Louisville Community Grocery

Category: Committees

  • Recap of July 18 Owners Meeting

    Recap of July 18 Owners Meeting

    Sixteen owners attended the July 18, 2026 Owners Gathering and Meeting. We began by enjoying delicious food from Caked Up Ent Catering of Louisville. Board member Judy S opened the business meeting by inviting veteran owners to talk about LCG co-op organizing and what has worked in the past. Owners shared the following positive experiences from past years:

    • commitment, discipline, consistency among board members and owners
    • a sense of community, a sense of shared purpose in working together to open a cooperatively owned grocery store
    • specific ways to enter the work

    Next, those present offered the following areas that need improvement now:

    • need to set strategic goals for engaging current owners over the next year
    • need more informal fellowship times to build community and trust
    • need to implement the onboarding process developed by the Ownership & Outreach Committee for owners to become involved
    • need tangible ways for owners to contribute time as organizers and as “worker bees”
    • need a database to collect owner information and a dedicated volunteer to keep it updated
    • need a way for prospective owners to join and if technology is a hurdle then consider simpler ways (i.e. cash or check)
    • we may need to reconsider the role of owners – not just as investors, but active members

    Judy then summarized the options MK Lindsey of Winter Wheat presented at the February Owners Meeting regarding the case studies she researched and LCG’s possible way forward:

    1. closure & dissolving assets for the benefit of a like-minded project; 
    2. partnering with a like-minded project or partner; 
    3. re-organizing better.

    For the next hour we had a panel discussion with Barry Z., owner and former member of a food buying club, and Birch Bragg, owner of LOCALS in Louisville and Frankfort.

    Barry talked about his experience as a buying club member in the 1970s at another co-op. He shared about the various jobs the co-op members would do as part of the buying club, such as contacting farmers to find out what they had for the coming week, picking up produce from the farmers and bringing it to the distribution site, bagging the grocery items for the buying club members to pick up, managing the orders and handling the money. Barry noted that courts closed many co-ops in the late 70s due to not paying members for their work which became a violation of the new employment tax laws. This raises awareness for us about our business model as we consider opening a buying club as a Limited Cooperative Association (LCA) in Kentucky.

    Birch discussed his business endeavors beginning with forming a Bowling Green community supported agriculture (CSA) to get farmers’ food in people’s hands. He has since expanded to a grocery store model with a restaurant component. He noted that the restaurant stabilizes the grocery business. Birch offered to share information and resources when LCG is ready to discuss. He suggested contacting Kentucky Department of Agriculture’s cabinet for grants and answers to business questions.

    After a stretch break, we agreed that LCG would need to have at least 15 owners commit to joining a buying club working group for the project to continue to be developed. We will spend the next few weeks sounding a call for owners to step up. If we do not get 15 owners to commit, we will let the buying club project go.

    We continued to discuss what a food buying club working group would be tasked to do:

    • First priority is to learn the legality of owners volunteering to run the buying club for the LCA; if this is not possible, how many employees would be needed?
    • Starting from scratch. We need to make a timeline for the buying club. 
    • Finances. We need to make a business plan; initial capital for equipment, funding for supplies
    • Product. We have a buying club survey with over 50 responses indicating top priorities for owners interested in joining a food buying club.
    • Location. The Kling Center has offered space and refrigeration.
    • Operations. Staffing – employees and volunteers

    There was some concern around a food buying club being for “subscribers” only vs. open to the public. Does this line up with our purpose? Will this turn people away from LCG if they cannot become regular subscribers to a buying club? A hybrid version with subscribers and walk-up sales was suggested as well.

    Action: Lead Team (Abby L, Judy S, Carrie V, Barry Z, and Carlos N.) will commit to the buying club working group. We need 10 more owners to join these leaders. A poll will go out in our e-news and voice messages asking for owners to choose a meeting time in August for the first organizational meeting. These dates are August 5, 19, 26, and 27 at 6:30 – 8:00 PM.

    Get involved with the Buying Club team
  • Let’s Start Selling as Louisville Community Grocery

    Let’s Start Selling as Louisville Community Grocery

    LCG owners agree that we want to begin engaging in the business of selling fresh, high quality food and other products in a cooperative manner that is responsive to community needs, and support the regional food economy (one of our core purposes). We want to start now, while we are still working on opening our brick and mortar store. A buying club project has risen to the top in recent owner meeting discussions as a desirable way to start achieving this objective.

