New Co-op Group Website

The new Co-op Group website has now been up-and-running for a little while, so its time I gave it a look over. After you've successfully logged in with your member's card number and your postcode, there are various items to look at. There is thye facility for moderated discussions (although only one has been held so far), and online quick polls and petitions, details of how to put Co-operative ethics into action, and details of how to contact your democraticly elected representatives (including a link to this site!) There are also pieces on how to take part in the Co-operative Climate and Community Challenges. There is also a calender that will tell you which Co-operative events are coming up in your region.

The "Manage Your Profit Account" section is protected behind increased security questions, and on your first visit you will need to provide answers to these. Inside, you can select how much of your dividend payment is donated to community dividend projects (none, 25%, 50%, 75%, 100% or the "odd pence), choose whether to recieve dividends as cheque or voucher, "partner" cards together so that many cards can contribute to one account, and view your current and past dividend calculations.

However, there are a few problems. Some of the content is missing or incomplete, such as the contact details for some of the forthcoming events. And I am unable to log-on from some computers, with no resulting error message. Once these glitches have been ironed out, though, it'll be great.

National Co-op Group Interim Accounts Reported

The key figures from the Co-op Group accounts from the first half of the year have been reported. Shame that the full accounts are not yet up on either of our websites.

We have apparently seen a 12.5% increase in operating profits and a 3.2% increase in turnover, which is of course welcome. As mentioned in the post about regional results, though, our Co-operative is made up of very different businesses, and the detail from each one is needed to see how well we are really doing.

Co-op Bags Do Biodegrade

Proof positive that our carrier bags do indeed degrade as promised.

Offsetting Controversy

The Co-operative Group use carbon offsetting in three ways - both to offset its some of its own emissions, to make some insurance and mortgage products "green", and to use as a membership gimmick, like when we were at the PINK festival. However, there is some degree of controversy about their use by "big business" - and most people agree that stopping an emission of carbon is better than offsetting it.

George Monbiot has joined the debate over at the Guardian, and has been replied to by someone from Climate Care, a sort-of-for-profit company that provides the offsetting process to the Co-op Group and lots of other businesses and individuals.

My position, for what it's worth, and repeated from a previous post here, is that while offsetting is clearly not as good as reducing carbon emmissions to begin with, and some of the maths may possibly be a little dodgy, planting trees and providing more efficient technology to third world communities can never be a bad thing...

Another Merger?

Sheffield Co-operative Society (who don't have a website that I can find!) and United Co-operatives are discussing a merger. As I've said before with respect to a different merger, the needs of the members will hopefully be foremost in the minds of those in charge. Ideally, such a merger would combine the benefits of economy of scale with a continuation of local membership events and local identity. Easier said than done, though.

Member Communication at Mill Road

I can't fault Mill Road Co-op as a shop at the moment; it always seems to have a decent number of customers and full shelves when I pop in, but in terms of member communication things aren't quite so rosy. When I paid a visit on Saurday, there was still no members' noticeboard. The "stand for election" poster was still up (considerably after the closing date for applications), and there was no sign of the notice for the half-yearly meeting to be held on the 10th October at the Gonville Hotel in Cambridge. I'll get in touch with the regional membership team so that this oversight can be sorted out.

Co-op Environment Event in Cambridge

The Cambridge and East Anglia area of the Co-op Group is organising a meeting from 7pm to 8.30pm on the 5th October on the subject of Climate Change. This meeting, which I think is organised in partnership with Friends of the Earth, will examine how we as individual citizens, as Co-operators, and as a society can help prevent catastrophic climate change.

You need to be a member to attend, but there will be able to join on the night. Places are limited, so if you wish to go get in touch with the Central and Eastern Region as soon as possible on:

membership.central&eastern@co-op.co.uk

The event takes place at The Pitt Building, in Trumpington Street, Cambridge (between Mill Street and Silver Street). I hope to see some of you there!

More Co-op News

This fortnight's edition of the Co-op News features a member of the Cambridge and East Anglia Area Committee .... but this time it isn't Rowland! Kathy Hamilton (from Trumpington) is featured half-way up the climbing wall at the PINK festival. I am ashamed to say that I was given the same opportunity, but chickened out!

