WATERVILLE — Downtown local foods store Barrels Community Market, which closed for restructuring a month ago, won’t be reopening anytime soon, and directors aren’t sure if it will open again at all.
Members of the Waterville Food Cooperative, which operates Barrels at 74 Main St., were told by an emailed letter Wednesday morning that the market “won’t reopen as planned” and that the cooperative itself may dissolve.
David Shipman, executive director of the cooperative’s board, said later Wednesday that doesn’t necessarily mean the store will close permanently, but that its future is up to the co-op’s 175 members. He said the board still hopes to reopen, even if it is in a different location or on a smaller scale.
At the beginning of August, co-op officials said the market would close for a month to restructure, and Colby College planned to help the market come up with a business plan.
Barrels started six years ago as a project of the downtown economic group Waterville Main Street. The intent was for the store to become self-sufficient. In 2013 the co-op was formed and took over the store, but it hasn’t been able to sustain itself financially.
“Having exhausted all known avenues for keeping Barrels Market open, the Board of Directors is sorry to announce that the Barrels Community Market physical storefront cannot reopen as planned,” said the letter to co-op members signed by the co-op’s board.
The letter asks members to attend a membership meeting next Wednesday “that will be pivotal.”
“We need your vote on some important decisions we as a cooperative have to make, including the question of whether to continue on as a cooperative,” the letter says.
They initially estimated a re-opening date of mid-September.
Before it closed, the store sold locally grown produce; bread from nearby bakeries; and crafts such as wooden cutting boards, hand-knit socks and hats and greeting cards designed by local artists. A small lunch menu offered some prepared foods.
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