Why our Warehouse/Software 
Capital Campaign is Important.

Here’s the story of the modern American supermarket system:

• Mystery meat,
• Commodified produce drenched in poisonous herbicides and pesticides,
• Genetically modified organisms,
• Rural economic decline,
• Consolidation of the food business,
• Animal cruelty,
• Disappearance – extinction! – of heritage varieties of livestock, poultry, and vegetables.

This is what your supermarket dollar buys.

If the robot from Lost in Space was around, he would be hollering "Warning – Warning – Danger – Danger".

The Oklahoma Food Cooperative story is different –

• Family farms,
• Rural economic development,
• Empowered customers,
• Production that preserves nature,
• Voluntary cooperation,
• Re-weaving rural-urban links,
• Preservation of heritage breeds and varieties.

See what your grocery dollar buys at the Oklahoma Food Cooperative? All this, and great tasting, healthy and nutritious food too! Is this a deal or what?

We can and are changing the face of the grocery business in Oklahoma one kitchen and one farm, one carrot and one pound of ground meat at a time.

At the coop, it is easier to make good choices about your food –

• Choices that bless and heal the natural environment,
• Decisions that do not poison ourselves and our children and pollute the earth that gives us sustenance,
• Asystem that brings great tasting and healthy foods from our family farms to our family tables.

Yes, our story and our operations are a bit creaky at times. Nobody knows that better than I, because sooner or later, nearly every complaint finds its way to my inbox or telephone.

We are not a story of perfect people who never make a mistake. We are a true and authentic tale of people voluntarily cooperating to do the best we can, with what we have, where we are.

We are a story in major growth mode. For the past three years, our gross revenues increased more than 100%, and we are on target to repeat that performance in 2007.

As the revenues grow, so does the work. Some of us are thinking that the work is increasing faster than the revenues, as we try to manage the increasing complexity and scope of our business. It’s kind of like herding cats for the most part.

The food coop doesn’t happen by magic. It takes work and much of that work is manual labor – loading/unloading/hauling ice chests, setting up and taking down tables, cleaning and sanitizing ice chests, and cleaning up afterwards.

The situation is complicated by the fact that our delivery day is a work day and much of the work is done during regular business hours. The pool of potential volunteers able and willing to come at 8 AM on what for them is a work day is small, mostly because of the date and time issue..

And so it comes to pass – we are on the verge of a significant progression in our journey to create a local food system in Oklahoma that is –

•  economically viable,
• environmentally sustainable,
• and socially just.

Now is the time for a place of our own.

We found a unique place and are negotiating a very favorable five year lease for the cooperative. It is large enough (12,000 square feet) to accommodate expansion and cheap enough to be affordable ($200/month rent for the first year).

The "catch"is -- we need to do renovations up front, in exchange for much lower monthly rental payments over the five years of the lease. The building is fixer-upper that we can add major value to with investments of cash and sweat equity. Just as with lunches, "There Is No Such Thing As A Free Warehouse" –

•  The roof leaks,
• The wiring needs replacing,
• Equipment must be bought,
• The place needs a good cleaning and a coat of paint,
• There is general patching and repair needed here and there,
• There is trash and scrap and the place needs a good general cleaning.
• And we need to do some major work on our software.

All of this adds up to about $30,000. It may be more ("everything always costs more and takes longer"). We are not broke, we have working capital from the sale of membership shares, but we need that working capital to pay the producers on delivery day. And we have spent some of that money over the last 3-1/2 years on capital expenses – ice chests, software development, and some operating expenses.

In our quest to keep things affordable, we under-estimated the coop charges for producers and customers, and thus had to dip into the share revenue for monthly operating expenses. We solved that problem. In April, our monthly operating deficit narrowed to almost nothing and when the May-July statements are in, I am thinking we will have wiped out the operating deficit entirely.

Renting a warehouse eliminates a THOUSAND DOLLARS of monthly operating expenses.

•  Rental of tables – $560/month, GONE!
• Rental of storage unit – $90/month, GONE!
• Large U-haul truck to haul and store ice chests – $340/month, GONE!

It adds $200/rent for the first year, plus utilities, but any way you look at it, we are ahead on the deal.

• A warehouse will make the monthly work of the cooperative easier to complete.
• We can move some of the critical delivery day work to the previous or the following Saturday.
• More members will be able to help.
• On the Saturday before delivery day, we could do the set up – ice chests, freezers and refrigerators washed and sanitized, set-up area put in order, and general cleaning done.
• On the Saturday after delivery day, we could clean up that month’s mess and put things away for the next month.
• This takes a big load off of several key volunteers who presently are carrying a very heavy burden.

And a secure place of our own will make it possible to look at creative ways to increase the frequency of our orders.

So that’s why this Warehouse and Software Capital Campaign is so important.

Whatever we can’t raise as donations or profits from T-shirt sales, we will need to borrow. Twenty-five dollars from every member would cover our present estimate with some extra left over for higher costs.

Many of us could give more – $50, $100, or even $500. You can make a pledge and pay it out over three months.

•  To give, simply open an invoice for August and add product # 5679 in whatever amount you are able to donate. To pledge, send an email to prez@oklahomafood.coop with the details.
• We are taking orders in August for delivery of our attractive coop logo T-shirts in September. Look under "Non-food Items – Apparel" for those products. (Shirts ordered in July for August delivery will be delivered in August as scheduled.)

The spirit of the traditional rural barn or house raising has always animated our cooperative culture.

• That "can-do attitude" makes our work possible.
• We thank everybody for all the work and investment that we have made, together, in the Oklahoma Food Cooperative.
• Everyone is a stakeholder in this – producers, volunteers, officers and directors, customers.

We ask for your continued help during this exciting but challenging time of change in our cooperative operations.

Help us make the necessary investments so we can ramp up our operations for the year 2008, which could possibly be our first Million Dollar Year.

And unlike the giant chain supermarket and its 10% pittance to the farmers, 85% of that money will go directly to Oklahoma farmers, who certainly deserve it.

This will be a major event of truly epic Bon Apetitin’ proportions that you can help make a reality.

For mother Earth, for all the generations of farmers who have loved and cared for the land, and for the sake of our children and our children’s children, I remain,

Your Elf in Chef,

Bob Waldrop

President and General Manager of the Oklahoma Food Cooperative