: https://fci.coop/business-development/ https://fci.coop/business-development/ Seems reminiscent to me of the open-source ethos or the (declining?) community spirit in tech startup land. Except where organizations compete directly, collaboration makes a lot of sense.
Semaphor 4y ago
I wish I could follow this, but the blog sadly lacks any (discoverable) RSS feeds. So qrush, any chance of that changing?
- qrush 4y ago
  Good question. I moved away from Jekyll/GitHub Pages a while back and onto Notion/Super.so. A good feature request, but I'll just post again here next year :)
- kthartic 4y ago
  Not to be rude, but I don't think I've seen the term "RSS" in over ten years. I'm sure there's probably a niche group of people that still use them (maybe disproportionally higher amongst HN users), but I think OP can be forgiven for not including one.
  - Semaphor 4y ago
    Which is the advantage of technologically boring WordPress blogs: They get them by default without the author ever having to worry.
  - daxvena 4y ago
    I kind of feel like you're missing out then. I was pretty young when RSS was "popular" and didn't really get into it back then. I started using it in the past couple of years, and I find it's one of the best ways to keep up to date with multiple things I want to follow (without being tied to a specific platform). I would also be pretty surprised if you haven't heard of podcasts in over ten years. I feel like a "podcast" isn't really a podcast if it doesn't have an RSS feed.
    - kthartic 4y ago
      My point wasn't whether or not I like RSS feeds - it was to explain why OP can be forgiven for not wanting to put the effort in creating one. I'm sure they're wonderful.
WaitWaitWha 4y ago
I read the article, but it is not clear what kind of co-op they want to create. Is it a brick & mortar, delivery? Is it making deals with local farmers & homesteads, or buying from large distributors at discount? I have participated in co-ops that were delivery only, local only. It was not always the cheapest, but for planning meals it worked out. The quality was almost always better if I just walked down to the large chain grocery store.
- qrush 4y ago
  We're definitely aiming towards a brick & mortar - but we are still figuring out distribution and more (and will continue to do so until we're open for business)
  - WaitWaitWha 4y ago
    I have also seen co-ops where members could opt to do labour for both membership and food. And, although co-ops on the surface sound democratic, they can never achieve full democratic votes. I have participated with where I get to pick what I wanted from a pre-determined list that I had no immediate input to (the co-op "buyers" were), and I have also seen the list extended to "for the future". There was one where I got what I got, and had zero choice in what was in the basket. There was one where my "basket content" could be exchanged with anyone else within co-op, e.g. I had too much sugar beets and member X had too much kohlrabi. We wanted what the other had, bam! exchange made prior to delivery. This also helped with waste reduction. Good luck!
- bombcar 4y ago
  So I've seen a couple of different kinds: 1. The one they're working on results in a "grocery store" when done - it's coop run and handles working with distributors, etc. It often ends up "feeling" like a Whole Foods or similar, as the "non-direct" farm products end up sourced from similar distributors. 2. The "farmer's market" type - where you end up with basically a continual farmer's market - this one can grow into being more of a "grocery store" but is often quite limited on the products available; think almost entirely local farm produce and nothing much else. 3. The "community supported agriculture" type - where you pay a flat fee and get a box every week/month/whatever, but don't really have much choice what's in the box. These can be the "closest to the farm" as you're literally getting boxes of whatever they're harvesting. However, they're often only active during harvest periods and you don't control what's in them. The third one is the only one I've seen be consistently higher quality (and if I had to rank them it would go 3,2, 1) because the farmers pick the super ripe stuff for the CSA because they know it will be delivered and eaten in a day, not packed into a truck for travel across the country. You can also end up with strange fruits you've never heard of before, but still exist.
miclill 4y ago
Cool, I've been a member of a Coop for about 10 years now. Website of our Coop (in German): https://foodcoop-karlsruhe.de https://foodcoop-karlsruhe.de
- Aachen 4y ago
  I had never heard of this concept before seeing this article. Great to hear it's in Germany also! Would you know if there is a list of co-ops in Germany somewhere, to see if there is one closer to me than Karlsruhe?
  - Symbiote 4y ago
    Try REWE, the second largest supermarket chain in Germany. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Cooperatives_in_Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Cooperatives_in_Germa... A little north, we have Coop Danmark, also the second-biggest retailer (runs the supermarkets Kvickly, Brugsen, SuperBrugsen, Fakta, Irma).
    - luckylion 4y ago
      ReWe is very different from that though. There are two things named Cooperatives: One is a coop that is owned by those it serves, e.g. a housing coop is owned by those who live in the flats, a food coop is owned by those who buy the food. The other is the coop as a legal form of corporations where you have essentially no difference between a regular corporation, a LLC or a cooperative, and the cooperatives will usually own other entities with different legal forms for actually run the business. ReWe is the latter, and has nothing in common but the name of the legal form with what is discussed here.
