Running a business with 8,000 of your neighbors might sound like an impossible task, but for the Long Beach Grocery Co-op, it’s a goal they inch toward each day.
The cooperative has been stewing for over a decade, but has gained momentum over the last couple of years (currently nearing 1,000 owners) all with the same goal: to build a community grocery store stocked by local farmers, artisans and cooks. This year-round farmer’s market will boast only healthy, local produce grown by people in and around Long Beach, a few necessities from fair trade farmers, as well as salsas, sauces and more whipped up by home cooks — no big corporation logo in sight.
“We are literally a bunch of neighbors, friends, colleagues and strangers that just happen to live in the same city and all want the same thing,” said Dodie Reddington, vice president of the Long Beach Grocery Co-op. “It’s a long journey, but we’re going to get there because of that common denominator. We all believe in the same thing and we want to build it together.”
Grocery co-ops in the United States, a part of the earliest documented mutual aid groups, date back to the Free African Society, formed in 1787 by Black residents to aid people newly freed from slavery. In the 1800s, white and Black farmers created separate farmer co-ops to make joint purchases of tools, feed and equipment. It wasn’t until the 1900s that modern grocery co-ops saw a lasting impact…