Friends and Farmers Cooperative Meet and Greet Dec 10

Posted by Jamie Oberdick on 12/04, 2013 at 08:29 AM

Friends and Farmers board members and volunteers will be mingling with the crowd available to answer questions about the co-op’s progress so far and what comes next. We are also inviting farmers, local business owners, and community leaders to attend to discuss how they can fit into the larger scheme of this community owned grocery store. It should be a great networking opportunity for those who want to get involved in the growing local foods movement. Due to limited capacity at the Nittany Lion Inn, we are asking that guests rsvp here:  http://www.evite.com/event/02B6Y6GD6TZX2EEMAEPDKY2G7IA25A.

Over the last two years, the co-op has made a lot of progress. From the very beginning we have sought the advice from existing successful cooperatives and have been using well researched steps laid out by the Cooperative Initiative to guide us in our planning. We incorporated in the spring on 2013 and have made many public appearances at community events, promoting our mission and vision, recruiting volunteers, and spreading the word. We have a mailing list of over 800 individuals and have been active sharing our successes and stories in social media and on our website: www.friendsandfarmers.coop. You can learn more about our mission on the site and there’s a lot of good info in the “how it works” section under the about tab.

We plan to kick off out membership drive in early 2014 with a big community event the first week in March. Becoming a member of the cooperative means becoming an owner. A member-owner investment will cost $300. This amount can be paid in full or paid into smaller installments. We plan to give special recognition to our “founding members” who invest in full during the first month of our membership drive. Once we reach 250 members, we will hold elections for a board of directors to replace our interim board. At the milestone of 800 members, we will be able to hire a general manager. We plan to host special events to bring community members together around food and local food related topics throughout our campaign.

We are looking for folks to help out with our membership committee. People who like to talk to others about local foods would be a great fit. We are also looking for folks who like to write about food, farms, or cooking to contribute to our blog. We can be contacted at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

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