JIM’S MUSINGS by jim deluca
Ge n e ral Ma n-
As we approach our first anniversary in the new location, I am feeling proud of what we have accomplished. The planning, negotiating, financing, construction, and moving were quite challenging. All of the staff worked hard under the stress to get us to this time. We still have much to do to make Abundance a real community anchor in the South Wedge, but we continue to inch ahead. Part of the stress has been the shortfall of expected sales. We anticipated average sales of $90k per week and we are just getting up to about $60k per week. We have adjusted our staffing and other variable expenses so that we now believe that we can be sustainable at $65k in sales per week. CONTACT
In order to improve our opportunities to increase sales, we brought in the marketing expert from the National Grocers Co-op as well as including a local marketing expert. Both of these folks said we need to make our instore experience more rewarding, exciting. Our merchandising is pretty weak; we don’t have many colorful presentations around the store. The good thing is that the facility has plenty of space for us to improve into. We also get feedback that while we do pretty well greeting at entry and thanking at exit, we could be more interactive with shoppers in the aisles. Our Community Room/Classroom has begun to book more. We have had several successful events with music and art as well as community groups using the space for meetings. We have a sliding scale for use starting at donations for local, non profits or other small groups that are not charging or promoting something to sell up to $20 per hour for more commercial usage. The room can hold 15 people reasonably comfortably.
Karl Abbott Karl47@frontiernet.net
571 South Avenue, Rochester, NY 14620 tel: 585-454-2667 mail: marketing@abundance.coop website: www.abundance.coop
Chris Whitebell chriswhitebell@gmail.com
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Katie Malarkey katie.malarkey@gmail.com
Paula Hansen, President Paulah1@rochester.rr.com
Maria Coles mariaicoles@fastmail.com
Max Gianniny, VP and Treasurer mgianniny@gmail.com
STAFF DIRECTORY
Beth Garver, Secretary bgarver@rochester.rr.com
General Manager Jim DeLuca, gm@abundance.coop
Leah Feldman, STAFF REPRESENTATIVE lfldmn@gmail.com leah@abundance.com
Administrative Debbie Loo Anderson, Financial Manager Francis Barrow, POS Coordinator Richard Rowley, Financial Assistant Richard Sauvain, IT Coordinator Center Store
Peter House Housepeter171@gmail.com
Ru ta baga Rap | 2 | Sp r ing 2018