Mad River Market members consider a change in direction

By Colleen Gundlach

Norfolk residents who invested in the Mad River Market (MRM) in the past will be interested to note that a new initiative has been launched to revitalize the market cooperative that was sidetracked by the onset of the Covid pandemic. A group of former board members of the co-op has stepped forward to revitalize the group and determine its future. The movement has not been without controversy, however.

The Mad River Market co-op was formed back in 2016 when the Super Saver store in Winsted closed. Super Saver had been within walking distance for Winsted’s senior housing complexes and for other lower-income residents who lived in the downtown area. John Dwan, then owner of Super Saver, approached Community Lawyer Charlene LaVoie and Bob Geiger, who was Winsted’s town manager, to talk about the possibility of creating a co-op market to take over the grocery store when Dwan retired.  After several discussions, the pair reached out to Economic Development Commission member Philip Allen and several community members. LaVoie then organized the corporate structure for what became the Mad River Market project. The group received a Rural Seed Grant from the Food Co-op Initiative to support the initial study and up-front costs.

Beyond that, the business model was that the largest part of funding for the project would come from the sale of shares, at the cost of $200 for a regular share and $1,000 for a preferred share. At the time, Allen, who has now retired, said, “It’s a one-time purchase, not a yearly fee. One person, one share, one vote. No one person will have controlling interest.” Many Norfolk residents are on the rolls of member/owners who purchased shares at that time.

Planning for the market had been on a back burner until earlier this year, when Kathy Engle-Dulac, a former board member of Mad River Market, posted a notice on the market’s Facebook page on April 10, stating that an email notice had been sent out to the 360 members of the co-op, inviting them to a Zoom meeting because “It has been entirely too long since we have shared thoughts and space with each other.” This notice was followed by an invitation, also posted on the Facebook page on May 3, to attend a meeting and vote on the future of the co-op, set for May 10. The three options put forth for a decision were: 1) dissolve and return $10 to each member/owner; 2) elect a new board of directors and keep organizing or 3) combine with a different co-op group in New Hartford.

On May 17, it was announced on Facebook that 76.7 percent of shareowners who voted decided to move forward with the “New Hartford team.” It was decided at that Zoom meeting, attended by an undisclosed number of people, that the Mad River Market would combine with a group from New Hartford that is working to find a replacement for Brigidio’s Market (formerly Marandino’s), which went out of business last year.

The reaction on Facebook, which was the main source of information about the meeting itself, was instantaneous. Former Winsted Town Manager and MRM owner/member Joshua Kelly summed up the feelings of most of those who posted saying, “For those of us who didn’t get emails (seems like there are many of us), info about voting was posted just four days ago – nothing before that suggests that there was a vote to move the business to New Hartford. Four days’ notice on a Facebook page that has been fairly inactive over time is hardly fair.”

Another owner/member commented that if the market is not going to be in Winsted, then money should be refunded to members.

Charlene LaVoie, who has 30 years of experience as a community organizer and is a graduate of Quinnipiac University law school, was the founding lawyer of the market. She resigned in 2020 as Winsted’s community advocate attorney, but she still has an interest in making Mad River Market work and attended the Zoom meeting.

“The group wanted to send out a survey,” said LaVoie. “I advised them to reconstitute the board and have a formal meeting. Many of the people with whom I spoke had an interest in joining with the New Hartford group.” She says the Zoom meeting was not a legal meeting designed to make decisions, but rather a discussion to see if there might be interest in such a collaboration with New Hartford. “There is a lot of interest in working with New Hartford, but we can’t just do that. Before a decision can be made, the board needs to be reconstituted and we need to have a formal meeting to put the pieces back together.”
LaVoie, while not a member of the MRM board, is providing pro-bono legal help to the group, working to get the files back together and start fresh. “We hope to rekindle an interest in Mad River Market. We have 360 members. This is a clarion call to the membership.”

Engle-Dulac agreed, saying, “I’m just grateful that the member/owners are dedicated enough to the vision of a cooperative grocery that they pushed to get things moving again and are showing up.”
“If Mad River Market is to become a reality, we need meaningful, significant participation from our member/owners,” said LaVoie. Any members who want to join the Board of Directors (or non-members who would like to participate in MRM) are asked to write to madrivermarket2025@gmail.com.