New Food Cooperative Taking Root In Coos County

Following the award of $47,500 in New Hampshire Community Development Finance Authority tax credits to the nonprofit Androscoggin Food Cooperative (AFC) in June, the chair of AFC’s board of directors outlined the organization’s history and plans going forward.

The cooperative, which encompasses the communities of Berlin, Gorham, Milan, Colebrook, and Jefferson, is a community-based initiative to establish the region’s first community-owned, full-service grocery cooperative.

Aims include reducing food insecurity in Coos County communities where access to healthy, fresh, affordable food has been a challenge.

The tax credits will support outreach as the co-op’s directors work toward selecting a site and raising capital.

Pamela Laflamme, AFC’s board chair, described the beginnings, some delays, the path now being charted, and the use of the Littleton Food Co-op as a model.

Regionally, AFC’s effort advances as the Caledonia Food Cooperative, also years in the making, prepares to open on July 8 in St. Johnsbury.

“The Androscoggin Food Co-op is a startup co-op project,” said Laflamme. “We were incorporated in 2019 and were just about to get things underway in early 2020 when the pandemic started. We had a rough couple of years trying to do the work necessary to get a grassroots project going. We weren’t getting a lot done remotely.”

After much turnover in the past few years, the co-op is at last settling into having nearly a full board, said Laflamme.

“We have been lucky enough to receive funding from a few small private funders to help us with technical pieces of the start-up work such as a financial feasibility study and market and sales forecast report,” she said. “The tax credit allocation which we received for capacity building has been used in a previous round of funds to hire a marketing and outreach coordinator. We were able to get a phenomenal individual to help us last summer, and she was instrumental in doing events last summer in areas that are considered part of our market area, but in which we haven’t yet established a presence.”

The co-op saw an infusion of members late in the fall of 2025 and saw small, steady growth through the winter and spring of 2026, said Laflamme.

“Our board just had our annual board retreat and is excited to start the summer season getting out into the surrounding communities to do outreach activities,” she said. “The funds from CDFA will be utilized to continue work on marketing and outreach. We have just about 375 members, but need another 200 to get to the point of choosing a site and working on the site selection activities. We will be utilizing the tax credit funds to do exactly what they are intended to do — build capacity and membership, and with that, we hope to find ourselves starting to assemble a site selection committee to get started on the next big milestone.”

She cited some sources of inspiration.

“Littleton Food Co-op is our model and we are so excited to see the Caledonia Co-op opening,” said Laflamme. “Local ownership, working with regional farmers and producers, investing in the local community, and keeping those dollars local are among the values we hold as a cooperatively owned entity. We are energized to see this work and its impact on community become a reality.”