“Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns.”  -George Eliot

From the desk of the General Manager:

The older I get, the more I appreciate the coming of fall.  Of all the seasons, it is the one I feel most present in, focused not on the past or the future, but on what is happening right now.  The chill in the air.  The explosion of color in the trees.  The quality of light that has no comparison. I am also a huge sucker for anything pumpkin spice, so this season is my jam.

At your Belfast Community Co-op, we are packing away the vestiges of summer and preparing for the festive months ahead. The summer of 2026 was another record breaker.  All five of the highest sales weeks in our co-op's 50-year history occurred this past summer, with the first week of August blowing away all competition at $393,636 in gross sales! We saw 7.4% sales growth over last year’s summer sales and for the first time in our history we had over 10,000 shoppers come through our doors in one week! Three times!  Amazing!  We are in a strong position heading into the slower winter months as we all take a moment to repair and rebuild before the holidays.

We had our largest Common Cents donation ever this August, with the Mid-Coast Maine Homeless Coalition receiving $8,666.15 from customer round-ups at the register. 100% of all donations go to each group, every month. We also grew our active BCC ownership by over 8%, surpassing 6500 co-op owners.  Of those 6,500 owners, over 1,900 are fully vested, meaning they have paid their $200 equity in full, a 43% increase over the previous year. This is my annual gentle reminder that if you are looking to make an immediate impact on the fiscal health of your co-op, please consider paying your full equity. Nothing helps the co-op's bottom line more than additional owner equity!

This past season, the Board of Directors Strategic Work Committee drafted a long-term strategic vision statement for our cooperative. The vision statement is intended to complement our Ends Statement and give the Belfast Community Co-op a north star to aim towards.  The vision goes beyond operating a successful grocery store and positions us as a leader in cooperative innovation to lift up and strengthen our broader cooperative community. The committee offered the following draft statement for consideration:

The Belfast Community Cooperative envisions a thriving community and world in which our co-op serves as an innovative leader of an inclusive economy that empowers people to build a more just, resilient, and connected future.

There is an opportunity for you, as a co-op owner, to weigh in on the statement and offer feedback to the committee.  The goal is to have this project completed before the winter holidays, so keep your eyes out in the store and online for that announcement!

October is Co-op Month and we have an exciting event planned to showcase the power of the cooperative business model. Back in July, our Grocery Manager Evans Goff traveled to Peru with a delegation from Equal Exchange, a worker-owned producer co-op that was a pioneer in the Fair Trade movement, to see firsthand the supply side of their operation. We will be hosting a tasting event and presentation on October 13th from 5-7pm in the Co-op cafe, open to all.

It's election season at your local food co-op! If you or someone you know cares about growing our local food economy and helping neighbors meet their needs, we may have a seat at the table just for you. Do you have skills and experience that could help this cooperative thrive and expand in the years ahead? If Board governance interests you, reach out to bodcomm@belfast.coop today and find out how you can get involved. 

Thank you all for choosing us. Thank you for engaging in the cooperative economy. Together we make the world a better place.

See you in the aisles

-Doug

Doug Johnson, doug@belfast.coop