Good stories often start in the middle of the action. That’s where the good research you can use to build sales starts, too. Getting data on your current customers always starts with one primary activity: their shopping habits in your store. With that information you can validate your hunches and learn many things you didn’t know about your customers. As retailers look at ways [...]
We hear a lot about “hope” and “change” these days, but how does our vision compare with the kind of lasting change brought about by the humble men and women of Rochdale, England, a century and a half ago? For the Rochdale Pioneers, the founders of our modern cooperative movement, cooperation gave them real tools to change a dire economic situation. Beset by indebtedness, [...]
By Marilyn Scholl 130 May - June - 2007 Boards of directors are the critical link between owners and management in the accountability chain for a cooperative. If boards don’t have a good understanding of how accountability works or don’t have good systems for accomplishing it, the job can be frustrating. Accountability mirrors empowerment To begin, we must recognize that accountability and empowerment go [...]
By Mark Goehring 123 March - April - 2006 There is a fifth dimension beyond that which is commonly known to directors and managers. It is a dimension open to interpretation—potentially as vast as space and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between too much and too little, between knowing and doing, and it lies between the pit of a director’s [...]
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 membership is the key to success. Without it, a co-op is just another store that has to compete on price, product, or service alone. Ownership by the consumer-users distinguishes [...]
By Marilyn Scholl 102 September - October - 2002 Long before "just do it" became part of the American lexicon, the teenaged Homer Hickam, inspired by the launch of Sputnik in 1957 and fueled by a desire to beat the Russians at the space race, decided he also needed to launch a rocket. Never mind that he was a naive kid living in a [...]
By Jeanie Wells, Nancy O'Connor 096 September - October - 2001 When you last read about Community Mercantile Co-op in Lawrence, Kansas, we had just barely survived Wild Oats coming to town. The article in the May-June 1997 edition of Cooperative Grocer chronicles our struggle ending with the closure of Wild Oats. After being profitable for only the past few years, how did we [...]
By Marilyn Scholl, Carolee Colter 088 May - June - 2000 What we love most about co-ops is the emphasis on people. Food co-ops are businesses that operate on a human scale, valuing individual voices--whether it be the democratic aspect of choosing leaders, the ongoing dialogue with customers through comment boards, or staff involvement in key decisions. In cooperatives, people are valued. What drives [...]
By Marilyn Scholl 084 September - October - 1999 The relationship between the board and the general manager is probably the most important relationship in a co-op. To be successful, a cooperative needs a strong manager AND a strong board AND a strong, effective relationship between the two. In 22 years of working for and with food co-ops, I have seen too many examples [...]
By David Fowle, Marilyn Scholl 083 July - August - 1999 Do the following statements or situations sound familiar in our cooperatives? "The co-op shouldn't carry (X), because these products are not natural." "This is a co-op, so all the members should have a voice in operational decisions -- otherwise I may as well shop down the block." "This decision is too controversial, so [...]
