Greetings fellow Dixon Cooperative Market community members,
This is just a short note to announce that the co-op has been nominated for a Local Hero Award from Edible! It is an honor to be considered, and we deeply appreciate the recognition of how hard the co-op works to stabilize our local food economy.
We are not the only local businesses nominated! Old Gem Farm and Sugar Nymphs Bistro are also up for recognition.
Please vote and share some love for your hard working neighbors. Voting closes May 6th.
The Dixon Cooperative Market Board of Directors
https://www.ediblenm.com/local-hero-awards/
There are a couple of new initiatives the Coop is pursuing this year that we hope will help the people who need a boost in their nutrition and pocketbook. The first one is our new fund that will help the people who are most in need of support to feed themselves and their families. The Convite Fund has been established through contributions of concerned Coop members to help people who might find themselves in immediate need of food but without the means to pay for it. We don’t think anyone in our community should be suffering from hunger. If you find yourself in need, please ask any of the managers on duty and we can get you some good and nutritious food immediately, free of charge. This fund doesn’t pay for candy or tobacco products, but you will walk out of the store with enough healthy food to get you and your family through a tough time. If you would like to contribute to this fund you can also talk to one of the managers and we can help you add to the fund.
The other effort we are making is to create more locally grown produce available here at the store. All of the people who shop at the Coop will benefit from this, and anyone who uses EBT can take advantage of the Double Up Food Bucks program that gives you half price on all local produce when you use your EBT. We are reaching out to all growers in the area so we can be a daily farmers’ market during the growing months. If you grow food or would like to grow food for the Coop, we will soon be holding a meeting that will help us coordinate our needs with those of you who are planning your planting schedule. Currently, we buy most of our produce from an organic distribution company in California, but I would much prefer to buy local products that are harvested within a couple of days, if not hours, of having them available at the store. It also reduces the environmental impact if we are delivering items from Apodaca instead of the Central Valley of California. And best of all for the local economy, the money we spend in Dixon stays in Dixon. Look for an announcement in the coming week about our organizing meeting in early March to establish how we optimize our local purchasing.
And in the meantime, what’s left of last year’s seeds are 40% off right now, and our new seed have arrived. Get yours today, and I hope to see you soon at the Coop.
The annual members’ meeting of the Dixon Cooperative Market will take place on Saturday, January 27th, at 1:00 pm at the Embudo Valley Library. All members are welcome to attend in person, and a Zoom invitation is available by contacting Board President Nancy Levit by email at nancy@dixonmarket.com. The agenda includes reports from the board president and treasurer, as well as a report from the manager. Public input will also be included. Finally, election results for new board members will be announced. Please come to the store to vote, or get your ballot in the mail so we receive it by Saturday.
The Coop exists to provide a wide variety of food and necessities to the people who live in and near the Embudo Valley. While we are a for-profit business, our goal is not to make a profit beyond what we need to operate. If we make a large profit, we are not doing our members any favor because it means we are charging them more than we need. In 2023 we were less than .0025% off of our sales to break exactly even. Not bad, considering we did over $1.3 million in sales. If you like statistics like that, come to the meeting for a whole lot more.
The biggest challenge we have here at the Coop is keeping prices down. Because of our remoteness and scale of our volume of sales we struggle to keep our cost of goods at a rate that could compete with bigger stores in more populated areas. As our volume increases, our gross profit margin can be decreased which brings prices down a bit. Our clientele is limited to those who live here and the tourist trade that builds in the summer and dwindles in the late winter months. That is why it is important to the health of the Coop to get the business, especially in these months, of those of us who live here. Without enough volume of sales, we will only break even with higher margins of what we sell. We don’t like raising prices any more than you like paying them.
Another challenge is convincing people to take advantage of the benefits of membership. Did you know that if you took your discount on one purchase of $12.50 each month you would pay for your membership? I recommend taking the discount on purchases of $125 or more once a month and saving ten times the cost of your membership for the year. Being a member also allows you savings on bulk orders through our buying club. We would love to help you find lower food costs by taking advantage of the buying club and member discounts. I you’re not a member, join us. If you are already a member, take your discount and check out the buying club. I hope to see you soon at the Coop,
–Clark
Happy New Year from all of us at the Coop. We’re looking forward to providing you with good food in the year to come, and hope the addition that we are starting will offer an opportunity to give you better service and selection. It’s going to be a busy and exciting year here, full of changes and improvements, and I can’t wait to see what the year holds for our little store and our greater community.
If you are interested in buying a portion of a steer from Vaquero Beef, let me know. We should be receiving it in the next couple of weeks, and I would be willing to sell it at our buying club prices if you would like as little as 1/8th of the beast. Pricing and total weight will depend on the finished product that Joe delivers to us, but if you are interested, talk to me here at the store so I can reserve you a share of it. You would get ground beef, steak, roast and ribs if you opt in, and at a discount of about 20% off of our shelf pricing. This is grass fed and finished meat that roams in the neighboring hills for its happy life. It’s lean and local, the best meat you can find.
The Dixon Deli is still making fresh pizzas and sandwiches to order, and we try to have sandwiches available in the hot case for you to grab and go. Javier has been making some specialty burritos as well as soups and stews, so stop in and check out what is available as a special each day. Specialty cheeses and olives are available in the cold case by the Deli as well as our cold sandwiches and salsa and guac made here in the kitchen. And after selling over 37,000 breakfast burritos we’ve figured out how to make them so you’ll want one every day. Only about 25 lucky people get them every day, so get in early for yours.
January and February are our slowest months, and we could use all the business we can get in the coldest part of the year. Please consider skipping that trip through the canyon and keeping your money in town. The impact of shopping local is huge. Don’t give your hard earned money to the richest corporations in the world like Amazon and Walmart, and now that Krogers and Albertsons are merging they will be able to squeeze us little guys out even easier unless the consumers make the decision to support the businesses that create local economies. Thanks for your business, and I hope to see you soon at the Coop.