  - miclill 4y ago
    Yes, look here: https://foodcoopedia.de.fcoop.org/wiki/Hauptseite https://foodcoopedia.de.fcoop.org/wiki/Hauptseite
    - Aachen 4y ago
oldandboring 4y ago
So much enlightening info in these comments about the economics of these stores and the truth behind the sourcing of the food. I've been a co-op member for almost 20 years; back before I had kids and lived really close to the store we used to go there almost every day. The biggest draw was always the quality of the food; the chain stores were only selling conventional and mass-produced products and if you wanted a better and/or local product, the co-op was your place. But then in the mid-2000s we got Whole Foods, Trader Joes, and and an organic/specialty aisle in all the supermarkets. Eventually the organic aisle disappeared and it was just organic products on the regular shelves. When we moved away, our new city also had a co-op but it was a 15+ minute drive from home and there was very little draw for us: it was largely the same products we could get at our local stores, but 20% more expensive. The only reason to go there is if we happen to be in the area and/or if there's something we want that we know they only sell there, but that's no different than the 3 big-chain stores in our town.
- smeagull 4y ago
  The one thing my local co-op does is being able to buy a random box of seasonal fruit and veg for cheap. That's ended up being cheaper than our supermarket.
  - oldandboring 4y ago
    Similar effect as a CSA but you get to choose whether you actually want the stuff and when. Pretty nifty idea.
- chiefalchemist 4y ago
  > The only reason to go there is if we happen to be in the area and/or if there's something we want that we know they only sell there, but that's no different than the 3 big-chain stores in our town. Actually, there is a difference. The dollars spent at a co-op are far more likely to stay in the local community. On the hand, give it to the big chain, and it's far more like to make it back to HQ (and the shareholders). Not your local community. "Local Dollars, Local Sense" by Michael Shuman was an enlightening read for me. https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/local-dollars-local-sense-how-to-shift-your-money-from-wall-street-to-main-street-and-achieve-real-prosperity--a-resilient-communities-guide_michael-shuman/554683/?resultid=46891659-ddb0-4abc-b99b-f3cc9d6082a5#edition=6535963&idiq=4420833 https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/local-dollars-local-sense-how-...
artec 4y ago
How do you all keep it truly democratic with (eventually) 1000+ owners? Who decides on major decisions like, where it will be built, what funding sources you'll accept, who will do what work etc.
- bombcar 4y ago
  You can’t keep it “truly democratic” - the owners are basically there to replace the management if they go insane. And coops have been known to explode - usually when they become untenable for the reasons that drove the grocery stores away.
  - lambertsimnel 4y ago
    > You can’t keep it “truly democratic” - the owners are basically there to replace the management if they go insane. In a sense, that's true of other kinds of business, which also allow their owners to vote. The difference is that in a coop it's one person one vote, and nobody can be an owner without being a stakeholder of another kind (such as an employee or a customer), whereas in a conventional business there's no reason owners must intersect with other kinds of stakeholders (though there might still be some overlap), and votes don't necessarily have equal value.
Melatonic 4y ago
If you have not checked out a real CSA in your area I highly recommend it (Community Supported Agriculture) - its basically the convenience of a farmers market without you needing to dedicate the time to it. Plus you are getting the absolute freshest produce from a local farm directly. Definitely avoid though the big name giant ones that claim to be a "CSA" but are a giant national org
- oldandboring 4y ago
  I love the concept of a CSA. We've tried it a few times. It's such a great idea and I want these things to succeed. For us, we canceled after a few weeks each time because the ones we joined were all setup similarly: once every week or so, you get a bag of food, whatever's in season. That leaves us having to figure out what to do with all this stuff we don't normally cook and don't have recipes for, and that the kids aren't used to eating. These are all solvable problems but I guess there was too much friction in adapting our lives to it. I'm not sure if it's actually easier to make shopping lists and drive to the store to buy exactly what we need, but it's what we were used to.
  - Melatonic 4y ago
    That is kind of the whole point of a CSA though - you adapt each week or month or whatever. How things used to be basically before the advent of the super grocery store and global supply chain.
    - oldandboring 4y ago
      Right, I know. Wasn't a good fit for us having hectic lives and two little kids. Most of what we received ended up going to waste.
      - Melatonic 4y ago
        I end up fermenting and preserving a lot of stuff I know I will not eat - fun thing probably to do with kids too. Plus it generally makes the stuff you may not like taste way better (assuming you like pickled stuff). Pickled cauliflower or romanesco is amazing for example My problem is they always have too much of a focus on leafy greens which go bad way too quickly - I prefer stuff like Broccoli in general which has a pretty similar nutrient profile and lasts way, way longer.
