May Newsletter coop 5-3 newsletter
April 6, 2013 Breakfast Event
The April 6th breakfast event was a great success with over 100 people in attendance! We had 16 members become members at the event and three more joined online that same day! We increased our membership to 122. Speakers from Harvest Moon and Eastside Coop shared their stories and committee members provided an update on what we have been doing and our plans moving forward.
We had some local vendors at the event some at our event as follows: Farmers Community Market - Delano, MN, Trumpeter Swan Farm, Three Goats in a Tub, Wooden Shoes, cheese sample from many local farms in MN and WI which were donated by Classic Provisions, Plymouth, MN, Buffalo Rock Winery, Farm-Farm Jimmy Bauman and Heather and Rockford Bike Club.
If you have not joined – now is the time. We need to raise money memberships and through our upcoming financial campaing in order to open our doors.
Free Breakfast
We are hosting a Free Continental Breakfast – Saturday – April 6th 9 a.m. at the Rockford High School. Join us to hear what the committee has been doing since our last event. Visit with some of our members to find out why they decided to join. Without your support our doors will never open!
Join Us for Cooking Class Sponsored by the Crow River Food Co
Update 2-13-13 We are up to 89 members as of today! Kelly Grimm’s face book campaign is working as well as all of the other media we are creating interest and our membership is growing. We are planning to be out about at many upcoming community events reaching out to our future customers and members.
The Crow River Food Co-op currently has 89 members. We need your support in order to make this food co-op a reality. At our last business meeting on January 14th the group discussed how we can spread the word and do more marketing. We have a marketing volunteer that will be meeting with us soon to start a campaign. Kelly Grimm is also starting a face book campaign to gain support by signing up new members. If you want to support your local economy and shop locally for fresh whole foods we you to join us! If you have any questions, please email us as www.crowriverfoodcoop.com We are planning a cooking class, a booth at the community expo, a membership breakfast in April, etc.
A Members “meet and greet” was held on December 29th at the Rockford Mall. It was nice to meet with a few of our members. We sampled some great cheeses from Classic Provisions that we hope to sell in our store. Door prizes were provided by the VanBergens of the Wooden Shoes Farm.
***************************************************************
The food co-op founders have been out in the community talking with our future shoppers. Two of the committee members are at the Bridge Street Cafe in downtown Rockford on Saturday mornings to talk discuss the benefits of a membership and to answer questions. We are currently at 77 members. The co-op also had a booth at the Crow River Christmas on December 1st and sponsored the Chili Contest which was a great success. Many families have expressed interest in joining the co-op. A survey has been posted on the website, and sent out to families with children attending the Rockford School district. The survey will give the committee an idea of what our shoppers want and feel is most important in our future store, so please complete the survey today, it only takes a few minutes of your time.
We have 62 paid Crow River Food Coop members as of Oct. 19th. Remember the $200 is a one time membership fee. If the store never opens people have asked “will I get my money back?” There is a chance that if there are not enough support in the community the doors will never open. In that case the Board of Directors would decide to evenly distribute whatever funds are remaining in the bank back to the members. We are using the money now for promoting and marketing the Crow river food co-op but have been very frugal with the money. Check out our minutes and you will see what the bank balance is at each meeting.
Julie Hinds from Maple Grove, MN provided some great facade designs for the future store. Check them out! Are you ready to start shopping? Purchase a share of the co-op now! Check out the membership page for more information.
CO-OP FACADE’S
Doug White and Nancy Carswell were interviewed on the local Buffalo Radio Station 1360 AM KRWC on Tuesday – Sept. 11th to discuss the Crow River Food Co-op and to promote our Dance Under the Stars membership drive this Saturday.
Members walked in the parade at Rockford River Days and passed out information about the food co-op efforts. There was a great float with some new banners promoting the Crow River Food Co-op.
Members or our committee were out at National Night Out in Rockford and Greenfield. We had many residents stop by our table and pick up membership applications! The children planted a seed in some dirt and took it home to watch it grow.
We were interviewed on July 21st by KARE 11 news if you missed us on the 6 p.m. news check out the KARE 11 website community video’s. The was due to being a recipient of an Allina Healthy Foods Grant we recently received.
The board met with a member from SCORE on June 25th and got some great feedback about the grocery business. We need to make our store unique and specialize in a product that makes us stand out above the rest. Ofcourse, we feel that our customer service is going to above average and will make our customers feel special and welcome.
We were notified that our application for a grant from Allina was approved. This grant money will be used to help us promote the co-op and to gain supportor’s, etc.
The Initiative Foundation awarded the Rockford HRA a grant in the amount of $3,000 to help finance the feasibility study! We have signed an agreement with Keith Wicks and Associates to begin preparing the study on June 7th.
The executive committee met on June 11, 2012 and we adopted our bylaws. The membership brochures along with a letter will be mailed out to all of the supporters that have signed up.
