Park Slope Co-op Brings Home the Bacon
“Founded in 1973, the Park Slope co-op has grown so dramatically in recent years that it has been forced to limit the number of new members. Its balance sheet is so strong—the co-op paid off its mortgage in January—that general manager and founding member Joe Holtz wonders what to do with more than $500,000 in…
“Founded in 1973, the Park Slope co-op has grown so dramatically in recent years that it has been forced to limit the number of new members. Its balance sheet is so strong—the co-op paid off its mortgage in January—that general manager and founding member Joe Holtz wonders what to do with more than $500,000 in profits. Last year’s revenues were $39 million. If we continue to accumulate cash like this, he says, we’ll have to have a meeting and maybe lower our prices again. — Crain’s
Photo by Peffs
There is more “meaning” to raising your own food than shopping. Maybe Fresh Direct should consider an old-fashioned system of dray horses and ice houses. They could cook the manure and give it out to people with gardens.
“It’s not the delivery, per-se that’s evil (although seems like a perfect deployment for CNG vehicles); it’s the notion that people have structured their life in such a de-humanized way that they derive no meaning (or insufficient meaning) in shopping for food, and all that entails.”
I used FreshDirect in the past and joined the co-op earlier this year, but am wondering how ordering from FreshDirect somehow makes someone a lesser person. Why are groceries any different from ordering pizza from Pino’s or books from Amazon?
I have a hard time understanding why people hate the Park Slope Food Coop. All kinds of terrible things go on in the world and someone’s bothering to hate . . . a successful grocery store. That from everything I can tell treats its vendors and employees pretty well and gives a healthy amount of resources to helping feed homeless people.
Weird.
Brooklyngreen:… your perspective is just that: “your perspective”…eh? as opposed to what? of COURSE it’s my opinion, your making a dismissive statement does not invalidate it. Talk about a sideways ad-hominem attack.
Just on this thread, there’s been the “if you don’t like it shop elsewhere” comment…also one thrown at me by my neighbor who’s got a 2-digit Co-op number (ie he’s been there a LONG time). What normal place elicits that kind of response to criticism? Thin-skinned, would you say?
Using Nazi in this context is tongue-in-cheek; over the top maybe but, stop being so PC. It fits. I’ve been in meetings where ‘rules’ were pointed out to me as if I were a kindergartner (I wrote a nasty letter to the LWG about it and to their credit they published it); I’ve been told I can’t shop while on duty even when there’s nothing to do (my normal ‘squad leader’ allowed it, this was a makeup); I’ve seen so many people with nothing to do; I’ve seen make-work to compenste for above.
Sorry, it’s a rule-bound mishmash there. Who in their right fx89ing minds has a Committee to make sure shoppers are not racially insensitive? Or has a “Disciplinary Committee”? Or wants to check your card at checkout again even though you couldn’t get it without it…even if you snuck in, you’re paying for the frigging goods anyway, so how does it matter?
It’s not the delivery, per-se that’s evil (although seems like a perfect deployment for CNG vehicles); it’s the notion that people have structured their life in such a de-humanized way that they derive no meaning (or insufficient meaning) in shopping for food, and all that entails.
I think Fresh Direct is evil. It just is. It strikes me as 1/2 to some dystopian future from some science fiction book.
BroolkynCouch,
You wouldn’t be the only one.
Heather, please don’t order from Flesh Direct. I’m sick and tired of them spewing incredibly hideous diesel fumes into the streets, idling forever with the fumes and their incredibly loud compressors AND, I should point out, bringing this kind of truck traffic into the neighborhood at 11PM. I’ll wonder “What in Heck is THAT NOISE?!” run to the window and see that orange and white truck idling out front for 15 minutes at 11:30PM…idling so loud the windows shake.
It’s one thing driving your groceries home in a car or having them delivered in a van. It’s quite another to have a big, powerful diesel truck making all sorts of micro-deliveries and using even more fuel to refrigerate everything from meat to toilet paper. It just doesn’t make sense.
Frankly, it would be great if someone could do a full study on the amount of fossil fuel used to get 100 calories of food to you via Flesh Direct as opposed to a “regular” supermarket that has to heat, cool and light retail space.
I defer to all of you who will be, no doubt, checking in with this thread after dinner is over…
I may finally join. But I will not admit I am a Republican. No one will know. Except maybe in 2012 when they see my Mitt Romney For President Sweatshirt.
Well, what can I say? I love shopping at the coop!
Now, Heather, please get a little bit of a grip. Even “old†ladies shop at the coop and manage to get home to Fort Greene. I use a “granny cart” most of the time… I’m starting to hate that term. 🙂 Expansion is a huge financial undertaking. If you would like to write a check for a couple of million to underwrite it (and you’ll get your money back at very decent interest by the way), please do. Or, as someone above suggested, get involved in the Greene Hill Coop that some of us are working on in Fort Greene.
People, there is no “entrenched board†at the PSFC. There are old-timers, yes. And as someone else pointed out, the PSFC is working with, offering resources, and mentoring start-up coops around the city. Sure…maybe I’d love a “branch†of the PSFC in Fort Greene, but I have a feeling it would not be as well-stocked and I’d still have to go to Union Street. Who knows, maybe, once established the Greene Hill Coop will be able to co-buy inventory with the PSFC.
Also, Everyone, the PSFC is instrumental working on hunger and nutrition in Brooklyn. The extremely successful Brooklyn Food Conference last year, the side conferences in Fort Greene and other things sponsored throughout the year under the auspices of the Brooklyn Food Coalition and this year’s conference are heavily worked on by the staff and members of the Park Slope Food Coop.
CMU, I have to say it sounds a bit like your perspective is just that: “your perspective”. I have seen many (20 and 30-somethings…most young men) who are not self-starters who mope around sometimes either admitting they don’t know what they can do or out-and-out “faking” work while texting, listening to their iPoops, etc.
Rob, as I have suggested in the past, you really should join. I think you might meet some people right up your alley. The coop is NOT a hippie hangout. HHhh… It’s a real meet-n-greet. And it is certainly not does not smell moldy–far from it. I’ve rarely if EVER been able to buy such consistently fresh food in NYC.
Look. For many of us it is destination shopping. It makes sure I actually have to WALK somewhere! I like the exercise and I love the place–where all sorts of different people can interact. It’s one of the few places like it, if not the only place like it, in the US at this point…sad to say.
The reference to a party in Germany in the 1930-40s is unacceptable. We have been members for years and never felt any of the criticism it appears non-members are hurling at the coop. This is NOT, and I repeat, NOT some rules-crazy place. We follow hygiene and good practice rules, rules of democratic procedure, rules of politesse and getting along with each other. Maybe I simply love rules so much I can’t see what you’re all talking about. But frankly, I’ve never felt there are burdensome rules. I shop, I participate, I find all sorts of great food and other products, I connect with people while shopping doing my 2hr 45 min shift once a month and go to many of the interesting extracurricular vents organized by or that are simply hosted in the big meeting room.
Cooking classes? Health classes? Free daycare for your tots while you shop? Good food at a reasonable price? Local produce? A cross-section of Brooklyn? Exposure to many people I might never interact with at work or at home?