1. Roll Call
Board Members Present: Nathan Creswick, Danielle Cenci, Kris VanHaitsma, Tom Cary, Lisa Nelson, and Georgia Monroe
Staff Present: Tara Simmons, Paul DeLeeuw, Jerry Adams
Others Present: Casey Lubbers
Board Members Absent: Kolene Allen and Christina Radisauskas
2. Reports from Committees
Membership
Tara reported that the Membership Handbook is almost done, but needs some tweaking. She also wanted the Board’s opinion on the policy pages. The late pick up fees make the Co-op seem much stricter than it is. Jerry, Paul, and Tara said that the late fees are not enforced. Jerry pointed out that we don’t want to drive members away. Paul said that since we added the warning about late fees to the website there haven’t been many late pickups, but he felt that we should track who is consistently late. He also pointed out that if late fees were enforced, most of the time they would double the cost of the order. Tara felt that the late pickup fee was too steep, so the fee structure was discussed, and a reduced fee of $5 per day late fee instead of $15 was proposed. Georgia pointed out that we need to charge a fee consistently so that we follow our policies, otherwise we are not being fair. After more discussion the change in late fee was brought for a vote, and passed.
Tara will remove language about “if we don’t receive payment within one week, your membership will be suspended.” She tracks people down and if they don’t pay she adds the total to their next invoice, and they pay then.
Late fees will be added to the invoice as a note, so Ginny knows why there’s an extra charge. When people call ahead and say “I won’t be there”, we will tell them about the late charges. If they can find someone to pick up their order for them, there’s no charge. There was discussion about the possibility of setting up a forum on the website so that members can connect, maybe having a thread labeled “I can’t pick up my order”, where members can find other members near them to connect. However, we will not post member info online.
Producer checklist will be on the same page as the profile, with a comparison checklist at the end. Handbooks would be available online, and a few printed out at the Co-op. If members wanted to take one home, we will charge a nominal fee to cover printing costs.
Marketing
Marketing Committee has had two meetings since the last Board meeting. There have been a lot of events we’ve been involved in. Coming up soon is the Local First Street Party – they’d like to be a sponsor for this event($100 – $250), which reaches 8,000 – 10,000 people. This level of support would include our logo on all the flyers. In the fall, they’d like to do an event like the Wealthy Theater kick-off event. They would also like to update the look of the website (new picture, etc).
The Marketing committee currently has four members. Jerry wants to try to get involved more in all committees, so that there is a broad organization, and so that he has a better feel for what everyone is doing. Jerry and Paul have talked about adding a lot of things to the website (for example volunteer opportunities sign-up). Tara would like to see the Marketing committee take more responsibility in scheduling events for which volunteers are needed, and organizing brochures and materials for each event. There has been some confusion on what is needed for each event (and how many events there are). Maybe we need to cut down on the number of events we participate in. Jerry was concerned about how many brochures we’re printing (right now he is eating that cost). We discussed selling t-shirts, bags – should we even be doing this? We need to focus on getting people signed up. Georgia suggested having a drawing for a t-shirt or bag, because people will sign up for that. Jerry wants us to be more pro-active in getting people to give us their email address so we can send them an email invite.
Lisa mentioned that we need to plan better and let people know ahead of time that when they volunteer for an event, there is set up time so they will have to be there earlier than the actual event. Marketing committee will work on streamlining volunteering.
Vision
Tom presented the need for a strategic plan. We need a framework for all moving forward together, so that all the committees are coordinated. The plan would be a timeline with goals. If we have a co-op member who would like to donate the time to facilitate that would be great, otherwise we need to pay someone to do that to keep us accountable and on track.
Nathan was concerned about the timeline (over summer/fall), but as we discussed, there is no good time for everyone. We just have to commit to doing it because it has to be done. Strategic plan meeting was scheduled for Tuesday, June 9, 5–9pm. We’ll ask producers and some members (and the board) and try to get 20 – 25 people to commit to doing this. Jerry suggested his partner Brian as facilitator, but he may not have time.
Product
Danielle reported on the committee’s last meeting. They will be meeting the Wednesday before each pick up. They talked about changing the application so that it has a section for food producers, nonfood producers. They would like it to be online. Paul is planning to work on this, but there have been other priorities.
Producers can all apply, but they are not going to approve any more at this time. They did approve the following new producers:
But from now on they want producers to sell their own products, not other people’s. Some they turned down because they are outside our range, and some have not yet responded.
Talked about milk: Jerry was going to talk to Hilhof Dairy and Mooville and see if either of them were interested, because members really want dairy. They decided not to add Shaklee products. They did talk about pottery, but they are not going to search for that. If artists contact us, we’ll let them participate.
Once the Product committee approves a vendor, they get an email that lets them know they’ve been approved, and they get a login/password and directions of how to list products. In the application they download, all our policies are included, but that doesn’t mean producers are reading it. They’d like to send them a welcome email to help them get involved with links to different things on the website (like wiki, calendar, etc). Tara wants producers to promote the co-op. Most do not.
Web
Paul reported on the Web committee meeting. Members have been tasked with going through the website and wiki and updating out-dated info, especially since this info will be going into handbooks. Much of that has been done.
They are trying to push all committees to post minutes on the wiki, so that people can feel comfortable getting involved in a committee. They will start doing a weekly roundup on the blog (upcoming, past week events, meeting minutes, volunteer opportunities, etc…). Kari & Kolene are doing the blogging. Jerry will start doing a “letter from the director” once in a while also.
Paul did a mini-training with the committee on making adjustments so others know what to do on pickup night if he isn’t here. Went through new system of additions, it really went well this past pick up. The new bottleneck was the cash out table. This could be fixed by adding another cashier volunteer.
Kris asked about volunteers, noting that it seems like sometimes there are too many volunteers not doing anything. Floaters were spending too much time near the “check-out volunteers”, giving the impression that there are too many volunteers not doing anything. From now on, we do not want a floater assisting in check-out. Instead, two volunteers directing check-out is enough.
If we want a survey for the May cycle, Paul is ready for it, but he needs it by Friday if we want it to be there for people to use when they login to shop. The web committee is trying to focus on technical issues, streamlining the website, etc, rather than the look and content of the website at this point.
3.Old Business
Insurance:
Tara has researched workers comp insurance, and had information on how to determine whether the three of them are employees or independent contractors. After reading through the requirements, and some discussion, Nathan suggested we start with independent contractor status, and change that in the future if needed. Tara also presented quotes from our current insurance provider and a local provider. The local provider was lower cost, and the board approved Tara to accept the local insurance policy rather than the current policy. We do not need workers comp insurance at this time.
4.New Business
Budget Proposals.
Each committee presented estimated budget proposals.
Vision: $1500-$2000 for a strategic planning facilitator
Marketing: at least $3250 which included $2500 for print and radio ads, $400 for promotional stickers and event table reservations, $100 for an umbrella for outdoor events, and $250 for printing of brochures & posters. Marketing
Membership: $2900, which included $200 for “I shopped the Co-op” stickers, $1500 for a volunteer appreciation party, $500 for a summer potluck, $500 for quarterly education workshops, and $200 for a monthly newsletter
Product: $350-$500 for mileage reimbursement for producer site reviews
Web: $1200 so the co-op can have it’s own server (Paul is currently hosting it for free)
Jerry will compile all the budget information and post it on the wiki.
Increasing vendor participation. Danielle will get them more aware and involved in what the co-op is doing.
Further discussions regarding rate adjustment. This will wait until visioning.
5.Public Comments
There were no public comments.
6.Next Meeting
June 30, 2009 at 6:30 pm
Meeting Adjourned at 8:45 pm