 I have been working with the food system since the food conspiracy and those with the food buying clubs, we just got together to buy food together because the idea was that good food, healthy food, organic food doesn't have to be just for rich people that we can have good food without being rich. So we got together and took control of the food, not just the price that we didn't have to pay high price but also trying to get hold of the farmers and trying to also teach ourselves how organic farms worked and what was the difference between organic and commercial and so on. So it was the effort to educate ourselves. It wasn't so much at the time to create jobs. And when the clubs got so big, we decided to open up storefronts. And somewhere along the line, I got involved after volunteering to work with one of the stores, first at the heat food store and then at other avenues which is in the outer sunset. And my folks that I work with, my co-worker, kept asking me whenever I tell them anecdotal history that why don't you put down these thoughts in computer and make a book with this. And I thought that was a great idea, but history was never really my favorite subject. So I kind of put it off for a while. But then I decided that I can actually tell story that's better. Her story is always better than history. And so I decided to do that way and I interviewed a lot of people, including one of the gentlemen is here today, Adam, and his photo is also in the book. Adam had been working with the food system as long as I have it. So I interviewed maybe 24, 34 people. So a lot of those voices are here. There are a lot of quotes in the book. The book is not just about making the stores happen. It's about the whole moment and how that moment was possible then and how some of those legacy, the remnants, growth, seeds that germinated are still going on in different directions. So that's what the book is about. In addition to three institutions that are still thriving, including Rainbow, which a lot of you know if you live in the area, and other avenues and produce distributor called vegetable vegetables. So those three people and they each get a chapter as an example, showcasing what's concretely left. But a lot of things that grew out of the moment isn't something that is tangible right now. And a lot of those thoughts and ideas and dialogues are also in this book. So the book is divided into three parts. Firstly, history, general history of the food cooperatives in the Bay Area. And then the people food system, how it grew and what made it collapse. And then about the three entities that survived and how they survived whereas the other people disappeared. And a really good portion of the last portion of the book is about the vision, the future vision. How can we build from what's left? And what can we all do in small and big ways? So before I read some things from my book, I want to tell you that I have this 10 minutes video. That's kind of a really special treat because as far as I know, it's the only recorded history of the people's food system, which served thousands and thousands of households in the 70s and nobody else made any film. A friend of mine made a film with a very old eight millimeter camera. A lot of you probably don't even know what it is. But so if the quality isn't great, the sound is really poor, but you will get a slice of that era because it is 70s for sure. So first I'm going to read a little bit from my book as it is customary, but I don't want to read too much because I want you to buy and read it yourself. So how did it all start? So it was the 70s that the youth of America who had settled here, restless from the 60s, they were not very happy with the now settled war in Vietnam and what the war had created by global capitalism and funded by big industry. Many young people dropped out of society that seemed to offer nothing worth emulating. They wanted to replace consumerism, greed, and hark mentality with a world of sharing and harmony. Energized by leadership for socially aware artists, musicians, activists, ordinary street people, a new decentralized food system spread across the country. Okay, so a lot of these people, it wasn't just about changing food itself, but they wanted to change the whole society. We all did, you know, we tried our best. So this of course came very fast because first in the 70s we had a lot of clubs and then we had about dozen stores and then we had about six distributing venues and all this happened within like four years, right, Adam? It was really amazing. It just kind of combusted, like one store would have just a little bit of money to open another store in the other section of the town. They had a little bit more money. They would help out third people. We trained each other. We had a lot of fundraisers and dance parties and a lot of dope got smoked, I'm sure. But we had a lot of fun, but it was also really, really hard work as well. So I'm going to now skip a little bit and talk a little bit about the success. This was our hiatus and this is something you'll see in the movie. The movie was made, the video was made when it was successful, not really as many venues open yet, but everybody was very much into the dream of this is going to happen. They were really, really very optimistic and like what happened last night that we are not feeling optimistic today, but at the time we were really thinking, okay, we can do it. You know, we can really replace the cardboard food with real food. We can actually shut down all the safe ways and make all these little stores connected to each other and people's food system could just go around the globe. So at the height of the people's food system between 76 and 78, there were approximately two dozen community food store supporting and supporting collective. Although they followed some of the international principle of cooperatives, the people's food system worker remained reluctant to identify their workplaces as co-op because we had