Also featured in this edition is a call-to-arms by Professor Stephen Yeo, claiming that the time is right for bold, largescale Co-operative ventures in industries such as the railway or water.

More local interest is the report of the Co-op Party conference, in which it is reported that Joe Gluza - a local Co-op Party member, and like all the best people, a member of the Cambridge and East Anglia Area Committee of the Co-op Group - spoke against Nuclear Power, calling for more work into "clean coal" technology, and an end to the plan for a "plutonium economy".

Co-op Sandwiches

I was talking to a bloke in the pub last night. He knew that I was a "Co-op Man", and said that although he loved all the Co-op's ethics, Fairtrade, divi etc., he couldn't stand our pre-packaged sandwiches, which blighted his view of us.

It's funny, because I've always quite liked them (especially the beef and parsnip variety). What do you think? Are we putting off customers with nasty sandwiches?

Half-Yearly Regional Results

The new Network Magazine (see below) includes details of the regional results for the half-year from mid-January. In total, in the Central and Eastern Region, we have had sales of £302.5m (up £8.4m on this time last year), and made a profit of £8.3m (up from last year by £2.3m). So a good half year for our region?

Well, sort of. These figures are made up from four very different businesses: Food Retail, Travelcare, Funeralcare and Pharmacy (other businesses such as the Co-op Bank, CIS, Farmcare etc. are not reported on a regional basis). Of these, Food retail has seen a 2.3% increase in sales, leading to a profit of £5m (compared with £2.6m in the first half of last year). This is a reasonable performance, but we are still losing out in terms of market share, and much of the profit increase arises from reduced central overheads, rather than expanding operations. Nevertheless, Food Retail results are turning the corner, and are back contributing the major part of our bottom line.

Travelcare, by contrast, is having real difficulties with the changing nature of the travel business. More and more people are booking online, and organising their own holidays. Although we do have a growing online presence, we are struggling to break even, as can be seen from our £0.1m loss in this region, compared to a £0.7m profit last year. In my opinion, the way forwards for Travelcare has to be in cross-selling: we have thousands of food shops up and down the country that can have a small space promoting deals that can then be booked with us online - this is an advantage over most other direct sellers who can manage much less "real-world" promotion.

Funeralcare in the region is plodding on - the death rate is falling, but we are still running a profitable funeral business, which sounds like a win-win situation to me! We made £0.9m profit (up £0.4m) on sales of £10.4m.

Finally, Co-op pharmacies (of which we have plenty in the East of England) are still bringing home the dough. Profit is up slightly to £2.5m on increased sales.

Unfortunately, the breakdown by area was discontinued last year, and it has not been brought back this time. Instead we have a couple of pie-charts showing the share of sales and profit between the five areas that make up the Central and Eastern region. I think it helps to promote an increased feeling of ownership amongst members if the results for their individual areas are published, so I will raise this point again at the first opportunity.

Of course, the most important issue is what we do with all this profit that we have made: investment in the business, distribution to members and good causes, and support for the Co-operative Movement.

Posh Magazine

The new, brand-compliant Network magazine came through my letterbox yesterday. It is replacing the old (local) Network and (national) Your Society, by having a mix of national and regional news.

First impressions are good. It seems thicker than the previous publications, and looks very professional. News updates are useful, and include the potentially unpopular (department stores closing), as well as the positive (pharmacy acquisitions, fairtrade etc.). It includes details on the Co-operative Climate Challenge I mentioned here, as well as news on our environmental events (more news from me soon on this), our actions on reducing retail crime, and our regional interim report. There is also a story on how some credit unions in the UK are now able to offer banking facilities such as cash and credit cards.

And again, if you haven't received one of these magazines in the next few days, then you are probably not on the Members Network. In order to be sent information and ballot papers, and to truly play your part as a member of the Co-op Group, get in touch with your regional office - details can be found on the members website

Co-op Group Membership Going Through Roof?

On the launch day of the new membership website, I mentioned here about the little counter at the bottom of the page claiming to show the number of total members. It was then reading 3,536,019, and increasing with time.