thinkcontext 4y ago
I belong to 120 person food co-op. Its operated out of the basement of house since the 80s. We're a different model than described here, its a hybrid of a buying club and a grocery store. All of the labor is unpaid, you must be a member to shop, it has limited official open hours but everyone gets a key and can shop themselves whenever they like. Most people pay a 20% markup on goods but people that have extra responsibility pay less.
silexia 4y ago
Most areas don't have co-ops because not many people are willing to do a ton of work and not get any benefits from it. This is why capitalism works so well... Entrepreneurs take a ton of risk and do a ton of work and sometimes get windfall profits from it.
- lambertsimnel 4y ago
  The big food retail coops in the UK are in most respects supermarkets like any other. The people doing the work get paid, and they're as capitalist as any other business that doesn't list equities on a stock market.
mustafabisic1 4y ago
Oh my, this thread is full of positivity! Cheer y'all.
wonderwonder 4y ago
I don't get it. It said nothing about actually providing food. At what point do people grow or get produce? Also why does race have to be brought into everything? Why have the 8th principal? Looking at your board members all of you are white. All of your support staff is white. Why cant it be just a group of not racist people building a co-op, where all are welcome? Why does everything have to push race? Its exhausting. Don't get me wrong, I think its great you have a goal and are building something to help your community, I just don't understand some of the choices and I mean this in a "trying not to be a jerk" way.
- zzzeek 4y ago
  this article didn't seem to have anything about "race" in it except for a little box at the bottom. DEI is very important for basically any organization that doesn't want to be known as a bunch of exclusionary jerks. "Race", even though it's a only a social construct with no link to science in any way, is a big deal because people were enslaved for 300 years based on "race". After the Civil War, "race" was still used as an explicit or implicit basis for the next 100+ years to deny rights which continues to this day. So it's been a pretty long, big deal for a huge number of people who have been systematically denied equal status in society for centuries, it's pretty hard for any new endeavor to be equitable without taking an extremely long and hard look at how the endeavor interacts with this massive legacy that US society is only just beginning to attempt to extricate from. For sure it's exhausting. Think how exhausting it must be to be part of a group that's been systematically oppressed and terrorized for hundreds of years. You can choose not to give a shit because it's too "exhausting" to care, but that's not how food coops roll.
  - wonderwonder 4y ago
    "DEI is very important for basically any organization that doesn't want to be known as a bunch of exclusionary jerks" exactly my point, now you have to push it or you have to be worried about being automatically labeled racist. How condescending and insulting. "it's pretty hard for any new endeavor to be equitable without taking an extremely long and hard look at how the endeavor interacts with this massive legacy" No, its not. Just welcome all, you don't have to say anything, just be good people. I hear what you are saying but I don't think the answer is to constantly harp on it and I would think make it awkward for people of that race. Hey welcome to the coop, we really support Black people here. Sure they're black but they are people first and I have to think its tiresome from their point of view to constantly be reminded that white people see them as other. Its a superior point of view, look how noble we are, protecting the minorities with our power. I am sure the intent is good but I don't think it has the result that is intended. I have to take 4+ hours of classes this month at my employer to be told that I have to treat minorities well when much like this co-op 95% of leadership is white. Its condescending and I don't just mean to me. Just don't be racist and treat people like people. I guarantee just saying this has as much impact as the 4 hours of classes I have to take and their "8th principal" One of my classes I had to take at a very, very large company told me that if I help out a minority and they get offended to not argue back, but "sit there in my shame". Its reached insanity levels and I think having the opposite effect. At what point does it start driving people that are generally center based politically further to the right. I was surprised as a generally life long liberal when it started to do that to me. I'm not voting for Trump but for the first time in my life I'm likely voting for a Republican governor primarily because of this sort of stuff. Apologies for my rant, I guess it had been on my mind.
georgeoliver 4y ago
I was also somewhat surprised to hear there weren't any grocery co-ops in Eastern/Central Mass (notwithstanding the chain that closed), but it could be the co-op niche (small store, high-quality groceries) is already filled in the area by the many small markets, delis, etc. that have been there for decades.
jefftk 4y ago
It's not clear to me what this co-op is trying to bring to the Boston -area grocery market? What do they want to provide that's missing?

