Buying Club
The function of the Buying Club is to provide access to healthy foods without having to shop at Whole Foods or a big box grocery, to save money on delivery charges, to allow members to share larger quantities, and to gain experience with some aspects of running a grocery.
Members of the Buying Club place orders and wait with mounting excitement for these to arrive in the city. Upon arrival, the group order is sorted by member volunteers into individual orders. Each member then pays for and picks up their order and takes home their box of tasty food, perhaps including what they are going to bring to the next NOFC potluck in their order.
United Natural Foods is where we can order through our distributor.
Email Amy George-Hirons, the NOFC Buying Club Co-Coordinator with any questions, problems, or to request a login. Please include your first and last name and an e-mail address with your log-in request.
Some common questions about the Buying Club:
Where do I make a Buying Club order payment?
We are in process of developing an on-line payment procedure via Paypal. Please check on this page to see if it ready.
I’m a member of the Buying Club but I’ve yet to place an order. Frankly, it’s a bit intimidating. How can I get past that?
The first time was the most difficult for me. After I developed a list of “staples” then it’s just a matter of re-ordering from those, and browsing for other potential items, especially case shared items.
On the on-line ordering system, it shows for most products two boxs, “PREF” and a “Max”. What do I do with these?
For these, only cases of products are available. “PREF” is the quantity you prefer, and “Max” is the quantity you would be willing to order if others would order the rest, to fill the case.
I try to order a quantity of one of an item that does not require a full case be ordered and I get an error. What is that about?
For some items you will see MMQ=3 or similar, Apparently this means the minimum per member quantity is 3.
How do I view partial cases that others have ordered and that I may wish to add to and help fill?
Just click on the “Sharing Items” hyperlink near the top right-hand side of the window.
Whom and how do I pay for my order?
You pay for your order when you pick it up. The best way is to write a check that will be made out to NOFC. We are not set up to take credit cards.
Where do I pick up my order?
The UNFI truck, being an 18-wheeler, cannot get to most residential streets. So a volunteer or two meets the truck at a truck stop, currently the Mardi Gras truck stop on Elysian Fields Blvd. at I-10. The volunteers take the orders to a volunteer’s house and divide it up into individual orders. We normally announce the pickup location and time to this list and to the website.
Can I have my order delivered?
The NOFC is all volunteer-based, and right now we don’t have a delivery team. If someone else who lives near you also places orders, you could work out alternating months on the pickup, but there’s no delivery service. If you would like to volunteer to coordinate this service, just let us know!
Am I limited to the items listed at the store on the Buying Club site?
For now, yes. One day we hope to carry local products too.
When a product is listed as 12/9.5oz, does that mean I’m getting 12 items each weighing 9.5oz?
Exactly.
Can I get a printed copy of the supplier’s catalog?
Yes! Contact Amy George-Hirons at mailto:bcorders@nolafoodcoop.org to request a catalog.
Didn’t the Buying Club used to sell local products?
It is true that we used to handle local products such as locally roasted Fair Trade coffee, Louisiana sugar and rice, local honey as well as organic produce from Pastime Farms. Well, the coffee roaster is still operational, and the honey guy is still going, but we have lost our contacts for other products and Pastime is gone. Many folks would love to set up a local supply again, if you are interested in helping contact your NOFC Buying Club Coordinator.
Can you please send me specific information about the nola food coop, like how much does it cost to join and a list of available food items? Thanks Ramona
do you guys take food stamps or is that impossible because you don’t take credit cards. taking food stamps and advertising at the office would widen your customer base to people who have limited income and are severely suffering from institutionalized racism, and the lack of neighborhood groceries.
Ramona–
Send an e-mail to info@nolafoodcoop.org to be added to the Buying Club list. You will then be able to access our club’s ordering website where you can see a full list of available items. It’s pretty much everything you could get at a natural foods grocery except for fresh produce (we’re working on that one!). There is no cost to join the Buying Club itself, although all members are expected to work one shift every six months. We do recommend that Buying Club members consider becoming Founding Members of the Food Cooperative itself, to help support our efforts to open a storefront in New Orleans. Membership in the co-op is a $100 equity payment to become part-owner of the store.
Rachel–
It is our intention that the grocery storefront will take food stamps when we are finally able to open it. In order to make full participation in this effort to open a cooperative storefront possible, we are offering a $25 membership level to those for whom the $100 level would represent a financial hardship. We are not able to allow for the use of food stamps for the Buying Club itself, unfortunately.
Best,
AmyGeorge
NOFC Information
Note: For prompter reply to comments, please also cc them to info@nolafoodcoop.org
Is it any cheaper to buy from the food co-op than it is to buy from Whole Foods? Is it as cheap as such outlets as Trader Joe’s or is it cheaper? Some of the prices I saw listed on the catalog link you included seemed just as high after doing the unit per case math. Am I misreading this? Is it just that some items are the same or more expensive and others are cheaper? If not, what is the benefit of being shopping with the food co-op instead of Whole Foods?
@ grocerygetter
I have used the buying club now for a couple of years, and to tell you the truth you have to shop it just like you would shop anything. If you do a lot of price comparisons to decide what to purchase when you shop a store, then you should do that with this as well. Some items are cheaper, some are not, just like any other store.
To be honest though almost no one shops at whole foods for the price
And one advantage that the Buying Club catalog has is that a lot of products are available in bulk. In fact there is a much larger selection of bulk items in the buying club catalog than are available anywhere in town. And when you purchase bulk items, that is where you see a real savings.
Additionally, the larger the club order, the large a discount you will see on your invoice. The club gets a volume discount from the warehouse that ranges from 2-5% depending on the size of the total club order, so your final price goes down there as well.
I usually get a lot of my perishables from the farmers markets, and I order my staples every month through the Buying Club, and then my trips to groceries are very hassle free and usually only for a couple of things, so I use a hand basket instead of a clumsy cart. Strangely enough, being in the Buying Club has made my trips to regular groceries much more pleasant.
And on a personal level, I like the buying club because it represents an alternative, something the grocery scene here in NOLA truly lacks. And I like meeting folks in the club, it has a fun social aspect to it as well.
Aaaah, Trader Joe’s. An option that New Orleans does not have and is not likely to have at any point in the near future (they have been approached by some New Orleanians in the recent past and have stated that New Orleans does not match their target demographic or some such). Anyhow…
It seems to me that the canned goods probably hit a similar price point to Whole Foods. The commodities (ie bulk foods), though, are significantly cheaper, especially if you can convince a lot of people to go in on an order so that you can order in 25 or even 50 pound increments.
I just got some folks to go in on my flour order with me, for example, and was able to get good, high quality flour (not organic but still really good) for 51 cents per pound, so $5.10 for 10 pounds of flour–pretty cheap, I think!
So it definitely depends on what you’re buying.
The benefit to me is being able to really think about what I want to buy and putting my order together collectively with my club members rather than getting into the grocery store and losing sight of what I really wanted and ending up with a pile of things that I didn’t mean to get. By pooling orders, I do sometimes end up with things that I wouldn’t normally have bought on my own but some of these end up being things that I’ve then gone on to incorporate into my regular shopping list (one example: agave nectar). So it’s a different way of exploring food options and, I think, more social.