Co-op Expansions Raise the Bar
By Bill Gessner, Patricia Cumbie 121 November - December - 2005 Every expansion is unique in some respect, but the universal truth is that building a larger facility includes taking on a bigger role in [...]
Case Study: Strategic Growth by Acquisition
LaMontañita Co-op Food Market Founded: 1976 Members: 12,000 Number of Locations: 4 (Albuquerque, Gallup, Santa Fe) Number of Staff: 200 You don’t have to travel far on the sun-baked streets of Albuquerque, New Mexico, to [...]
Avoiding Post-Expansion Burnout: The board of directors’ role
By Bill Gessner 120 September - October - 2005 More than half of our food co-ops have engaged in planning and implementing an expansion project during the past three years. As demanding as these projects [...]
20 Years of CDS Highlights
The Common Cooperative Financial Statements (CoCoFiSt) program allows food co-ops to compare data and create best practices for a wide range of operational functions. The Food Co-op 500 (later renamed Food Co-op Initiative) program is [...]
Democracy in Cooperatives
By Michael Healy 118 May - June - 2005 Alexis de Tocqueville, in the first half of the 19th century, visited our still-wet-behind-the-ears nation and penned his famous treatise Democracy in America. In this book, [...]
Co-op as Store Becomes Co-op as Community
By Mark Goehring 117 March - April - 2005 We can no longer (verb)_____ in isolation. Try these verbs: Learn. Vision. Plan. Invest. Be. Then try your own! Nearly three years ago, the board of [...]
The Spirit of Generosity: Co-ops need to plant and nourish the seeds of future cooperation
By Bill Gessner 111 March - April - 2004 The collective progress in collaboration that the food co-op sector has achieved over the past decade has been significant and inspiring. “Cooperation among cooperatives,” through the [...]
Empowerment + Accountability = Success (and Fun)
In mission-based organizations like co-ops, the empowerment of individuals and groups is highly valued. For groups carrying out projects in such associations, organizational process is often as important as the outcome. Ideally, the co-op’s development [...]
The Ownership Toolbox
by Karen Zimbelman and Marilyn Scholl A Tool for Building Strong Co-op Membership Programs Any store can provide natural foods—just like any financial institution can provide checking accounts. Therefore, for a co-op, a strong supportive [...]