State of the Co-op, October 2021

To Our Community,

Last week at the Co-op Board of Directors meeting, I presented a brief overview of the Co-op’s operations for the month ending October 2021. Below are the highlights.

Overall, activity remained relatively robust. However, the industry is experiencing scheduling delays from vendors, which is resulting in out-of-stock conditions for select products. Although the Co-op Merchandising team is managing well during this initial phase, we are not immune to these developing conditions.

The graphs below reflect data for sales, customer count, basket size, average price for gas and gallons pumped for the years 2019 through October 2021.

Sales

Grocery, Meat, Produce, Dairy, and Frozen Foods continue to provide strong sales growth. However, sales for the 9 months ending October are slightly lower than the same period last year ($65.55 million versus $65.63 million). On a year-to-date basis sales continue to exceed budget.

Financials

Customer visits for October are up over last year but remain lower than 2019’s figures. Average basket size is approximately $49.51 down from $54.12 last October.

Gasoline

Gas prices began the year at approximately $2.24 per gallon. At the end of October, the average price is approximately $3.32 or $1.08 more per gallon. Our average price is approximately $1.06 per gallon more than October last year.

For the month, we have pumped over 13,000 more gallons than the same period last year. Sales of our non-gas business was ahead of budget for the month and year to date.

Wrap Up

From all of us at the Co-op, we hope you have a great Thanksgiving! We will talk again next Thursday. In the meantime, remember to be kind to one another and to yourselves, and we look forward to serving you in our stores and at the curbside.

Onward and upward,

Paul

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Paul Guidone

Paul Guidone, CFA, spent the better part of four decades in the investment management business here and abroad. He held positions ranging from analyst through Deputy Chairman and Group CEO, at organizations such as Citigroup (US) and The HSBC Group (London and Hong Kong). He joined the Co-op in 2016 as the CFO and in 2018 became Strategic Advisor to the General Manager. Paul was appointed by the Co-op Board as interim General Manager in March 2020 and General Manager in September 2020. To contact, email PGuidone@coopfoodstore.com.

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