Well I've been keeping my eye on it, and it doesn't seem to be a complete fake (as I feared at first), with a simple linear increase per day reflecting the estimated number of new members. It has in fact shown a huge increase of 15,642 members over the last 16 days: that's a rate of 40 new members per hour, night and day! The behaviour with time is a little strange as well: I'm not sure what happened during yesterday when 2012 people joined in less than 7 hours, as you can see from my ever-so-slightly obsessive graph:

Dudley Co-op Gives Advice to World Superpower

The Federal Emergency Management Agency of the US have been searching for ways to deal with the unpleasant aftermath of a national disaster, such as Hurricane Katrina. And when it comes to the arrangements for the unpleasant task of removal of the dead from the streets, apparently the Dudley branch of the West Midlands Co-op are the world experts - even though the only recent disaster to occur in the town was the collapse of a sports ground into mineworkings - with no injuries.

Search Terms

By using a web statistics package, I can find out which search terms have brought visitors to this site. Its always interesting to find out what people are most interested in, so here's the list for the last week or so:

3
cooperative community challenge in somerset

3
sam tudor co op

2
ilkeston merger of co-operative societies

1
brampton,uk climate in july

1
pink festival cambridge

1
ilkeston co-op and midlands co-op merger

1
cambridge co survey

1
houghton co-op regis fire

1
simon sedgwick jell

1
co-op instore radio

1
rainbow saver anglia

1
cambridge co ops on milton road

1
pink festival 2006 cambridge

1
paraguayan rum

1
tara a bit

1
ilkeston co-op merger

So there you have it. My blog is simply a vehicle for people to learn more about rum, the West Midlands farewell "Tara-a-bit", and Simon Sedgwick-Jell.

Trumpington Co-op

I was in Trumpington the other day, and popped into the Co-op Group shop there. I seem to be making a habit of dropping into very small branches of the Co-op recently, as this must surely be our smallest in Cambridge and East Anglia. It used to be a newsagents, and we are keeping it more or less in the same line of work by designating it a "CTN" format store: i.e. one where most of the business will come from confectionery, tobacco and newspapers. However, we have made it into a bit more of a Co-op type shop with the inclusion of a chiller cabinet with sandwiches, pasties etc. The Trumpington branch have been very good in the past at having a good array of membership posters and leaflets, and this was still the case at my visit.

Book Review #1: "Co-op: The People's Business"

This is the first in a non-regular series of reviews of books about Co-operation.

I start with a superb book predominantly about the British Consumer Co-operative Movement, entitled Co-op: The People's Business. It begins with the first, unsuccessful movement begun by Dr. William King in Brighton, the formation of the Rochdale Pioneers, and the social conditions that made Co-operation so vital. The book then continues chronologically through the expansion of Co-operative societies, their amalgamation, decline and through to the date of writing; 1994. Information on the Co-op Guilds, the Co-op Party and the Woodcraft Folk is included as part of a look of which activities were open to Co-operators at the height of the Movement. There are also a couple of chapters on the international Co-operative movement, which were later expanded by the author to become a book of its own.

The book is written in a very approachable style, and will not dazzle anyone with complex sociological jargon or analysis. It is predominantly the story of the trials and successes of the Movement written by a sympathiser, and is an excellent introduction to Co-operation.

Tha author, Johnston Birchall is senior lecturer in social policy at Stirling University, and is a well-respected researcher into the Co-operative Movement and Co-operation in general.

Co-op: The People's Business is out of print and difficult to acquire through most bookshops, but it is currently for sale through the Co-op College online bookstore for £14. If anybody would like to borrow my copy, please let me know.

Last Night's Co-op Party Meeting

Although we also talked about retail Co-ops, credit unions, forthcoming events etc., the main event of last night's Co-op Party meeting was the nomination of potential Labour parliamentary candidates for Cambridge, as explained below. There were lots of candidates to choose from, but we quickly whittled the list down to seven, including those with Co-op Party membership, and others who seemed compatible with the Co-op ethos and very able as well. In the event, we nominated three potential candidates: Nicole Murphy, Tariq Sadiq, and Daniel Zeichner. Hopefully any one of these will lend a sympathetic ear to Co-operative concerns and solutions in the city.

We also discussed the 90th anniversary of the Co-operative Party next year (it was set up towards the end of the first world war to protest at the shoddy treatment the Movement was getting from government), and what could be done to mark this occasion. Watch this space...

Phone Co-op in Top Five

I've talked about the Phone Co-op here before. Its now been reported that Which readers have placed the Phone Co-op in the top five phone providers in the country.