234 points by qrush 4y ago

This seems to be in the Boston, Mass., area. Some related local background is that there was the Harvest Co-op chain until a few years ago: https://www.boston.com/food/food/2018/10/04/harvest-co-op-markets-closing/ https://www.boston.com/food/food/2018/10/04/harvest-co-op-ma... There's also the Market Basket for-profit regional chain, where employees and customers successfully stood up against some family business maneuvers to force out the head, and it's once again generally well-regarded AFAIK (including profit-sharing for employees). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_Basket_(New_England)#2014_firing_of_Arthur_T._Demoulas_and_protests https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_Basket_(New_England)#20...

AaronM 4y ago
Vermont has a fairly successful Co-op in Burlington. https://www.citymarket.coop/ https://www.citymarket.coop/
- twunde 4y ago
  Vermont has a number of successful co-ops. https://nfca.coop/vt/ https://nfca.coop/vt/ has a list of them. Most food co-ops belong to co-op partnerships and many will cross honor memberships at other co-ops ie the Putney co-op will give you a member discount if you're a Brattleboro co-op member
- mym1990 4y ago
  I kind of love the old styler website and the .coop domain to booot!
- DFHippie 4y ago
  The Brattleboro co-op is quite successful. A co-op has a lot of positive externalities: better customer experience, better benefits, pay, and job satisfaction for the employees than at non-co-op grocery stores, the community it fosters, etc. If these things matter to you, they can outweigh the premium the co-op has to charge to provide them. I worked in the Lexington Co-op in Buffalo back in the 90s. It was a great job despite the meager pay and benefits (at the time) because I didn't feel like I was the lackey of the customers or my bosses but their friend and neighbor. I was in graduate school, which was depressing and alienating. I found the co-op a far nicer place to live my life than academia. It's been many years, but it's still one of the best jobs I've had. I met my wife there. My pay is better now, but I still shop at co-ops when I can.
jpm_sd 4y ago
Given that Harvest shut down "after years of financial instability", what's the strategy for this new co-op to survive? If you can't run a successful co-op in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where can you?
- socialismisok 4y ago
  Most places I've lived on the west coast have grocery co-ops. Often they stand out in the market by carrying high quality, locally produced, or "hippie" food. Some folks prefer to shop there because they like the model - co-op businesses generally seem to be more invested in local communities.
  - jpm_sd 4y ago
    Yes, you are accurately describing the Harvest Co-op which operated in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and failed to thrive. Aka "the People's Republic of Cambridge"? I dunno, maybe it was mismanaged due to excessive ideological community involvement? Or maybe operating costs were just too high in one of the most expensive cities in the nation?
    - seibelj 4y ago
      I went to the one in JP a lot before it closed. Our main issue was that the produce was often rotten / moldy and there were flies inside a lot. It's hard to justify higher fees and being "more healthy" when all your food is spoiled. We went because it was a 5 minute walk but now we use Whole Foods for everything.
    - KennyBlanken 4y ago
      Harvest's JP location was costing them an arm and a leg in maintenance and repair due to the building (an old mansion) being in very poor shape, and then Whole Foods bought up a property from a local ethnic 'super' market whose owners were done being in the grocery business. Harvest built out a very fancy new store very close to a major subway/bus terminus that was gorgeous but everyone went to the Whole Foods which was closer to the higher population-dense areas. Location, location, location - but also WF was very stiff competition. I never saw rotten produce. I have no idea what the other commenter is on about. Organic, locally-sourced, heirloom produce often isn't as pretty as the stuff genetically modified or bred to survive being shipped halfway around the world and stored in a warehouse for 6 months.
carride 4y ago
Here are more details are the year before harvest shutdown. Summarized to say that all the unique organic and varieties of healthy food they were once known for, can now be found at most other grocery stores. https://archive.ph/NEc4o https://archive.ph/NEc4o
- carride 4y ago
  This could have been pre-pandemic thinking in 2018
jt2190 4y ago
I mean… Stop and Shop is literally two blocks from where Russo’s was [1] so I’m not sure what relevance Harvest or Market Basket bring to this conversation. (Edit: I’m not trying to be dismissive, but it’s not really clear why these other stores are relevant. Are you suggesting that perhaps labor is being treated better than at the big chains?) Russo’s was definitely a high-end, premium prices place: Fancy imported cheeses, a large bakery, fresh-made pasta, and a large selection of fresh fruit and vegetables. I have no idea if the workers were paid better or treated better than anywhere else. A co-op feels like a different beast altogether, so I’m not sure that the patrons of Russo’s will suddenly just move to shopping there en masse, especially since the market for groceries around here is well served. It really feels like the coop would mostly not be about the food. [1] https://www.google.com/maps/dir/570+Pleasant+St,+Watertown,+MA+02472/Stop+%26+Shop,+Pleasant+Street,+Watertown,+MA/@42.3670568,-71.2128279,16z/data=!4m8!4m7!1m2!1m1!1s0x89e382b97833654b:0x1de8b99ca20d1052!1m2!1m1!1s0x89e382b880c1bf2d:0xcec21ef22f9bc39b!3e2 https://www.google.com/maps/dir/570+Pleasant+St,+Watertown,+...
- neilv 4y ago
  I thought someone who's interested in new co-ops in this area would be interested in the history of a prior co-op that operated in this area. Also, one of the things that the co-op seemed to value was treating workers well, which overlaps with one of my favorite recent stories of people banding together (a little like a co-op), to succeed. And that store is known for better prices than the others, making it more accessible while a certain premium store has been gobbling up other ones, so there's another social justice angle that might be of interest.
forgotmypw17 4y ago
I was able to figure out it's in the Boston area by the 617 area code and the name, but after spending 5 minutes looking for its actual location, I still can't find it. It doesn't seem to be on the website, and it's not on Google Maps either. Does anyone know where this is actually located?
- topaz0 4y ago
  If you go to the FAQ, they say that they are likely several years from opening.

dylan604 4y ago

As a kid, my family was part of a co-op. I grew up in the boonies, and there was one local grocery store that had horrible selection. The larger chains required long drives to get to, but even then they did not have the produce selections that is the norm now. Instead, each weekend a member of the co-op would visit the farmer's market in the Big City. We were no where near the size of the co-op in the TFA, but it made a big difference in the selection of produce we had. Now, that farmer's market is no longer, but now a series of condos with Farmer's Market as part of their name are there. I just never though that a co-op would be a viable thing in 21st century, so it was definitely interesting reading about how that's not the case.

hinkley 4y ago
Ace hardware is technically a co-op, but that would be a surviving one more than one for the 21st century. REI is also a co-op but I couldn’t explain how to save my life. However, Organic Valley definitely is a co-op, and while they started in 1988 they didn’t seem to get serious traction until around 2000, and now they’re everywhere on the west coast, which is not bad for a Midwest company.
- dylan604 4y ago
  Interesting you mention Ace. It is truly one of my favorite places to visit in new cities. No two Ace stores are the same. One in my area focuses on homesteading, and is known as the place to get your baby chicks to start your chicken raising experiment. They also carry other items that are in this line vs just your typical selection of tools and what not. Then another Ace in Flagstaff saved my butt while on a video shoot as they had some items I had never seen in a local Ace, but were the perfect fit for the off the wall rigging I needed. Ace is the place!
  - xsmasher 4y ago
    There's one in Berkeley California with a fully stocked model train department filling 1/4 of the floorspace.