experienced other co-ops, there were consumer co-ops that had become so big in the 50s that they were just co-ops in the name that they really weren't serving their members at all. So we kind of refrained calling ourselves co-op. We just call ourselves community stores and the people who worked there called themselves collective members. So those were more of the words that we used. The idea was to make it so that people who worked then that people we serve would be the same that they wouldn't be that much of a distinction. And a lot of those stores were small so it was working at the time. So in addition to doing a lot of this work and distribution, a lot of the people who worked like in the warehouse, like Adam worked, actually went to conferences to organize other workplaces. They delivered food far away, even like in different states all the way to Washington and so on. So there was a lot of back and forth between other people's food system and other food systems that were going on as far as Minneapolis. So this was going on across the nation. It was a very powerful moment. So let's see. I'm going to skip on the demise of, maybe it will come up in the Q&A after we watch the movie. Maybe some of you will have some questions. So I'm going to skip that because I want to really have the time for the movie and question and answer. I want to make this as much as sharing information as possible. So the survivors. The three businesses that revitalized themselves and are now doing well. How is that that these survived and remained vibrant even today? The continuing strength of the various food and justice movement helped as did the growing national interest in organic foods and healthy eating. But that is not all that kept these businesses going while one after the other all of them folded. For all these three, it is clear that their success in business and food activism was and is largely due to one, a strong connection with both the immediate neighborhood and the food and justice community at large. Two, constant attention to pragmatic business practices such as knowing how much the cost of goods is and things that we have to learn just like any market does. And three, a clear mission to bring healthy food to the people. Four, a strong commitment to workplace democracy. It's not something that we're just selling food. It's also we are serving ourselves as well as a community of workers. Okay. Now I'm going to read a little bit from the vision, keeping the vision. Also after the vision chapters, there's a really comprehensive appendix with list of markets like farmers market, organizations they give out food for free. There's a map of a small, irrevocable damage caused by global capitalism. How can we address world hunger, climate change and economic instability? These are hot topics to discuss among co-op supporters. Some scholars predict that the growth of corporate base income inequality is inevitable. That's a lot of the French economists said, this is it. All we get is Donald Trump. But then there are other people and they argue in two books that I studied that really gave me hope. One is called Democracy at Work, a Cure for Capitalism by Richard Wolff. And the other book is America Beyond Capitalism by Gar Alparovitz. So these books tell you that this is not the end of it all, that we can organize, that we can make things happen here, that we can make a difference. So then there's a list of things what we all can do and so on. Thank you. So now we are going to watch the movie, followed by a question and answer if you have about the movie or about the book. If the people that were in this film from the 70s are still around today and they have maintained their rent control apartments, their cost of housing is very modest. And I wish I was one of them. Right. I have kind of an answer, but other people might have answered. I think that a lot of these people, as it shows in my book, were discouraged after the people's food system folded and there was a whole drama and a lot of reason. And some of them was unfortunately similar to what might happen soon with, you know, Trump economics, you know, this Reaganomics, all the rents triple in quadruple. And this was true for storefronts as well as our home rents, you know, because it wasn't like we didn't have rent control when people needed to sell a building, you know, they just sold the building and there was no vacancy and there was just no support for small businesses. I can list just... Wait before I came here. Wait before I came here. I've been here for a long time. But at any rate, so there was a lot of factor why a lot of these people that are in the film aren't probably around or if they are around, they probably decided to do something else to stay in the Bay Area like myself, okay? But some of us who did continue to work, like I have worked with marginal income all my life in one of these stores, we did it more creatively like holding two jobs or learning how to live marginally and you know, it wasn't that easy, but some of the stores couldn't survive because their buildings got sold or their rent quadrupled and they just couldn't keep their doors open. I know at least three collectors that were older than 25-year-olds, three are co-ops that folded between 14 just recently, like 2014, 2015 because they got kicked out of their building, right? So that's the reality is in the Bay Area. You can't do what used to be able to do in the 70s is what I'm trying to tell you. I'm seeing empty storefronts all over the Castro. Let's take over. Yeah. There are a lot of empty stores. There's one store that was a real food store. When I came here, this was before people's food system, before food conspiracy. There were like a lot of moms and pops, health food stores, and they were really nice store. And then there was a series of little store connected owned by a private chain called Real Food. One of them Real Food is empty for 30 years on Novi Valley, Novi and 24th, right across