Eating Well and Keeping it Local

A colorful sign boasting groceries and fresh produce invites pedestrians of the Kalamazoo Mall inside, where they might find that this is no average grocery store. Petite yellow signs cry out, Local! Organic! Whole! Natural! Tomato coconut curry love soup wafts from the deli corner to meet with the scents of hemp and incense. Unkempt beards and wild dreadlocks scurry about gathering their cherished fares, politely excusing themselves as they squeeze past one another in the tight aisles. Employees quickly approach the obvious first-timers to offer needed guidance.

The People’s Food Co-Op downtown Kalamazoo does not aim to compete with the massive grocery conglomerates on the outskirts of town. The not for profit Co-op seeks to provide organic, locally grown and natural products at a reasonable cost. This task tends to be quite difficult in the United States, where corn, wheat and soy based processed foods are heavily subsidized. In comparison, farming legislation gives almost no incentive to farmers who grow fresh produce. Going against the grain, the People’s Food Co-Op tries to tackle this issue and offer an alternative.

For some customers People’s fits with their environmentally conscious lifestyle. Others simply have to know what exactly they’re eating, and that it’s healthy. A few only come in for one hard-to-find snack that fits their gluten-free diet, but a core group of members do the vast majority of their grocery shopping at the Co-op. Their requests dictate the inventory carried and they can browse vendor catalogues to make personal orders for items not already available. The most die-hard members arrive with cloth grocery bags and empty jars, leaving with them full of bulk grains, pasta and beans and a beaming smile.

Members of the core group also include the young, trendy staff members. Heather Finch, 22, works as the assistant manager at People’s and like most employees, spends much of her free time hanging out and shopping there as well. Following nearly three years of employment at the Co-op, most customers refer to her as the “co-op girl” when they see her somewhere else in town. Even with her modest income she eats almost entirely organic and only shops elsewhere when she needs a bottle of wine.

“I eat nasty food sometimes too,” Finch admits, “but when I’m eating well I feel better.” Does she feel like she is giving up a lot to eat this way? “Yes- the potential for thousands of dollars of medical bills.”

Mainstream America commonly assumes that an organic diet would be too expensive. Evidence to support this theory inhabits any conventional grocery store, where sad-looking organic strawberries cost more than double what genetically-altered pesticide-laden cartoon-sized strawberries do. Boxed macaroni and cheese costs nearly two dollars at People’s, while the standard bright yellow version holds strong at $0.49. “Look at the ingredients! You have to know what you’re paying for,” Finch counters.

Though the list does not reach even half the length of that of a Twinkie, it may make you reconsider your appetite. The cheese-like sauce for this “enriched macaroni product” produced by Kraft Foods contains whey, milkfat, milk protein concentrate, salt, sodium tripolyphosphate, citric acid, lactic acid, sodium phosphate, calcium phosphate, milk, yellow 5, yellow 6, enzymes, and last but not least, cheese culture. To make this substance edible, the chef must add milk and some form of a butter-substitute. Those that choose the higher price for a more natural macaroni and cheese dinner pay its producer not to add some of these ingredients to it.

This goes for produce as well. Organic eaters have to pay extra for farmers not to process their crops into packaged foods laden with salt and sugars. They pay them to farm the old fashioned way, without chemical pesticides and genetically altered seeds. They pay so farmers can earn a decent living without hefty subsidies from the government.

Another employee preaches to the choir from the produce section. “Food just tastes better when you know where it’s coming from, that the land was farmed with care, and that the farmers were paid well. It has a whole other flavor.”

Kalamazoo College student K’tanaw Schiff, 20, agrees. She proudly declares that her whole suite enjoys using the co-op, as her roommates include vegetarian and vegan consumers. The variety of products at People’s also has enough options to fit within Schiff’s kosher diet. “I’m okay with paying more because their stuff tastes better. Its local and animal friendly and I support that.”

How much more are they really paying? Finch disagrees that it’s too expensive for most to eat organically. “If you buy grains in bulk, shop at the farmer’s market, and buy what is in season, you can eat cheaply and organically at the same time. But you have to take the time to cook.” Lucky for the cooking-challenged members, the Co-op community collaborates to sustain a bank of recipes, with copies of recent ones hanging above the produce for anyone to bring home. They coach each other on cooking techniques of vegetables with names that are rarely seen in a one-stop-shopping complex.

In offering natural and organic foods People’s encourages an overall healthy and environmentally friendly lifestyle. They live by the three Rs, reducing, reusing and recycling as much as possible. They minimize energy use and support local businesses including farms and health stores. Local music and artwork also sell well at the Co-op, recent additions to the inventory.

The activities at the Co-op represent a greater movement among American culture demanding real food at reasonable prices. The farm bill will be up for renewal this year, and hopes are high that per-unit corn subsidies will finally decrease in favor of healthier produce. With low income as the best predictor for incidence of obesity in the country, people are starting to take notice. Many other illnesses can be traced to poor diet and some members of the American populace want to go back to their roots.

Finch says “you have to decide that you’re worth it. Your body is worth healthy food.”