_chap 4y ago

What an incredible legacy you're creating Nick. Keep dropping those breadcrumbs for the rest of us to follow!

debacle 4y ago

There is a local group trying to "disrupt" coops in this way: find members to shell out $$, have a steering committee, do a lot of marketing, all before the coop even has a location in mind. Meanwhile there are actual coops (though they don't call themselves that) with skyrocketing membership who are doing, not planning, and slowly growing to encompass more than just produce. One of them now has a year-round greenhouse. I haven't been impressed by the style of coop the author writes about. It seems like the doers are much more successful. Just this past year a new farmers market started in an urban food desert with two vendors in a church parking lot. Now they are trying to find new space because they have 20+ vendors weekly. To my knowledge, they raised zero dollars to get started.

socialismisok 4y ago
Where do the "doers" get the capital to create greenhouses and raise vegetables?
- phphphphp 4y ago
  Do you need to create greenhouses and raise vegetables from the start? My understanding is that a coop (like any business) is a means to an end and so you can start out by leveraging what is effectively group buying to source high quality fresh produce and then, once established, gradually iterate towards total self reliance. Does that not work for this model?
  - socialismisok 4y ago
    It could, but where do you get the capital to do the group buying? My point is that the parent is likely simply not aware of the organizing that went into creating the group of "doers" they are praising.
    - bombcar 4y ago
      Around here the "doers" (we have farmer's markets and similar) are spouses/children of actual farmers, and even though their main product may be fifty five billion bushels of ethanol wheat, the family grows some crops for personal use, and they have been "roadside standing" the excess for years; the farmers market starts as an extension of that and from there can grow. You'll note that they already were farming for the big players. The other half are often "hobby farm" hobbyists who may or may not grow to be an actual business (there are at least two or three honey providers that have done this around here - starting small and obviously not the primary income to being large enough to have employees).

socialismisok 4y ago

I love this! Thanks for sharing the details. The world needs more co-ops. The US needs to make it easier to incorporate co-ops. As someone who looked into building both a software co-op and a housing co-op, getting the paperwork in order was such a larger hassle than seeing up an LLC.

the_lonely_road 4y ago
What made it a hassle? I abandoned Ember for React even though I liked the former a lot more because the community was tiny meaning there were few resources and it was practically impossible to hire anyone that could hit the ground running. It turned out to be a great decision. I have set up a number of LLCs over the years and it’s dead simple, but I know nothing about setting up a co op. Seems like it shouldn’t be much more difficult except for how rare it is so I’m curious to hear your pain points.
- davidjfelix 4y ago
  It depends a lot on the state that one resides (or incorporates) in. With LLCs they mostly all follow the same pattern and if you're the sole owner they can be done without charter, initial incorporation docs, etc. With coops, some states follow uniform common law LCA (limited cooperative association) laws and allow worker-owned coops pretty easily (although lawyers are generally less familiar as they're rarer). Other states only allow certain kinds of coops and require charters and organizational documents. Basically, any time you involve more than one person, there is some paperwork (LLC or otherwise). Coops have this, plus the added difficulty of not being uniform around the US. Last I looked, Colorado and IL had a lot of coop options to choose from, but nothing was as straight forward as an LLC where you just file 1 notice with the state and pay 100 bucks. LCA states are close, but you still have the "many people" issue.
  - socialismisok 4y ago
    Pretty much this. No one is familiar with any of this stuff, so you have to navigate off the golden path.

brnaftr361 4y ago

I'm kinda curious are there any protections in place to mitigate somebody (ostensibly nefarious) wresting control of the consumer-owner representatives? I know one of the aspects of Mondragon's foundation is that there is zero outside influence and all control is within the shareholders, which are exclusively workers because these sort of buyout risks have actually played out.

bombcar 4y ago
Co-ops themselves usually have a particular setup that's similar to a non-profit (and so they're not really "sellable" but can merge with other co-ops). The "nefarious" entities don't care; they will control the suppliers as that's where the money is made anyway; grocery stores are cost centers. The main protection I'd look for is avoid long-term and exclusive contracts. Anything that prohibits you from sourcing from other suppliers is highly suspect.

dugmartin 4y ago

The article mentions no open food coops in central or eastern Massachusetts but there are quite a few here in western Mass. Not sure why the difference but maybe it’s due to greatly cheaper rent?

tacostakohashi 4y ago
It tends to work in places where a for-profit supermarket would be marginal (at best), but people still need their groceries, fuel, etc.
- bombcar 4y ago
  And look how much the land sold for - $36 million! In rural areas the land is basically free, and even then many of the "for-profit" grocery stores are just family owned businesses that have more in common with a coop than you might expect.
- M2Ys4U 4y ago
  The vast majority of co-ops are for-profit enterprises, so I'm not sure why you'd phrase it like that.
  - tacostakohashi 4y ago
    Because their primary goal is to provide goods and services to their shareholders, rather than profits and dividends.
- bbradley406 4y ago
  I'm not certain that's the biggest reason, I think it's more about the number of local farms, butchers, etc. Middle / upper-middle class health-conscious customers who are passionate about high quality food are a big part of it too, and there's plenty of them in Western MA and close-by NY towns. In GB (Western MA) the co-op competes with two other cheaper supermarkets. What sets them apart is 2 day old (max) Atlantic seafood and local produce that hasn't been subjected to long distance transit (and the flavorless ripening process). Not having the "beige tiles and fluorescent lights" atmosphere is a huge plus as well.

orzig 4y ago

I live in that area and would love to start getting involved. I’ll reach out! Anyone else who’s on the fence about getting involved: If you value building community (even aside from food in specific), your public involvement now will only snowball in impact; strike while the iron is hot!

