Food Co-op

Anyone can start or join a co-op with their neighbours, school network, workplace or anyone local to you. Co-ops are led by their members, but Elizabeth House is here to provide guidance on getting started.

Please fill in this short form to register your interest, and the organisation nearest you will get in touch to support you. If you are unable to fill in the form you can ask someone else to do this for you, or you can email MGAssistance@manorgardenscentre.org or call 07483 149 519 to speak to someone.

Please do also join our Islington Local Food Cooperatives Network Facebook group to start chatting to others in Islington who might be interested in starting or joining a local cooperative.

Islington Food Cooperatives Leaflet

What is a food cooperative (co-op for short)?

A food co-operative is a group that comes together to give people access to food (and other household items) at affordable prices. A food co-op describes different types of approaches but in Islington we are encouraging local residents to join or start up their own food buying groups.

The way a food buying group works is simple – the group decides on what items the group wants to buy and how much each member should contribute. By pooling the money, co-ops can purchase large amounts of food at wholesale prices. As a co-op you can also register with local shops, supermarkets, restaurants and food suppliers to get deliveries of surplus food – food that is perfectly edible but is excess, on its sell-by date or out of season.

Each co-op is owned and run by its members, so you decide together how to manage yourselves, how much your membership fee is, what you want to buy, and you share the management responsibilities together. We’re also here to help you set up in any way we can.

We’re working with Cooperation Town, who have a great online Starter Pack and Resources with more information.