Intros

Victoria, vista for the Jones Falls Watershed Association spoke about mint that is available to be harvested from Octavia's Garden at the corner of Guilford and Lanvale Sts.

Jamillah - newsletter
After some debate, we agreed to send out this first mailing in hard copy form. We would include a notice that all subsequent newsletters will be sent via email. We will be happy to continue
mailing hard copies to any member that notifies us by mailing in some sort of notice. Lots of ideas were generated:
include store hours, phone #, address, history of this co-op, general co-op info, wish list for the co-op (mop, fridges, etc),
various subcommittees and their heads - invite and encourage
members to join a subcommittee
We decided our general meeting will be held August 7th - we will include this in newsletter
Luke suggested we have newsletter ready on a Friday (Jun 3rd?) and enlist Friday and Saturday store volunteers to help with folding and mailing

We agreed on once a month meetings - 1st Sunday of each month at 6 pm. Most agreed that it will be more efficient to meet once a month as a whole and meet more often with our smaller subcommittees.

We agreed that by the 3rd Thursday of each month, all subcommittees shall have met and emailed a report of the meeting to Steffany, who will compile the reports and send them out to the
listserv.

As food buyer, I brought up my need for having some system for deciding what to carry in the store. We decided it may be best to agree to carry vendor's items on consignment at first, to see how they will sell in the store. Also - specifically about bread - it has been a highly requested item, and yet hasn't sold so well even when only small orders were made. I will order even smaller amounts for next week and then we can build from that if demand increases. I will also look into sprouted varieties, which have been requested. Brands are available from Neshaminy, yet they arrive frozen and we don't have the freezer space yet. I will be placing a large order with Neshaminy on Sunday because we have the money at this point to really stock up on nonperishables. Margie will be assisting me and will be ordering in specific items that she'll need for her classes (see below for more info on classes). I
requested that anyone with any burning requests for what we should carry, look up the product code and email me that as well, if possible.

Matt - treasurer
We have $1600 in our account and $500 in Fusion account. We have been bringing in more sales lately and are on firmer financial footing. We still need more detailed tracking of sales and inventory and purchases to get a clear picture. Matt and I will be meeting soon to discuss finances and food buying.

The possibility of joint purchasing with Red Emmas was brought up again. Margie will pass my contact info on to them so I can forward them the availability lists for who we are purchasing
from and talk about a relationship.

Here are a few things that we need to focus on (it's not quite a master list, Gretchen, but it's a start) tracking inventory, daily sales, spoliage, etc to get a clear, detailed picture of what's selling
we need more nonboard members to volunteer on subcommittees
food stamps application fridges pricing worker training
alarm - apparantly it goes off randomly in store, yet alarm company has no record of our account buttons/bumper stickers that we discussed at last meeting "go-box" to be used for fairs and festivals that's stocked with banners, flyers, etc

Volunteers needed:
Sowebo festival is next weekend May 29th - we have a booth and need volunteers - contact Nora Charles Village festival is Jun 4 and 5th and we need more volunteers - contact Luke

Margie will be teaching classes on Monday nights starting Jun 6 and will need one other person to assist each night. I will be assisting on June 20th. The classes start at 7:15, so Margie will
probably need you around 6 or 6:30.

Gretchen - Kazuri let us know your request for the manager priorities and no one seemed to have it or be too clear about what they were - if it was covered in a meeting, hopefully it will be in
the minutes.

The meeting was adjourned at 8:30