from there's Whole Foods, right by a bookstore called Folio. Castro and 24th, that's going to be really prime estate, right? Somebody's able to sit on that property for more than 30 years now. Yeah. So, yeah, there are a lot of empty spaces in Berkeley and San Francisco. There should be cooperatives, among other things. Any other question, comment? Yes, Janet. There's a number of food co-ops throughout the country and they have members. And then if you're a member, you get a 10% discount at the counter. Is that something that would help finance food co-ops here? It could. That's a different model, the consumer cooperative model. It could. And I think that even the consumer cooperatives, there are two really good ones, one in Sacramento that just moved into a huge location. And one is in Davis. They were having some sort of a problem with the discount and even patterned refund to customers. So they have replaced that or eliminated that. I don't know the reasoning or the bookkeeping reasoning behind it, but they found it too cumbersome. So they're not doing that anymore. But there are other parts of the country that is still working to promote membership. In the city of San Francisco. Other avenues. Where is that? It's on 44th and Judah in the Outer Sunset District. Other avenues is in San Francisco. The whole city is 14 miles long only. It's not that long a bike, right? That's fine. Rainbow is a good thing. They are our sister store. We love Rainbow. Remember, Shanta, the original other avenues storefront. What is that now? Do you know what built what? That was closer to 46 and it's where general store is now. Oh, great. Thank you. Yeah. The little bodhiki gifty store. Anybody else have questions? You alluded to this a little bit in the film, but you're showing the paper and the reactions of the town to the food co-op mysteries. What was the, were other businesses threatened by the co-ops or what was Safeway's reaction or any kind of reaction for the regular grocery stores? There were some of those touching in the, how the food system collapsed. There were some conspiracy theory or maybe real threats that some people, some Safeway's, they were threatened by the fact that we were serving thousands and thousands of household and it was declining their sales, especially if the very effective food conspiracy was in their neighborhood such as the hate food conspiracy. Like we had a mantra that, you know, if you cannot walk to a neighborhood to order your food, you should start your own food conspiracy. So there were that many food conspiracy. But can you add something to that, Adam? Because Adam worked at the warehouse, cooperating warehouse. The stories around how much big stores like Lucky and Safeway may have been threatened by growing food system. I'll have to really dig deep in memory to come up with a more concrete answer, but I do recall there being some, well, perhaps conspiracy theories that large food supermarket chains were aware of our efforts. Could I come up with a document to, you know, nail that down, not at the tip of my tongue? But it's a possibility. Yeah, there were other, you know, you will read about some other stories too that there were perhaps outside forces, you know, like undercover agents who were infiltrated in some of our meetings. Who knows? There was a lot of that. So you've obviously been in this cooperative food system for a very long time. Right. Is there anything you would have done differently now that you've had, you know, the foresight to help make these alternatives more viable in this day and age? That's really, really a good question. I actually had one of the people in the audience from Rainbow and he was rather young, must be in his twenties or so, and he asked something similar like, how many times did you think, I can't do this anymore? And so, but I like the way you said it, like, you know, what we could have done better or different. Yeah, I think about that a lot. In fact, I have put some effort, not so much putting myself, but what could have happened that could have saved more of the venues, more of the stores, you know, more of the bakeries or whatever. Yeah, so the book touches upon that. Could you share a couple of those ideas? Myself, I think that, unfortunately, I was, and so a lot of little stores were so involved, day-to-day survival that really took toll on my life that we really didn't have time to think. But now, if I really had to reverse the time, I could say that, you know, maybe having a sense of better capital is, you know, like having better capital instead of just raising money in a shoestring like bake sale. I mean, we did really strangest thing to, you know, make few bucks to get going for the next rant, you know, because we were working on volunteer basis and we were really having fun, you know, and we also had other jobs that was our job to pay rent. And my rent was like $60 a month, I kid you not, and it was like a Victorian house that we shared with two other people, so we all paid $60, you know. So, you know, this was not that far long ago, you know. So at the time, either we were really struggling, but we were kind of enjoying the struggling. So if I had to really back, maybe I shouldn't, we shouldn't have enjoyed, and I'm speaking about myself and the few people that I was involved with, you know, that we could have planned better, you know, with a better capital. And I think this is probably my message now, now that we have better planning like at other avenues, like we are right now working on a five-year plan, you know. We didn't have that vision at the time, you know, and I wish that we, some of us did that we could have. And some of those who did, you know, like, veritable or veritable is like either as the first or the second largest organic distributor in the U.S., which probably means in the world, you know. So they are really big. So obviously they did something right. What's it called? Vettable vegetable. They're not a store. They are a