the-printer 4y ago

This may be an ignorant question. I’m sure I can search for it myself. But the commenters here sound well informed and experienced. Here it goes. I understand the process of establishing the food co-op, but how did they get the food??

qrush 4y ago
Most co-ops pair with local distributors and national ones (the most prominent being National Co-op Grocers - https://ncg.coop https://ncg.coop) to actually get the food, but tons of steps to do before we are ready for this!
- the-printer 4y ago
  Wow. So this is a process. I can understand that when the goal is likely sustainability, scale and longevity. Thank you for sharing this with us.
- kjbreil 4y ago
  Just to clarify NCG is not a distributor but an overarching organization which helps Grocery Co-ops nationwide to run their business. A generally used distributer would be UNFI along with using local distributers.

ricardobeat 4y ago

Can anyone shed more light on why it takes 7-10 years to get to an actual store? In my head you’d start signing up suppliers / farmers, find a suitable place to rent, get some more funding, build out the store, hire, and start it up. What makes it slower than other businesses?

sct202 4y ago
There's a long capital raising period where the co-op will need to raise a substantial amount of capital in the form or preferred shares and owner loans. The co op near me says they need a certain percentage of capital to come from owners in order to secure commercial loans, and they've recently completed raising capital after signing up owners for the last 9 years.
Kalium 4y ago
Coops often find it harder to borrow and they cannot sell equity. This makes the every "get some funding" step harder than it sounds. Going over the list I see a lot of people-organizing and community-outreach efforts. These are definitely going to be more time-intensive than setting up an LLC owned by a single person and running with that.
- luckylion 4y ago
  Why can't they sell equity? I live in a housing coop, and they do sell equity. I own 100 shares.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    The amounts they need are high. They’re trying to get 1000 people to kick in $100 so they can get a multimillion dollar loan. Trying to get that is hard enough, getting them to kick in 3-4K each is nearly impossible, even if you can sell “shares”.
  - Kalium 4y ago
    My apologies, I can see I was not nearly specific enough. In addition to needing to sell a lot of equity to get enough money, coops generally cannot sell equity to outside parties through general-purpose capital markets to raise funds. Living in a housing coop, you can buy shares as a resident-owner. I would guess your coop does not have many investor-owners who own shares while not living in the housing coop. Does this clarify my point for you?

wpietri 4y ago

I love the playbook mentioned here. I think it's part of this library: https://fci.coop/business-development/ https://fci.coop/business-development/ Seems reminiscent to me of the open-source ethos or the (declining?) community spirit in tech startup land. Except where organizations compete directly, collaboration makes a lot of sense.

Semaphor 4y ago

I wish I could follow this, but the blog sadly lacks any (discoverable) RSS feeds. So qrush, any chance of that changing?

qrush 4y ago
Good question. I moved away from Jekyll/GitHub Pages a while back and onto Notion/Super.so. A good feature request, but I'll just post again here next year :)
kthartic 4y ago
Not to be rude, but I don't think I've seen the term "RSS" in over ten years. I'm sure there's probably a niche group of people that still use them (maybe disproportionally higher amongst HN users), but I think OP can be forgiven for not including one.
- Semaphor 4y ago
  Which is the advantage of technologically boring WordPress blogs: They get them by default without the author ever having to worry.
- daxvena 4y ago
  I kind of feel like you're missing out then. I was pretty young when RSS was "popular" and didn't really get into it back then. I started using it in the past couple of years, and I find it's one of the best ways to keep up to date with multiple things I want to follow (without being tied to a specific platform). I would also be pretty surprised if you haven't heard of podcasts in over ten years. I feel like a "podcast" isn't really a podcast if it doesn't have an RSS feed.
  - kthartic 4y ago
    My point wasn't whether or not I like RSS feeds - it was to explain why OP can be forgiven for not wanting to put the effort in creating one. I'm sure they're wonderful.

WaitWaitWha 4y ago

I read the article, but it is not clear what kind of co-op they want to create. Is it a brick & mortar, delivery? Is it making deals with local farmers & homesteads, or buying from large distributors at discount? I have participated in co-ops that were delivery only, local only. It was not always the cheapest, but for planning meals it worked out. The quality was almost always better if I just walked down to the large chain grocery store.

qrush 4y ago
We're definitely aiming towards a brick & mortar - but we are still figuring out distribution and more (and will continue to do so until we're open for business)
- WaitWaitWha 4y ago
  I have also seen co-ops where members could opt to do labour for both membership and food. And, although co-ops on the surface sound democratic, they can never achieve full democratic votes. I have participated with where I get to pick what I wanted from a pre-determined list that I had no immediate input to (the co-op "buyers" were), and I have also seen the list extended to "for the future". There was one where I got what I got, and had zero choice in what was in the basket. There was one where my "basket content" could be exchanged with anyone else within co-op, e.g. I had too much sugar beets and member X had too much kohlrabi. We wanted what the other had, bam! exchange made prior to delivery. This also helped with waste reduction. Good luck!
bombcar 4y ago
So I've seen a couple of different kinds: 1. The one they're working on results in a "grocery store" when done - it's coop run and handles working with distributors, etc. It often ends up "feeling" like a Whole Foods or similar, as the "non-direct" farm products end up sourced from similar distributors. 2. The "farmer's market" type - where you end up with basically a continual farmer's market - this one can grow into being more of a "grocery store" but is often quite limited on the products available; think almost entirely local farm produce and nothing much else. 3. The "community supported agriculture" type - where you pay a flat fee and get a box every week/month/whatever, but don't really have much choice what's in the box. These can be the "closest to the farm" as you're literally getting boxes of whatever they're harvesting. However, they're often only active during harvest periods and you don't control what's in them. The third one is the only one I've seen be consistently higher quality (and if I had to rank them it would go 3,2, 1) because the farmers pick the super ripe stuff for the CSA because they know it will be delivered and eaten in a day, not packed into a truck for travel across the country. You can also end up with strange fruits you've never heard of before, but still exist.

