Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, July 20, 1990 TAG: 9007200415
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARK MORRISON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
It's in the black.
For the fiscal year ending June 30, the Grandin Road store turned a $6,792 profit - a big turnaround from the nearly $58,000 loss it suffered the year before.
"I'm not really surprised; that's not the word," said Fred Liady, board president and co-op spokesman. "We've been working toward this and creeping closer each month."
Total sales for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 1989, and ending June 30, 1990, were $492,000, according to an unaudited financial statement.
The year before, sales totaled $480,000 and the co-op recorded a loss of $58,000.
Members were told of the deficit last October, and the store has been embroiled in controversy since.
First, the store's general manager, Alan Mathewson, quit under fire from co-op members who disagreed with his management philosophy.
He believed that increasing the staff would result in increased sales.
But many members felt the 10-person staff was already too big. They wanted a return to the co-op's roots, when members volunteered at the store in exchange for an added discount on food.
Meanwhile, the board bickered over dues and membership fees.
One faction favored charging a yearly fee of up to $50, while another faction argued that co-op operations needed to be streamlined before dues were raised.
The fees were never changed.
To reduce costs, the board decided instead to leave Mathewson's job vacant. Linda Swift, the store's assistant manager at the time, was named to take over.
She resigned in June.
Interim co-managers Elizabeth Todd and Robynn Onyett are running the store until the board can hire a permanent replacement. Applicants are being interviewed.
The board also has had problems.
Three of its members resigned in March after one of them was denied access to the co-op's financial records and staffers called police to have him removed from the store.
A month before, the three board members charged the rest of the board with trying to take power away from the general membership.
They had also published an open letter to the membership in the co-op's newsletter calling for financial restraint and improved management. For that, opposing board members demanded their resignations.
The demands were ignored until the flap over the financial records in March.
They have since been replaced by Andre Namenek, Robert Bressler and Rick Bradshaw. Another new board member, Ken Hammond, also was appointed by the remaining board members.
He replaces the store manager, who traditionally had been a voting member, but will now serve only as an adviser on the board.
All four new board members will remain until elections in the fall.
Liady said the financial turnaround can be be attributed mostly to payroll cuts and conservative spending.
"All of the things that we had a choice to spend money on, we cut back," he said.
For example, advertising was reduced and some products that only had a limited buyer market were eliminated.
"We absolutely tightened our belts," said Onyett.
Onyett credited the staff, former manager Swift and the more than 1,700 co-op members for "hanging in there through this controversy.
"I think this shows a tremendous upward swing," she said.
Liady was equally optimistic.
"I'm optimistic to the tune of making a $30,000 profit for next year," he said.
Liady and Onyett said that some of the profits will be kept in reserve for future financial hardships should they arise, and some of the money will be used to purchase new food bins and other co-op needs.
by CNB