Montavilla Food Co-op Seeks Volunteers

We are looking for volunteers to host house parties on behalf of the Montavilla Food Co-op. If you live in the Montavilla or surrounding neighborhoods, please talk to your friends and neighbors and invite them to your house for a party/potluck. We've been checking in with other start-up co-ops around the country that are in the middle of their membership drives and many have said the member house party/potluck was a boost for their membership numbers. So we've adopted this campaign as well and we have a handful of them coming up. We're hoping to find willing hosts for 12 parties in the next 6 months. It's certainly a great way to meet your neighbors!

Think about it this way: If each current member were to find 2-3 friends & neighbors to join we would gain 240-360 new members. Then, if every member (~450 at that point) helped bring in 1-2 more new members we would have 900 - 1350 members!

It's easy to host a co-op house party ? just work with us to set a date, invite your neighbors, and we'll do the rest! Please email our Outreach Committee with the following information: Your address, dates you are considering, ideas, and any questions you might have.

A member of our Core or Outreach team will come to your house and give a short talk about: what is a co-op, brief history of co-ops, brief history of the Montavilla co-op, and why co-ops are good for the community. This will last no more than 15 minutes followed by questions & answers.

Other ways you can participate:

Board Nominations

Nominate yourself! Nominate a neighbor! Run for the Montavilla Food Co-op Board of Directors! We are gearing up to elect a Board of Directors from our membership. We're looking for members who will take an active role in the development of our co-op. As a board member you would help make sound decisions that would lead us to the goal of opening our storefront co-op. If you've taken the step of becoming a member, now just take one more step for the co-op and serve on the board. For more information email our Outreach Committee.

Business Committee Chairperson

Our Business Committee is looking for a member to join the committee and become the chair. As chair, you would:
Ensure business committee meetings are conducted regularly
Serve as the meeting facilitator as needed
Recruit Business Committee members as needed
Serve as the committee spokesperson, summarizing and reporting activities to the Core team
Participate in business committee activities, contributing to grant applications, research, and work with committee volunteers

Become a Committee Member

We are seeking new energy and ideas for our committees. Serving on a committee is a valuable way to gain experience starting a business, working with a variety of people and getting creative about promoting our co-op.

You can join one of the following committees:
Core Committee - our acting Board of Directors, decides on issues that affect the entire co-op, discusses issues relating to the development of the co-op

Outreach Committee - organizes our effort to promote the co-op in the community, builds relationships local businesses/organizations

Business & Planning Committee - handles co-op finances, develops and helps guide co-op timeline

Information Technology (IT) Committee - coordinates website, Facebook, Square account, Twitter, PayPal, member & volunteer database and other IT tasks

Remember, please tell your friends and neighbors about the co-op, why you joined and why you think a food co-op in the neighborhood would do well. Your choices matter to your friends & neighbors. You might be surprised who joins the co-op so tell everyone!

We would like to thank all of the awesome co-ops in Portland and around the country who are supporting us, not the least of all People's, Food Front, Alberta Co-op Grocery and Equal Exchange. Thank you for your continued support!