miclill 4y ago

Cool, I've been a member of a Coop for about 10 years now. Website of our Coop (in German): https://foodcoop-karlsruhe.de https://foodcoop-karlsruhe.de

Aachen 4y ago
I had never heard of this concept before seeing this article. Great to hear it's in Germany also! Would you know if there is a list of co-ops in Germany somewhere, to see if there is one closer to me than Karlsruhe?
- Symbiote 4y ago
  Try REWE, the second largest supermarket chain in Germany. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Cooperatives_in_Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Cooperatives_in_Germa... A little north, we have Coop Danmark, also the second-biggest retailer (runs the supermarkets Kvickly, Brugsen, SuperBrugsen, Fakta, Irma).
  - luckylion 4y ago
    ReWe is very different from that though. There are two things named Cooperatives: One is a coop that is owned by those it serves, e.g. a housing coop is owned by those who live in the flats, a food coop is owned by those who buy the food. The other is the coop as a legal form of corporations where you have essentially no difference between a regular corporation, a LLC or a cooperative, and the cooperatives will usually own other entities with different legal forms for actually run the business. ReWe is the latter, and has nothing in common but the name of the legal form with what is discussed here.
- miclill 4y ago
  Yes, look here: https://foodcoopedia.de.fcoop.org/wiki/Hauptseite https://foodcoopedia.de.fcoop.org/wiki/Hauptseite
  - Aachen 4y ago

oldandboring 4y ago

So much enlightening info in these comments about the economics of these stores and the truth behind the sourcing of the food. I've been a co-op member for almost 20 years; back before I had kids and lived really close to the store we used to go there almost every day. The biggest draw was always the quality of the food; the chain stores were only selling conventional and mass-produced products and if you wanted a better and/or local product, the co-op was your place. But then in the mid-2000s we got Whole Foods, Trader Joes, and and an organic/specialty aisle in all the supermarkets. Eventually the organic aisle disappeared and it was just organic products on the regular shelves. When we moved away, our new city also had a co-op but it was a 15+ minute drive from home and there was very little draw for us: it was largely the same products we could get at our local stores, but 20% more expensive. The only reason to go there is if we happen to be in the area and/or if there's something we want that we know they only sell there, but that's no different than the 3 big-chain stores in our town.

smeagull 4y ago
The one thing my local co-op does is being able to buy a random box of seasonal fruit and veg for cheap. That's ended up being cheaper than our supermarket.
- oldandboring 4y ago
  Similar effect as a CSA but you get to choose whether you actually want the stuff and when. Pretty nifty idea.
chiefalchemist 4y ago
> The only reason to go there is if we happen to be in the area and/or if there's something we want that we know they only sell there, but that's no different than the 3 big-chain stores in our town. Actually, there is a difference. The dollars spent at a co-op are far more likely to stay in the local community. On the hand, give it to the big chain, and it's far more like to make it back to HQ (and the shareholders). Not your local community. "Local Dollars, Local Sense" by Michael Shuman was an enlightening read for me. https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/local-dollars-local-sense-how-to-shift-your-money-from-wall-street-to-main-street-and-achieve-real-prosperity--a-resilient-communities-guide_michael-shuman/554683/?resultid=46891659-ddb0-4abc-b99b-f3cc9d6082a5#edition=6535963&idiq=4420833 https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/local-dollars-local-sense-how-...

artec 4y ago

How do you all keep it truly democratic with (eventually) 1000+ owners? Who decides on major decisions like, where it will be built, what funding sources you'll accept, who will do what work etc.

bombcar 4y ago
You can’t keep it “truly democratic” - the owners are basically there to replace the management if they go insane. And coops have been known to explode - usually when they become untenable for the reasons that drove the grocery stores away.
- lambertsimnel 4y ago
  > You can’t keep it “truly democratic” - the owners are basically there to replace the management if they go insane. In a sense, that's true of other kinds of business, which also allow their owners to vote. The difference is that in a coop it's one person one vote, and nobody can be an owner without being a stakeholder of another kind (such as an employee or a customer), whereas in a conventional business there's no reason owners must intersect with other kinds of stakeholders (though there might still be some overlap), and votes don't necessarily have equal value.

