A SAMPLER OF RECENT SUGGESTIONS (APRIL 2008)
OF GENERAL INTEREST ... and our answers:

Please follow corporate WF example and eliminate the use of plastic bags. Give a discount whenever people use / bring their own bags. We must do this!

We are looking into this. We have doubled our bag refund from five to ten cents to encourage bringing your own bags, and started selling inexpensive ($1.99) Harvest bags last year.
Since the Cambridge Food Co-op was started in 1974, we have always hesitated to take actions that would encourage people to shop elsewhere. That’s why we carry the variety of foods we do – foods that you wouldn’t see in other “natural” food stores.
The founders of CFC preferred to educate rather than dictate choices. Also, if we did eliminate plastic, we would go through many more paper bags, which would not only use more wood for paper and more energy to create and transport, but cost a lot more.

Chris – Thanks for the answer on the bulk nuts. Anyone who puts their hand in the nut bin ought to be in the nut bin, if you catch my drift.

You are welcome, Pete – and yes, I catch your drift.
To those who missed the initial reply: we removed the nuts from the bins because too many people were putting their hands in the bins to grab a snack. While we didn’t want to add more packaging, we decided for health reasons that we had to remove the nuts from the bulk bins.

Colleagues: I was deeply disturbed to see your call for support of Cape Winds. The letter profoundly misrepresents the situation. Who wrote the letter? Was this approved as co-op policy?

Thanks for writing. I am the person who puts together the One Minute Activist. This is the third letter we have written in support of Cape Winds, starting in July 2003. If you have a rebuttal, please send it to me. We use many sources for the OMA. This time we used info from Greenpeace USA and the Mass Climate Action Network. Please email me with responses.
Thanks again,
-- Chris.

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