Not-for-profit fruit and vegetable-buying co-operative has been successfully extended to Mosgiel, where it attracts up to 50 customers a week.
The Otago Healthy Living Trust's Fruit and Vegetable Co-op has been run from All Saints' Anglican Church, in North Dunedin, since early last year.
The co-operative aims to combine the buying power of a large group with volunteer labour to cut costs and ensure no-one goes without good food.
Organisers say it is important to enjoy good nutrition and to take pressure off people's weekly household budgets.
The co-op offers parcels of fruit and vegetables at well below normal retail prices.
Customers pre-order the parcels, containing a combination of fruit and vegetables. A single person can receive a week's supply for $3.
A couple's supply costs $6, and a family of four can receive about two bags of produce for $12.
Mosgiel co-ordinator Margaret McConnachie said the co-operative had opened a Mosgiel outlet last July and now attracted between 30 and 50 customers a week.
Twenty volunteers staffed the outlet, a villa beside St Luke's Anglican Church in Gordon Rd.
'‘We're a happy group and we do have fun.''
‘‘I love it. It's an excellent scheme. I think it's wonderful.''
Even people with jobs faced financial pressures, and the fruit and vegetable parcels provided a good way of keeping costs down.
The parcels were pre-ordered each week and could be picked up and paid for in cash at the house each Thursday between noon and 1pm, and 5pm and 6pm.
People coming in for their parcels also enjoyed having a chat and the friendly atmosphere, she said
‘‘The customers that we have, we can have a good good joke and laugh.''
She stressed they were not competing with other food outlets.
‘‘We're never going to take all that much away from supermarkets,'' she said.
The Mosgiel operation had strong community involvement through its volunteers and backing from St Luke's and she greatly enjoyed taking part.
And she is keen for the initiative to be better known in Mosgiel.
■The Fruit and Vegetable Co-op can be contacted at www.fruitvege.allsaintsdn.org.nz.
