Interviewer: Anne Gessler

Location: Wheatsville Co-op, 3101 Guadalupe St. Austin, Texas

This interview is a production of Foodways Texas and took place at the Perry Castañeda Library, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

Wheatsville Food Co-op is the longest established grocery cooperatives in Austin, opening in 1976.

While it began as a small, cash-strapped venture depending on volunteers to run its store, the cooperative has grown into a respected member-owned business in its own right, grossing $14 million a year and enjoying over 10,000 members. Wheatsville employs a paid staff, and unlike some cooperatives that require members volunteer their time, it operates as a consumer cooperative, in which members buy shares in the business. Wheatsville’s success has depended on its hybridity: in order to satisfy a broad range of customers, it sells not only specialty, vegan, vegetarian, and natural and organic goods, but it also serves as a neighborhood grocery for daily shopping. In contrast, says General Manager Dan Gillotte, other food cooperatives’ mission is to supply goods that are strictly “natural” or organic; “most co-ops are more ‘pure,’…Wheatsville promotes local and organic, but we’re very responsive to our members in what we carry” (Dan Gillotte interview in Eat and Drink Austin Magazine