Associated Grocers Co-op, Inc. (Atlanta, Ga.) Records

The Associated Grocers Co-op, Inc. was organized in 1929, by eight Atlanta Jewish grocers, who met at the home of Dr. Irving Greenberg. Faced with competition from chain grocery stores, which could buy and sell items less expensively, the Jewish grocers organized a buying group that would have the economic power of the large chain stores. Associated Grocers Co-op Inc., originally founded as Atlanta Saving Stores and later known as Quality Service Stores, bought merchandise collectively, and in turn, sold it to their member owners at the lowest possible cost. At the end of each year, if the margin of markup was in excess of expenses, the excess was refunded to the member based upon the member’s purchases. The organization was owned by the member groceries, who collectively participated in setting the policy for the organization. The membership remained entirely Jewish until the 1930s, when it expanded to include grocers from the larger community, as well as from grocers and convenience store owners throughout Georgia, and some in Alabama. By the 1960s and throughout the decades of the 1970s and 1980s, the first generation of Jewish grocers were getting older and began to think of retiring. Most of the small stores were not passed down to the next generation and simply went out of business, or were sold to non-Jewish owners, often Korean-Americans. Racial strife in the 1970s also contributed to the demise of the individually-owned grocery. With fewer and fewer stores dependent on the organization, Associated Grocers Co-op closed in 1988.