Durham Central Market reaches 300 owners, looks to next steps

As we've talked about here before, the planners behind the Durham Central Market co-op grocery store have been moving forward with informal location searches and with initial capital fundraising through the sale of shares to the general public.

The DCM team met their goal of selling 300 ownership shares to founding members at $100 a pop before October 31 -- with 346 shares sold during the period.

According to an email update from the DCM board, those funds will help pay for a financial feasibility study from Cooperative Development Services, a non-profit organization in the Midwest that provides consulting services to coops of all stripes. It also provides seed money "in the bank" for the hiring of a project manager to support fundraising, site selection, and operational aspects of the project.

The DCM update notes that its site selection committee is working to find one or two finalist locations for the market, at which time market and location analysis will begin.

Not stopping: fundraising efforts, as DCM looks to get to a total of 1,200 founding shares sold before a targeted opening projected for early 2010.

Not that the $120,000 in capital raised from owners' shares is all that will be needed to get DCM off the ground. The market's email update notes that it will take an estimated $2.5 million to get the business off the ground, a number that could vary as research continues. Given tightening bank lending conditions, the DCM notes it is likely to turn to owners for loans on negotiated terms for the "majority" of its initial funding.

Interested in learning more about the coop plans? Stop by their table at the Durham Farmers Market on Saturdays, or visit their web site for more details.

Comments

[Rob]

I think it is great that we can get a grocery store in the central park area. I just hope that they maintain some stock that is more accessible to the public than what was at the DFCO. I'm all for having organic/fair-trade/sustainable items, but please stock some things that average folks can afford as well. I can't buy organic everything, so I have to buy some conventional items to fill up the pantry.

[Michael Bacon]

Thanks for the shout out, Kevin, although you're making me look bad. It was my job to post the "we made 300" announcement on the web site, and here some damned blogger's beating me to it!

To answer Rob's question, trying to carry some conventional and "value" lines is something we're definitely aiming for and are trying to do. Perversely enough, it's actually hard, according to what we've heard from Weaver St. All of the "big boys" have their own distribution networks set up, so actually getting someone to sell you conventional groceries at a reasonable price can be a big challenge. Most often, you end up having to charge convenience store prices for them, which makes them not that much more attractive than the organic/natural products we could get through the distributors most co-ops buy from.

That's not to say we're giving up. We're committed to this being a grocery store that serves the community as well as we possibly can, and we've got a few tricks we may try to find ways to get affordable Cheerios to people. It's just that there's some challenges on the way.

[KeepDurhamDifferent!]

As one of the founding owners, I'm just hoping they have meat and fish (unlike the DFCO). I am so tired of buying the freshest and most expensive tuna I can find for use in sushi, only to be told by the Whole Foods guy that it is not sushi-grade and should not be eaten raw (wink wink, nudge nudge).