Salt Lake City's first member-owned grocery store set to open this fall

Fox 13 Salt Lake City ^ | Averie Klonowski

[Dilbert San Diego]

Is this what the socialist mayor candidate in NewYork wants to do?

But can a govt run store work like these privately owned co-ops? That’s a key issue.

[lastchance]

Not at all.

[Persevero]

Perhaps the future of groceries

In our shoplifting is allowed world

[bobbo666]

Imagine an HOA in charge of your food.

Jokes aside, co-ops can work. Just like unions can work. But, not one minute after you hire a big staff and prevent members from seeing the books.

Trust, but verify.

[TheDon]

Thanks. Sounds like a good possibility. I’ve heard grocery stores have rather low margins. However I wish them luck. I’m not much of a fan of large corporations being in charge of everything. Local control sounds good.

[TheDon]

Thanks for sharing. Encouraging news.

[TheDon]

“I encourage all self-supporting co-ops. I’m used to seeing them in our local agriculture sector, but any time people come together with their own money and time to do their own thing, I believe that is a benefit to civil society.”

Agreed.

[TheDon]

Perhaps more of a AAA model?

[TheDon]

Thanks for sharing the positive experience.

[nitzy]

But, not one minute after you hire a big staff and prevent members from seeing the books.

This is why credit unions have the members elect the board and the board hire the executives.

[AppyPappy]

We had one in Greensboro NC. Hippie grocery

[Retrofitted]

The members of the community who can afford the $300+ “lifetime membership” fee.

Pass.

[nitzy]

I’ve heard grocery stores have rather low margins. However I wish them luck.

In a co-op, there really isn't a "margin" in the sense of "profit". Sure you want to put away money to save for future improvements, maintenance, growth, rainy days, etc.... but there is no "profit". They are non-profit entities.

Any margin (above the things I just mentioned) would get put back into the organization through lower prices, capital improvements, higher wages for staff, etc...

One thing I can see right away that would be a benefit is the lack of a need for so much security. Requiring membership would make it more like a private club and the membership could be revoked at any time for any reason. This would keep a lot of the riff raff out and decrease the need for so much loss prevention, which I know is only getting worse in all retail environments.

[FoxInSocks]

We have a co-op in town that opened a couple years ago. All are welcome, members get a discount daily. Military and first responders get a discount once a week. Membership is free. It still has small-town feel, because it’s a small town. It’s mostly good-quality items, a little more expensive than the usual grocery stores — which are all 10 to 25 minutes away.

[Bigg Red]

Mikre-Ab Abera

hmmmmm....

[Montana_Sam]

As a kid growing up in rural Montana, co-ops were the ‘go to’ place for everything from fencing and tools and fertilizer to feed to clothes. Generally, there was a small dividend to the members each year, altho occasionally the ‘profit’ would be plowed back into investing in infrasture upgrades or new lines of merch.
Co-ops work well until the communists get control. And even back in then (in the 1950s and ‘60s), the Democrats were the home for such broken thinkers. And it only takes one such to poison the pot.
But the co-op concept works great in stratified communities where the farmers and ranchers and trades-folk were of one predominant religious vein (Lutheran, in the case to which I’m referring.) My folks were Catholic, but got along fine with the co-op community.