Co-op Party Meeting

Tonight sees the nomination meeting of the Cambridge and Saffron Walden Co-operative Party. Because we are affiliated to Cambridge Constituency Labour Party, we can nominate candidates to be the next Labour parliamentary candidate for Cambridge, in much the same way as affiliated trades unions can. We will be looking out not simply for general aptitude, but for knowledge of and commitment to Co-operative principles in our nominated candidates.

Manchester Pictures

Following on from this post, here are some photos from Manchester - first, on the left is me standing in front of the CIS tower, showing the solar panels on the service tower.
















Next, here's me and Robert Owen, in front of the headquarters of the Co-op Bank. There is an identical statue of Owen in Newtown, Powys - the town of his birth.














And finally, the plaque on Holyoake House, the headquarters of Co-operatives UK, formerly the Co-operative Union

United Done Well

It is being reported that United Co-operatives have posted results showing a 8.6% increase in turnover (to £1.1bn), and 34% increase in Gross profit (to £28m). United have, in the last few years, had some of the strogest results in the Movement - especially in terms of return on capital employed, where they are comfortally exceeding the Co-operative Commission target of 10%. Well done United!

I was Wrong

It appears that the Co-operative Community Challenge that I talked about is countrywide after all - so I may need to find my painting overalls ASAP. You have until October 15th to tell the Co-op Group about a project that needs some volunteer time - and then they'll raise a working party from staff and members.

The Co-op - the UK's Largest Farmer

Farmcare, part of the Co-op Group and the country's largest farmer, received £2.4 million in subsidies in the year 2004-2005. Now, it must be said that as I grew up in the Black Country, I have no knowledge about farming whatsoever. However, it is striking that according to the 2005 accounts, Farmcare made only £1.2 million in that year. Is this state of affairs normal throughout farming in the UK, or should we be worried that the government gives us a large stash of money, of which we lose half doing business?

Feeling Guilty

I unfortunately can't make it to the September area committee meeting on the 7th- the first one I've missed since my election. On the agenda are the usual trading reports, feedback from all the summer membership events, allocation of some Community Dividend dosh, consideration of some questions to ask the Chair of the Group Board when he visits the Region, and some other - more formal - business.

In Praise of .... The Guardian

The Guardian have made us the subject of today's "In praise of..." comment. You can see it here, although you should be warned that the level of debate underneath the piece from internet readers is at the usual, dire, Comment is Free standards.

It's Launch Day!

The new membership scheme gets launched today. This means that the old Blue loyalty cards should be thrown away, and replaced with the new white membership cards with the honeycomb picture on. If you haven't received one of these, then it is worth phoning 0845 090 1456 to find out why.

It also means that the new members' website is up and running. Unfortunately, I'm having some trouble logging in to the members' area, but the parts that I can access look pretty good, with good material on the Co-op's history, purpose, and what it means to be a member. Inside the members' area, we are promised discussion areas, online petitions, and full control of our profit accounts.

At the bottom of the screen is an area that states "Total members: 3,536,019". An hour and a half ago, it read 3,535,984. Is this really a real-time updated membership statistic? And have we really got over three and a half million members? (We had 1.5 million "potentially active members" at the end of 2005). I think we should be told.

Newnham Co-op

I popped to have another look at the Newnham Co-op today. Newnham is a very unusal Co-op - for a start, it's in just about the poshest area that Cambridge has to offer. Furthermore, despite how large my photo has made it seem, it is absolutely tiny. Despite this, it manages to stock and sell a large range of goods, and, from what I understand, is very popular in the village.

The place is packed uncomfortably full with shelves and stock, but the good people of Newnham don't seem to mind squeezing past each other in the aisles too much.

It would be churlish of me to mention the lack of noticeboard, as there is literally no space, but even Newnham Co-op manages to fit in a small array of membership leaflets just under the serving counter. So there's no excuse for any other of our shops!

The staff were very friendly, and I noticed that they knew some of the other customers by name, which is always nice to see.

All seems well at Newnham...

Joining Forces

It's been widely reported that the CRTG (the buying group conisting of all UK food retail co-ops) will join forces with Spar in buying a certain range of products in which bulk-buying offers oppurtunities for discounts.