I am a member of a co-op. I strongly believe in the mission, however, it is not affordable for families. Maybe if we prioritized less speciality foods and had more members we could bring costs down, but it is truly a struggle in balancing supporting the community and staying open.
My co-op tries to balance this by incentivizing donating to the local food banks, both in product and monetary donations, but it is a real struggle.
All that being said, since the price fixing began, health food is no longer that much more expensive.
Member co-op grocery stores used to be cheaper than the private, corporate stores, but they came with that barrier to entry that kept many people away. And the corporate stores continued to build capital, so they could afford better locations, more convenient parking, etc. Now, co-ops are niche, and need to operate as specialty stores because they were squeezed out of the market.
We could have affordable grocery co-ops again, but it would take a lot of blood, sweat, and tears at this point.
I personally would like to hear Bob Loblaw’s take on the situation…
I do all my product sampling in Loblaws, then go elsewhere to buy it if it tastes good.
Fuck Loblaws they left my country 30 years ago and didn’t demolish the building
Wish it was seeing more success where I work. Then again, I have batshit coworkers calling the boycott “Dumb”, that Loblaws “Is the cheapest place”, and think a successful boycott would “Cost jobs” (we’re fucking union no it won’t), so maybe it is being effective and I just hear the negativity from coworkers able to buy stock shares because of working here out of boredom rather than need
Lol. Out of curiosity, are you hearing this from management, or from staff on the floor?
If prices are so high that a store inspires a unified national boycott, jobs loss (if it happens) can actually be blamed directly on the prices!
Staff on floor. Who are also unionized. It’s like, shut up you elderly bag you clearly are not doing this because you have to and as such can afford the stock buy in program and not need to choose between eating and rent
At least some other coworkers are sane and agree with the boycott
Lol, loblaws is cheapest. Your coworkers need to check out other grocers. We have some Asian and Indian grocers, and prices on produce , and staple items (potatoes, rice, lentils, etc) is always half of what our Superstore charges.
