SOUTH LOS ANGELES — Every two weeks, South Los Angeles resident Bahni Turpin greets smiling customers on her front porch as she hands out orders of fresh, organic produce. She founded SoLA Food Co-op and says offering healthy food is something she saw a need for after she moved from Hollywood to South L.A. 16 years ago.
“I realized I was still buying groceries in my old neighborhood, Hollywood, because I wanted to buy organic food,” Turpin said.
She had a hard time consistently finding organic produce nearby so a relative suggested she open her own grocery store. Turpin, who is an actress, laughed at the idea but it got her thinking.
“Somewhere along the line, a light bulb went off and I was like, 'what if I didn’t own the store? What if the community owned the store?' And so I started researching co-cops,” she said.
This was back in 2011 and several years later, Turpin officially launched SoLA Food Co-op where community members pay a fee to own a share in a business that sells healthy foods, typically from local vendors. Turpin said the plan is to open a physical store in South L.A.’s food desert, which has organic offerings but you can’t always count on it.
To make matters worse, a nearby Ralphs grocery store is closing its doors as Los Angeles mandated workers earn extra “hazard” pay during the pandemic.
Mikaela Randolph, the SoLA Food Co-op board president, says now there is an ever greater need for healthy grocery stores.
“We’ve haven’t been able to convince grocery stores, well-known grocers to come into our community and we’re also seeing that our experience in the stores that are available in our community are just sub-par,” she said. “You don’t feel values, like, you don’t feel like your time is valued, your dollar is valued.”
Chris Temblador is a business counselor with the non-profit organization L.A. Food Policy Council and works on tackling food deserts.
“It’s very pricey to be able to buy fresh, affordable produce and food here, locally,” he said. “Often times, vendors required minimum orders to be able to purchase high grade quality produce.”
He works with existing corner market stores to make room for fresh produce, by helping them invest in equipment like refrigerators, which can cost upwards of $8,000, to store produce. He also helps foster relationships between produce vendors and store owners.
“In order for the food system in L.A. to change, those discussions need to happen at the micro level in order to make an impact not just in the city, not just in California but even globally,” Temblador said. He’s already worked with 56 corner stores in L.A. and plans to get produce into all 1,300 stores by 2025.
As for Turpin, she says SoLA Food Co-op plans to find a physical location for their store this year and turn a decade-long dream into a reality.
“My vision for this store is to have a place that this community owns, that we own, that we take care of ourselves, that we bring back a sense of self-sovereignty.” She said. “