General Manager’s Blog

by Kenna S. Eaton

Each month, I report to the board on how we are progressing on our long-term goals, which we call our Ends. These Ends reflect our aspirations—what we want to accomplish—and they are what makes us different from a regular grocery store. We publish these reports as a blog to keep our member-owners up to date on what we are doing.

The reports are organized by our five Ends, although not all are discussed in every report. Our Ends say that, as a result of all we do—

- Our community is well-served by a strong cooperative grocery store, integral to the lives of our customers, our farmers, and our producers.

- Our community has a resilient local and regional food economy, supported by our Co-op and our community partners.

- Our staff and board have the knowledge, skills, and passion to make our cooperative thrive.

- Our members and customers are proud to shop at a local cooperative grocery that is working to reduce its impact on the environment.

- Our community is informed, engaged, and empowered to join us in making a difference.

October General Manager’s Report

Working Together to Nourish our Community

Market Relevance

Sales are still meeting budget, even as we continue to struggle with supply-chain disruptions, including depressed orders from UNFI as well as continued out-of-stocks on pantry basics. This month it was distilled water. We have not had any order caps imposed on paper goods as yet, although other stores are beginning to have purchase limits.

Co-op Basics update – We have two new Field Day products: organic all-purpose flour and organic canned pumpkin. We will have several other Field Day baking items coming in October. Niman Ranch is not able to continue offering Co-op Basics pricing on the 13 pork products that we stock. Some Thousand Hills products will continue as Co-op Basics but will have price increases. These changes will be made in early October.

Food System Development

September is EAT LOCAL MONTH and we are bursting with local produce, including eight varieties of just-harvested winter squash! We’ve updated some of the large vendor photos in the store as well as the “Local” signage at the shelves.

We have two new Local 5 vendors – Holy Shiitake Fungi Farm and Echoes Brewing from Poulsbo. Holy Shiitake, based in Chimacum, supplies us with fresh shiitake mushrooms. They plan to become certified organic next year.

We brought in Local WA Hempler ground pork to fill the production gap from Niman Ranch. Look for local seasonal items in the store in most departments.

Thriving Workplace

News broke in mid-September of a federally-mandated vaccine requirement for all businesses with over 100 employees, which we believe includes the Co-op. At this time, we are still waiting for clarifying information to help direct how this will be implemented.

Environmental Sustainability

Earlier this month, the city replaced our water meter, so our water usage as tracked by the city may change quite a bit.

Custom Pure, our long-time filtered water vendor, has changed ownership. The company will continue to be based in Seattle. We are in the process of figuring out the timing of our service.

Our deli is beginning to package fresh soup in glass canning jars again. We hope to have soups available this way regularly. We ordered quite a lot of jars to have on hand before we began, but the supply of jars is still sporadic. As with some other preordered items, our pallets of canning jars never materialized this summer. Remember, you can bring the jars back and we’ll sterilize them and use them again.

Outreach

We have been collaborating with other great organizations to get the word out about eating local. Other sponsorships this month include an in-person Jefferson County Farm Tour and the virtual PT Film Festival.