Melatonic 4y ago

If you have not checked out a real CSA in your area I highly recommend it (Community Supported Agriculture) - its basically the convenience of a farmers market without you needing to dedicate the time to it. Plus you are getting the absolute freshest produce from a local farm directly. Definitely avoid though the big name giant ones that claim to be a "CSA" but are a giant national org

oldandboring 4y ago
I love the concept of a CSA. We've tried it a few times. It's such a great idea and I want these things to succeed. For us, we canceled after a few weeks each time because the ones we joined were all setup similarly: once every week or so, you get a bag of food, whatever's in season. That leaves us having to figure out what to do with all this stuff we don't normally cook and don't have recipes for, and that the kids aren't used to eating. These are all solvable problems but I guess there was too much friction in adapting our lives to it. I'm not sure if it's actually easier to make shopping lists and drive to the store to buy exactly what we need, but it's what we were used to.
- Melatonic 4y ago
  That is kind of the whole point of a CSA though - you adapt each week or month or whatever. How things used to be basically before the advent of the super grocery store and global supply chain.
  - oldandboring 4y ago
    Right, I know. Wasn't a good fit for us having hectic lives and two little kids. Most of what we received ended up going to waste.
    - Melatonic 4y ago
      I end up fermenting and preserving a lot of stuff I know I will not eat - fun thing probably to do with kids too. Plus it generally makes the stuff you may not like taste way better (assuming you like pickled stuff). Pickled cauliflower or romanesco is amazing for example My problem is they always have too much of a focus on leafy greens which go bad way too quickly - I prefer stuff like Broccoli in general which has a pretty similar nutrient profile and lasts way, way longer.

thinkcontext 4y ago

I belong to 120 person food co-op. Its operated out of the basement of house since the 80s. We're a different model than described here, its a hybrid of a buying club and a grocery store. All of the labor is unpaid, you must be a member to shop, it has limited official open hours but everyone gets a key and can shop themselves whenever they like. Most people pay a 20% markup on goods but people that have extra responsibility pay less.

silexia 4y ago

Most areas don't have co-ops because not many people are willing to do a ton of work and not get any benefits from it. This is why capitalism works so well... Entrepreneurs take a ton of risk and do a ton of work and sometimes get windfall profits from it.

lambertsimnel 4y ago
The big food retail coops in the UK are in most respects supermarkets like any other. The people doing the work get paid, and they're as capitalist as any other business that doesn't list equities on a stock market.

mustafabisic1 4y ago

Oh my, this thread is full of positivity! Cheer y'all.

wonderwonder 4y ago

I don't get it. It said nothing about actually providing food. At what point do people grow or get produce? Also why does race have to be brought into everything? Why have the 8th principal? Looking at your board members all of you are white. All of your support staff is white. Why cant it be just a group of not racist people building a co-op, where all are welcome? Why does everything have to push race? Its exhausting. Don't get me wrong, I think its great you have a goal and are building something to help your community, I just don't understand some of the choices and I mean this in a "trying not to be a jerk" way.

zzzeek 4y ago
this article didn't seem to have anything about "race" in it except for a little box at the bottom. DEI is very important for basically any organization that doesn't want to be known as a bunch of exclusionary jerks. "Race", even though it's a only a social construct with no link to science in any way, is a big deal because people were enslaved for 300 years based on "race". After the Civil War, "race" was still used as an explicit or implicit basis for the next 100+ years to deny rights which continues to this day. So it's been a pretty long, big deal for a huge number of people who have been systematically denied equal status in society for centuries, it's pretty hard for any new endeavor to be equitable without taking an extremely long and hard look at how the endeavor interacts with this massive legacy that US society is only just beginning to attempt to extricate from. For sure it's exhausting. Think how exhausting it must be to be part of a group that's been systematically oppressed and terrorized for hundreds of years. You can choose not to give a shit because it's too "exhausting" to care, but that's not how food coops roll.
- wonderwonder 4y ago
  "DEI is very important for basically any organization that doesn't want to be known as a bunch of exclusionary jerks" exactly my point, now you have to push it or you have to be worried about being automatically labeled racist. How condescending and insulting. "it's pretty hard for any new endeavor to be equitable without taking an extremely long and hard look at how the endeavor interacts with this massive legacy" No, its not. Just welcome all, you don't have to say anything, just be good people. I hear what you are saying but I don't think the answer is to constantly harp on it and I would think make it awkward for people of that race. Hey welcome to the coop, we really support Black people here. Sure they're black but they are people first and I have to think its tiresome from their point of view to constantly be reminded that white people see them as other. Its a superior point of view, look how noble we are, protecting the minorities with our power. I am sure the intent is good but I don't think it has the result that is intended. I have to take 4+ hours of classes this month at my employer to be told that I have to treat minorities well when much like this co-op 95% of leadership is white. Its condescending and I don't just mean to me. Just don't be racist and treat people like people. I guarantee just saying this has as much impact as the 4 hours of classes I have to take and their "8th principal" One of my classes I had to take at a very, very large company told me that if I help out a minority and they get offended to not argue back, but "sit there in my shame". Its reached insanity levels and I think having the opposite effect. At what point does it start driving people that are generally center based politically further to the right. I was surprised as a generally life long liberal when it started to do that to me. I'm not voting for Trump but for the first time in my life I'm likely voting for a Republican governor primarily because of this sort of stuff. Apologies for my rant, I guess it had been on my mind.

georgeoliver 4y ago

I was also somewhat surprised to hear there weren't any grocery co-ops in Eastern/Central Mass (notwithstanding the chain that closed), but it could be the co-op niche (small store, high-quality groceries) is already filled in the area by the many small markets, delis, etc. that have been there for decades.

jefftk 4y ago

It's not clear to me what this co-op is trying to bring to the Boston -area grocery market? What do they want to provide that's missing?