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Wall Street bouncing back, Main Street hurting Houston grocery in danger of closing
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By Craig Moorhead
Special for the Argus
“I’ve been here since the beginning,” Tony Denstad said. Tony, who manages the Root River Market in downtown Houston, is an experienced grocer. He worked for, and was a part owner of a Caledonia grocery store for 25 years before helping open the cooperative grocery in Houston nine years ago.
In the summer of 2000 when Tony took his present job, Houston had been without a grocery store for two years. Today with tough times hurting sales at the co-op, the town could find itself without a grocery again.
Denstad remembers what it was like a decade ago when community members pulled together to re-open the grocery store. “It took a couple of years before this concept came up,” he recalled. “At that time there was nothing in the store. It was just a gutted building. I supervised the placement of all the equipment. The Root River Market Board had set it all up and had things ordered and knew what they wanted to do. We opened on the first week in November in 2000.”
The co-op sells shares at $100 per family. “We have over 400 shareholders,” Denstad said with a trace of pride. “Each can only own one share, one share per household.”
The store needs everyone’s business to make the concept work, Denstad explained. “We’re open to everyone. We don’t do a discount (for members). We’re hoping to pay the bills and retire the debt and somewhere down the line declare a patronage dividend, so the more you buy the bigger your dividend. We try to send out quarterly newsletters that have special coupons that are just for the shareholders. A lot of it is (driven by) community pride and it gives people ownership. Of course we need to have sales from non-members. We encourage that also.
“Our sales have grown over the last five years,” Denstad reported. “This year with the economy hitting the skids, the growth has stopped. We’ve gone backwards in sales. We’re just trying to bring people the knowledge that if we continue (like this) we might not be here next year.”
Wall street may have shown some signs of recovery in recent weeks, but main street is struggling. Denstad notes how other groceries have closed this year in Lanesboro, Lewiston, and Winona, just to name a few.
“It’s because of the economy,” he stated. “Because overhead has gone up…everything involved has gone up but our sales.” Denstad spread his hands. “We’re not any different from other grocery stores in the area and in the country. Not only grocery stores but all kinds of small businesses. It’s small business that’s taking the hit and the ones that are really trying to struggle to stay there are the ones that are going to take it even worse.” He stopped and chuckled, “We don’t have that pocket that you can reach into and say ‘Here we go, this will get us through.’ We’re just trying to keep it going and we need to make people aware, because it’s their store.
“What happens when the grocery store in your hometown is closed, and your grandparents don’t drive but they’re still living at home? Who’s going to help them get groceries?
“We’re convenient, but we’re also necessary.” Denstad paused, “It’s not just the grocery store, it’s the hardware store, the bank, the school. As a small town, we need all those things.”
Denstad said that people from La Crescent or Caledonia or Spring Grove should patronize their hometown stores too. He grinned and added that if someone from Caledonia wants to come over and shop in Houston, they’re more than welcome.
For a small town, he said, Houston is still a thriving community. “We have the core of everything. We have gas stations, mechanics, the hardware store, a beauty shop, accounting office, and a lot more.
“When the town didn’t have a grocery store, it was really difficult for a lot of people. I’ve always felt that the grocery store, any grocery store that you go into, especially in a smaller town, is kind of the center of the community because you run into people; you stop and talk. Often it’s people that haven’t seen each other for a while. So it’s kind of a meeting place. You can stop and talk for an hour because you’re not bothering anyone. You’re not getting in anyone’s way. After we opened a lot of people commented that it was just so nice to see people again.
“We have wonderful support,” Denstad added with a smile. “We just need for people to realize that it’s a difficult economy.”
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