Our goal: to better serve members and ensure long-term sustainability for our member –owned co-op
We sincerely care about our members, and are committed to providing you with the best, most trusted shopping experience every day. It’s been like that since 1956, when Calgary Co-op acquired our first food store from Alberta Co-operative Wholesale Association to better serve Calgary members.
After careful review, with strong oversight and approval from our elected Board of Directors as your representatives, we are positioning our food business to further enhance our focus on Calgary with more local products and communications tailored specifically to you. Our food stores operate in a very competitive environment under continuing challenging economic conditions in Calgary. Positioning our food stores so that they are your shopping destination for local, healthy and convenient shopping experiences is important for us to truly reflect your evolving needs as a member-owner.
In the Spring of 2020, we will make three major commitments to elevate the customer experience we provide you in our food stores:
1. A tailored assortment of products – focused more on local, healthy and convenient items.
2. A fresh Calgary Co-op flyer, exclusively for our members – loaded with savings and inspiration.
3. A new range of private brands, exclusively available at our stores – providing you with quality, value and relevant products for your lifestyle and kitchen.
This effort makes us laser-focused on local relevance. It is driven by our members and their desire for choice, quality and everyday value. It provides us with the flexibility to focus our merchandising, marketing and IT programs, ensuring the long-term success of your member-owned co-op.
We will have a new food distribution partner to supply our food stores, the Alberta-based distribution arm of Save On Foods. The exception will be our High River food store, which will continue to be supplied by Federated Co-operatives Limited (FCL). Our food store purchasing relationship with FCL will end in the spring of 2020, except for the High River food store. We respectfully notified FCL of this planned change and have invited them to work with us through a smooth transition in the interests of both co-operatives’ members and team members. We appreciate FCL’s ongoing support of our Petroleum business, as we plan to continue to procure our fuel and convenience store products from them. Our other lines of business do not purchase any items from FCL.
Calgary Co-op continues to work with an increasing number of local producers and growers, to ensure more local products are on our shelves.
Our connection to this city is authentically unique – our local head office, 3,800 locally hired team members, and over 400,000 member-owners right here in the Calgary area.
Right from our start in 1956, change and renewal have always been part of Calgary Co-op’s DNA, with an unwavering commitment to excellence in quality and personalized service. We have listened to our local membership and responded to your needs with regularity – whether it’s making the substantial decision to redevelop food stores into modern exceptional shopping centers, start selling wine, or increasing the autonomy with which we operate our food business so that we can focus on your needs more specifically. We understand that your world is changing rapidly, and so must we. Our first accountability is to you, our members. We continue to increase our customer-focus, making sure your visit to Calgary Co-op is an experience that provides the right assortment and services that you demand.