Starting a food co-op: Year 1
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.