    The Buying Club Survey

    Owner, Barry Z. created a 2-question survey and we’ve had 43 responses from owners who would like to participate in a buying club. Can you help us get to 70? We’re learning from the survey what your top 3 criteria are for participating, and what products you would be most interested in purchasing. This helps a great deal to plan a prototype for a buying club.

    The Buying Club Survey

    Develop Our Cooperative Business Model

    We’re at a catch-22 with the prospect of opening our brick and mortar store. If our Business and Site Development Committee finds the right place and the willing partners to get started, we will need to have a team ready to take on the work to make it happen. This is why we need to start now to develop our cooperative business model through practical sales so we’ll be ready.

    Our Purpose  

    • Combat food insecurity;
    • Operate a multi-stakeholder, Cooperative grocery store;
    • Engage in the business of selling fresh, high quality food and other products in a Cooperative manner that is responsive to community needs and supports the regional food economy;
    • Develop an attractive and successful business model for worker and community ownership in food retailing and local economic development;
    • Create jobs that are secure and educational and support the dignity of all workers of the Cooperative; and
    • Engage in education

    Coordinators Needed

    To move this project forward and start learning new insights into what will work on a larger scale, LCG needs one or two volunteer coordinators for the project. This would involve the following tasks and time commitment:

    • Set up and facilitate working group meetings once or twice per month in person or online, or both;
    • Commit to one year as project coordinator or co-coordinator;
    • Set a goal for a start date for a buyers club or other prototype for sales;
    • Coordinate the operation of the sales prototype for a period of 3 months and evaluate;
    • Delegate work to group members such as
      • Drafting a committee charter with the group, to be approved by the LCG board of directors;
      • Recording meeting notes and posting to the LCG Google drive;
      • Attending monthly LCG board meetings to report on the progress, ask and answer questions;
      • Liaising with the Business Development and Site Selection committee as insights become clear about what will work on a larger scale;
    Get involved with the Buying Club

  • New Projects Brewing

    New Projects Brewing

    At our March 19th owners’ meeting, a small group of Louisville Community Grocery (LCG) owners volunteered to explore ways that LCG could start selling groceries before we build a store. One way is a “buying club,” which has a small space for receiving, storing, and distributing food but
    not an actual storefront. For example, a buying club might accept food orders from its members every Wednesday (in person or online) and distribute the food on Friday. A buying club usually serves only its member-owners, and not the general public. Starting a buying club could be a
    low-cost, low-risk way for LCG to grow into a full-service grocery store. It would help us learn the items to stock in the store, the payment methods that our community prefers, and other things that will make our owners and community members happy to shop at LCG.

    The LCG Buying Club Working Group is putting together a proposal to bring to the LCG Board for approval. We would start the buying club as an experiment, with the intention of improving and expanding it as we go. We will ask for your suggestions and concerns every step of the way. To help us get started, please answer a quick 2-question survey. Thank you!

    Buyers Club Survey


    If you would like to join the LCG Buying Club Working Group, please contact Arte Chambers at LouisvilleCommunityGrocery@gmail.com.

  • LCG Tech Update

    LCG Tech Update

    LCG tech projects are going pretty well. We have been making regular updates to our “Cooler Blog”. This site is built on the WordPress platform, which was chosen because it is open source and user friendly.  The co-op needs volunteers to help with posting articles to our blog. Ideally tech savvy volunteers who are willing to learn the platform and respond to board and committee post requests.

    Currently the co-op would like to clean up its web domains and set them up so that we can create email addresses like Board_President@louisvillecommunitygrocery.com. We own a few other web domains as well. We would like to coral all of them under one domain registrar. We are looking for any owner volunteers who may have these skill sets to assist in planning for this project.

    If you are interested in volunteering and getting hands on in the development of LCG’s tech platform consider joining the LCG Tech Crew. This group operates primarily remotely and is responsible for solving the technology needs for the co-op. Send a message to Arte at louisvillecommunitygrocery@gmail.com if you are interested in volunteering for any of these projects or to join the LCG Tech Crew.

    -Thanks

    Arte