distributor. They're a wholesaler. And they are also no longer cooperative. They're not collective anymore. They get a lot of their produce from Vettable, but we also do and they have other sources that they get produce from. We try to get as much local as possible. So I just wanted to clarify, Shanta, from the film, the short film. So it seemed like a group would go out to a warehouse and collect the food and then they would distribute it. Would they bring it to storefronts but also to individuals' homes? Is that right or garages where they could be? No, I think that the film was 40 minutes long. So it was spliced and you know, shortened. So there's a little bit confusion. Because some of the scene was actually, like when they were really carrying big bags and stuff, they were actually making delivery from the corporate warehouse to the store, not to the food conspiracy. But when the food conspiracy was just the buying club, we would just go to the farmer's market once a week. So you won't get fresh food every day, just on Saturday. We order on Wednesday, we get the food on Saturday. And then the dry good, which we call the great divide, where we had a lot of flour and oil and so on, that we did in bigger trucks and at bigger places. And the corporate warehouse was born before a lot of the storefronts were born. So we got it from them, as well as from some of the cheese factories, as well as from, you know, a lot of the wholesale sources that we developed. And one of the laws when the warehouse closed, which is, you know, and you will read in the demise, you know, that was kind of dramatic, is that we lost our source, you know. And to answer your question again, one of the things I would like to have happen even with the two co-ops left is if we can develop a warehouse again. Because, you know, that's what's missing. You know, we are now relying on some corporate warehouse and they're not always serving us right. And also, you know, it's not same as a co-operative warehouse. That would be another really good thing for us to do, not regularly, you know. Like, I might go and talk with their promotional person, like, let's do this and that, you know. Hello. The promotional person from Rainbow. So, only occasionally, I wish we had more regular chat to have more camaraderie, as well as maybe even financial success, you know, exchange to make it more successful. What exactly is the process of starting a co-op? Like, are there any things you have to do differently than, like, starting a traditional? Yes, this is not a how-to book. However, it has resources and we in the Bay Area are still very fortunate that three institution organizations are here. Two of them are Oakland. One of them is Davis. So, the Davis institution is called CCCD. It stands for California Center for Corporate Development. And one in Oakland is called NOBAS. It's a network of Bay Area worker cooperatives. And then the other is actually serving the whole country's worker cooperative and that's called USFWC. It's a U.S. Federation of Worker Cooperatives. And they can answer your concrete question. But as far as I know, all you need is three people, perhaps a lawyer, and a good bylaw, a storefront, if it is, you know, a retail. But if you're, you know, doing something else in your basement like a music co-op, you don't even need a storefront. But they can actually give you. And there are funds around if you seek for funds. You know, it depends. Two of the places, two of the organizations that can get funding more easily than others if you are trying to get something done in unserved community or if you're doing something in rural community, especially when it comes to food. Okay, any more questions? Did you have any guidelines concerning how you would accept organic produce? You know, for example, you know, certain organizations, you know, like USDA, you know, they have guidelines that the farmer has to meet, you know, do certain things specifically to be able to, you know, get that approval. Right. When we started, actually, there were not that many guidelines. So we relied on farmer's information. We relied on farmer's honesty. Often we would go to visit their farms because they would just open our door. They were very, very friendly with us. And a lot of what you see right now, that California developed the standard, organic standard, actually came from cooperatives. There were people who worked in the co-op who said we can't call everything organic. So let's develop standards. So there were a few people who organized and there were a few cooperatives that became backbone. What later became California certified. And now the U.S. certification is actually a little bit, I should say a lot, deluded from the California certification. So California certification is still a lot more stringent and more rules than is the U.S. Well, if the loose dictionary definition is something you grow that you don't use chemicals in fertilizer or you don't spray to get rid of the bugs. But then there's a lot of details involved in there too. Like last time the government wanted, you know, to have genetically modified and still call it organic and we said no, we can't do that. And we actually want that. But then we raised another concern about labeling of GM. We lost that battle, remember that? So it's Trader Joe, Safeway, and Rainbow, they all use the same organic standard? They're supposed, if a product says organic, it should be organic. The difference between though, if you get something from Trader Joe, apart from it being usually in plastic, is that they sell organic and commercial side by side. So for one, they're not really wedded to the organic principle. Secondly, they're also mixing the commercial and organic containers side by side. But they're segregated. Somewhat. Okay. But thank you so much. This was a great crowd. I don't know about you, but I really feel uplifted after being so depressed last night. Thank you for coming. Really, really appreciate the crowd.