Hello! I’m Marian Kuper, the newest board member on the RCCM board.
It was a no-brainer for me to decide to apply for a board position. The combination of a board vacancy and the board treasurer stepping down, plus my own background with several food co-ops and co-operatively-run food buying clubs, and finally my work history in accounting — all these made for an easy decision.
But the main thing is this, and here’s where I align completely with all of you: I really, really want there to be a storefront food co-op in our community, again. (We had one in downtown Cedar Falls 40-50 years ago!)
Iowa City/Cedar Rapids has New Pioneer Food Co-op, now with 3 locations. Ames has Wheatsfield Co-op Grocery. Decorah has Oneota Community Food Co-operative. Even Des Moines has a relatively new storefront food co-op – the Iowa Food Co-op – and while it’s not open every day, it just keeps getting better.
Iowa was the birthplace of two major co-operative food distributors – Frontier Co-op and Blooming Prairie Co-operative – which did business across the country. Frontier is still going strong. Like all of the co-ops I’ve mentioned so far, these got their start in the 1960s or 1970s. They, and thousands of other co-ops like them, all over this nation, were part of the food co-op “New Wave.”
While food co-ops had existed since the 1930s, New Wave co-ops were different. They focused on natural and organic foods, the connections between food and health, the fostering of strong communities and the value of member-ownership. And they grew, both in size and in number, attracting millions of customers. Millions of owners!
The commercial food industry noticed. Its chains started to compete for those same customers, and that competition, plus other economic factors, caused numerous food co-ops – like the Cotton Top in downtown Cedar Falls – to close their doors.
But a good number of storefront food co-ops survived those lean years, and learned new ways to thrive. Same goes for the co-operative movement in general. Today, there are co-operatively run groups of financial and business professionals who are devoted to making sure that every new start-up food co-op client — like us, and at least a hundred others across the United States — gets going on a rock-solid financial foundation so that it can not only start strong, but continue to thrive, and grow, for many, many years.
What our food co-op needs right now is a site. We’re looking closely at two sites, as we speak. One in particular. And that one, we feel right now, would be fantastic. We’re too early in this process to even talk about it. Confidentiality is paramount. But believe me, it’s super-exciting to be on the RCCM board right now.
We on the board absolutely want nothing more than to create a Rooted Carrot Market Co-operative storefront in Cedar Falls that is as strong, vibrant, thriving and capable of growth as possible. That’s why we on the board are laying the groundwork in such a careful, deliberate way.
Bear with us. Where there’s a will, there’s a way. Stay tuned!
Marian Kuper
Board Treasurer