July 2026 - Richard Marks

I'd like to speak to this, that 50 years ago, the Breyer Patch, the co-op here, started in 1976.

In a few other places, this turned out to be 1976.

Mountain People's Warehouse, which was a big food company, has now become UNFI, 50 years ago.

And Peaceful Valley Farm Supply, a 50-year-old business.

And back in 1976, when I came here to work Peaceful Valley Farm, I just kind of looked at the history of co-ops at the time because they were the big deal.

Co-ops were a big deal in that time because they actually mostly started with buying clubs where people would buy bulk food and split it up.

And that was one of the things that Mountain Peoples did.

It supported all those buying clubs.

And it was a niche that not many distributors really went for.

And especially in the mountains, more people back to the landers would need commodities like grains and beans and all those things.

And so that's how it began.

But just a review of co-ops in the Bay Area.

Like the Twin Pines Co-op started in the 60s in Berkeley, the Twin Pines Co-op.

Briarpatch of Menlo Park started earlier than the Briarpatch here.

And it seems to be that I don't remember exactly the history, and we're going to have a guest on that's going to come on a little bit, might shed some light on that.

But the Sacramento Natural Foods Co-op, 1975, Davis Food Co-op, late 70s, Chico Co-op, Arcata Co-op.

Auburn Co-op, there was a co-op before the Breyer Patch moved there in this 2023.

It was the Auburn Co-op, which was called the Tree of Life.

Bill Drake, who was a longtime employee of the Breyer Patch, started his food business with the community store in Auburn.

And we the people up in Lake Tahoe, there was a co-op up there.

And so that was there.

Davis Farmers Market began.

All those things in the 70s.

The 70s was an active time of the awareness of food and farming at the time.

And so that's kind of our background.