Journal of Co-operative Studies Vol 36 No 1

Short articles

A National Co-operative Archive

Gillian Lonergan, pp. 7-13

An overview of the UK co-operative archive, it's history, aims and collections.

Community co-operatives: A revolutionary model of rural community revitalisation 

Phyllis Winnington-Ingram, pp. 14-21

In the historical context of the merging of rural townships in Canada to municipalities, this paper looks at the role of community co-operatives.

Peer reviewed papers

Marketing and performance of fruit and vegetable co-operatives

Narciso Arcas and Salvador Ruiz, pp. 22-44

Agricultural co-operatives represent a significant percentage of the fruit and vegetable production in Europe. The objective of this paper is to analyse the marketing behaviour of the agricultural co-operatives, relating that behaviour to their performance. Information was collected from the managers of the co-operatives via personal interviews with a structured questionnaire. The results revealed that the co-operatives with more experience, resources and skills followed a diversification strategy, obtaining a higher efficiency (sales per asset) as a result of implementing marketing activities addressed to the last stages of the distribution channel and the consumer.

Success in retail co-ops

Roger Spear, Mike Aiken and Terry Newholm, pp 45-77

This paper is based on work carried out as part of a Society for Co-operative Studies research project on the co-operative advantage in the British consumer co-operative movement. This collaborative project was carried out by researchers from 3 academic institutions: CRU at Open University (leading the project), Leicester University Management School, and the UK’s Co-operative College (see the four papers in Journal of Co-operative Studies Vol 33 No 2, 2000). This paper reports on a comparative analysis of case studies in the following sectors: Dairy produce; Non-food produce; Travel; Funeral Services; Pharmacies. The research is based on interviews with managers of these business areas within the different co-operative societies. This paper examines the nature of ‘success’, and the basis for success in these co-operative sectors. Through comparative analysis, it attempts to identify common features in the patterns of factors leading to ‘success’, as well as significant differences.