Commitment to Community Volunteer Hours for Shareholders

Our Commitment to Our Community

All cooperatives live by the Cooperative Principles, a set of beliefs stewarded by the International Cooperative Alliance.

There are seven of them, including one member/one vote and voluntary and open membership. The seventh one is “concern for community,” a value that our Co-op and co-ops everywhere make central to their activities.

The COVID-19 pandemic had a great effect on volunteer shareholder work inside our store. We found a way to live up to our commitment to our working shareholders by upping the ante on our “Commitment to Community” program so they could work their monthly volunteer hours in a satisfactory, yet safe way.

We offered our working shareholders the option of doing their volunteer hours at various local non-profits. The Co-op accepted these hours in lieu of in-store hours and these shareholders were able to continue receiving their “working shareholder” discount of 5% off their co-op purchases.

Originally, we limited the number of hours a shareholder could work off-site, but the pandemic opened up a vast opportunity for community assistance and we have decided to allow shareholders who want to, continue to do their 2-hours of volunteer work at one of our approved community organizations.

We continue to work with community partners who have requested, and been approved as viable options for shareholders to help out with their cause.

The first partners accepted into our program were SUSU Community Farm, Groundworks, and the Vermont Food Bank, and we saw much excitement to help these organizations through the C2C program. Now a diverse list of partners is available to choose from.

We will encourage local non-profits to enlist in our program. Anyone with an interest can learn more here.

This program has channeled lots of energy and effort into areas that really need help.

Our shareholder owners are one of our most precious resources, and there is no better way to flex that resource than in service to those that need us the most. If you have any questions, please contact Shareholder Services by stopping by the Co-op, calling 802-246-8821, or emailing [email protected]/

Let’s spend our time and our energy well, and make our community a better place!