NYT: Food Co-op Exile's Story Demands 2,000 Words
Comrades, a new bar has just been set for Park Slope Food Co-op navel gazing: “For such a scrutinized institution, little public attention is paid to people like me—co-op failures and near-failures who have struggled to stay in good standing and have stumbled in the cramped aisles. Like every other aspect of the much-loved and…
Comrades, a new bar has just been set for Park Slope Food Co-op navel gazing: “For such a scrutinized institution, little public attention is paid to people like me—co-op failures and near-failures who have struggled to stay in good standing and have stumbled in the cramped aisles. Like every other aspect of the much-loved and much-hated co-op, the topic of members in trouble draws a bushel of opinions. An organic bushel, of course…The co-op, a place that raises aspirations for society, makes us raise aspirations for ourselves. I am still suspended, but imagine myself someday returning and remaining in good standing. Nostalgically, I envision old friends and former roommates in the aisles, examining the white nectarines. But I wonder: couldn’t it be a little mellower?” —Flunking Out at the Food Co-op
Photo by Betty Blade.
Dreamking — they have cart walkers anyway, so delivery shouldn’t be a problem. I’m sure the “pay not to work” is counter to their ethos, but using the labor to be “shoppers” like Fresh Direct makes A LOT of sense. Place an order online, the member “shopper” can call you if there’s a problem with the order (out of stock, etc.), and have your groceries show up at your door in a few hours. They must have inventory control and such already, right? So that’s linked to the web.
Not rocket science… though, actually, which is harder? Rocket science or computer science?
dreamking, it’s obviously not run/managed by anyone who gives an ounce about making any money. Don’t expect any rational decisions to be made.
BSD — it’s not negative reinforcement. It’s *punishment* to be precise. It’s a negative condition is introduced or experienced as a consequence of the behavior. It weakens the behavior of *missing* your shift, but doesn’t reinforce the going to your shift.
Also, since there are 33+ workers per hour… does that include 2:00pm on Wednesday and 10:30am on Friday? Are all members also required to have “flex time” at work? Or is the reality that mid-day it is all real employees and in the evenings and weekends there are actually more like 60+ members standing around with their thumbs up their butts?
Did anyone catch the ‘makeup’ terms? Talk about freakin’ predatory penalties. It’s like they’re designed to get people out of circulation. Miss 2 sessions and you start falling into a black hole of hours owed. They really should change this regressive, punitive approach. It indirectly pegs labor at a certain rate to start, and devalues that rate for anyone who defaults. It’s as if they counting on defaults and make-up work at some point in the past, as a buffer to ensure the time-sensitive work would always be done. Nowadays, there’s too much labor going around but the mechanism for an old problem is still in place. (I’d love to see their stats on how many hours are done as a result of penalties.)
If they’re overstaffed, there are TONS of things they can do reduce the ambient tension.
Start offering to have 20% of the membership pay a premium to not work. Pay a $400 annual premium to not work. Offer it to members in order of membership seniority, until you hit the 20% mark. They’d be making 1.2 million more a year, and reduce the overall labor pool at the same time. Use that money for a pool to either improve the store or buy/lease new real estate. Adjust the numbers accordingly, to ensure the labor requirements are being met.
Or make it a temporary event, for the specific purpose of amassing the capital to purchase larger property (or expand/improve the existing building).
Put all this scheduling nonsense online. No way at all they couldn’t find a developer who’d devote their time to an online scheduling system – you could probably get people to do it using their hours, as a special project. All these horrible interactions, on the basis of written documentation or spoken conversations, creates bottlenecks and guarantees frustration on a larger scale than necessary.
There would be fewer people in the stores if online orders could be submitted, fulfilled with all this extra labor, and bagged for pickup. Payments could be done online to ensure food doesn’t go to waste. Disabled or senior citizens within a certain range might be able to get home bike delivery.
An excess of cheap labor isn’t anything to be sneezed at, or wasted.
For most co-op members, it isn’t solely about the great prices, fresh (mostly local and organic) produce, and good selection of natural foods, it’s also about the camaraderie that comes from the experience of knowing that you and all of your fellow-members, who come from all walks of life, are treated identically, and that you are all working together to support the organization. Too crunchy granola for you? Don’t join. Seriously, everything in life isn’t about money.
That’s what bugs me, tyber. They can’t possibly use 33 workers every hour, but everyone has to do a shift as a matter of their wacky, outdated principles. I’m sure they could get away with one shift per household, or shifts every other month, but that doesn’t seem to be on the table.
I love the Flatbush food Co-op because I can shop there without having to work there.
In your face, Slopers!
75 BUCKS AN HOUR!
haha
lala land.
its a fucking grocery store. They wouldn’t pay you 8 bucks an hour if you knew everything there was to know about onions. Don’t expect your stupid inflated income to translate.
“I had no idea that missing shifts added to your work hours, though. That is insane.”
Correction: your work hours don’t increase. If you miss your shift, you have to do 2 shifts to make it up. Reasonable because if you only just had to make 1 shift up some other time, you’d have no incentive to go to your regular shift if you didn’t feel like it. You’d just go whenever you pleased. Thus, 2 makeups forces you to actually show up when you’re supposed to. (negative reinforcement)