Coop Coup

THE MANAGEMENT and directors of the Harvard Co-operative Society are scared. For the first time in the 86-year history of the Coop an alternative slate of members is opposing the ten stockholders' nominations for this year's board of directors. Management's fear is largely a fear of the unknown--understandable, but in many ways, unnecessary. Any revolution within the Coop board will be small and peaceful.

Wes Profit and Steve Roose, organizers of the campaign, did not choose a radical slate. The 16 opposition candidates share an interest in combining the continued good management of the business with improved relations in the community the Coop serves.

The group is unlikely to endanger the Coop's complex and delicate financial status. By not opposing the nomination of any of the stockholders' proposed officers, except for one vice president, the opposition slate seems to recognize the need for having experienced professionals on the board to add continuity to management and to recommend the most prudent business policies for the Coop. By controlling a majority of the board, however, the group hopes to use its strength to formulate new policies affecting employees, investment, and the community of Cambridge. While this plan for division of the responsibilities and concerns within the board may seem a viable compromise, it could create real headaches in application.

Professor Milton P. Brown, Coop president, foresees the possibility of defection by Coop management personnel if the new board institutes unacceptable or unworkable programs. The Coop's Harvard orientation has always granted M.I.T., and Brown fears that the selection of the entire opposition slate might cause real disaffection down Mass. Ave. M.I.T. accounts for 20 per cent of the Coop's annual $15 million income. "We just can't afford to alienate M.I.T.," Brown said. "If we lost them, the Coop would be in real trouble." Roose and Profit, however, see little danger of a bolt by M.I.T. if the new directors keep their pledge to give clear priority to the profitable and smooth management of the Coop.

Sometime this week the opposition slate will meet for the first time as a group to formulate its strategy and ideas. It faces the challenge of co-ordinating a campaign to draw a quorum of eligible voting members to the general membership meeting next Wednesday afternoon. The Coop by-law define a quorum as five per cent of the participating members of Harvard, M.I.T., and the Episcopal Theological School, or a little more than 1500 members. If, as in the past 85 years, not enough members show up, the stockholders' slate will automatically be elected. It appears likely, however, that if the Coop can secure a large enough meeting hall, the alternative slate, through concentrated promotion, will attract a quorum.

The slate is depending on its plans for change to excite student interest. The structure and nature of the Coop, however, severely limits the chances for extensive or exciting transformation. As yet the candidates have no formal planks, but their general program calls for investigation into two areas: alleged employee grievances and proposals for developing a more effective community role.

The present Coop management is well aware of many of its problems and in most cases has already taken unpublicized steps to investigate, correct, or refute these complaints. The opposition charges that the Coop discriminates in its hiring practices, since there are few black salesmen and no blacks in managerial positions. Jay Wilson, personnel manager, however, states, "The Coop has actively recruited through the Action for Boston Community Development, the largest agency in greater Boston working in the poverty field. The Coop's advertising has been concentrated in Cambridge and the surrounding communities because this is our prime recruiting and market area. All of our Help Wanted ads include the statement: 'An equal opportunity employer.'" The only way the Coop is legally allowed to count the number of its minority group employees is by a yearly head count. As of March 1968, the Coop had 604 employees, of which only 44, or about seven per cent, were from minority groups.

Related to hiring practices are the group's grievances over job training, wages, and unions. However, in these areas the Coop's record is remarkably good. For instance, between July 1967 and April 1968, the Coop ran five training programs for 75 disadvantaged youths recruited through ABCD at a cost of twenty thousand dollars. The Coop pays wages competitively with the other retail stores in the area. Contrary to the opposition's claims, no employee earns under the minimum wage of $1.60 per hour, while the average employee wage is $1.95 per hour. In addition, employees get liberal fringe benefits, including a 20 per cent discount on merchandise for the first year and, thereafter, at cost, group and hospital insurance, sick pay, and paid vacation. As in most retail stores, the employee turnover is high (ten per cent per month) and the average length of employment short (four months), but for the more stable work force the benefits are at least competitive with other retail stores, and better than many.

The Coop has been charged with trying to suppress union organization among its employees, yet there seems little documented evidence of this. Presently two unions have contracts with the Coop. The tailors belong to the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America and Coop drivers belong to the Teamsters Union Local 504. Three years ago the Teamsters tried to organize the sales clerks, but the movement died from lack of interest, not from any attempt by management to chill unionism.

Community involvement is the area in which the opposition candidates feel that their new majority on the Coop board could be most effective. As Profit puts it, "We believe that business today should have a social conscience." The Coop's financial structure puts severe limitations on any investments. Necessary expansion in the bookstore annex and the new Med School Coop have caused the Coop to be debt financed by the Harvard Trust Company. One of the terms of the present loan agreement is that, "The Company will not, directly or indirectly, make any investments in the stock, securities or other obligations of any other person, firm, or corporation." Thus, the Coop simply cannot invest in any other co-operative community venture.

If the Coop cannot invest its money, it could simply donate it effectively. The new board would have several alternative sources for such charity. Presently they could either siphon it out of the Coop's profits, but then it would be taxable and would mean a further reduction in patronage refunds; or they could take it from the Coop's annual charitable contribution, which amounts to about seven thousand dollars, six thousand of which goes to the Community Fund. The Coop just does not have very much money. What money it does earn, it either pays back to the members or plows back into the business. The opposition slate for the board of directors is aware of this fact, yet it feels that it could bring to the Coop the kind of knowledge and sensitivity that could not only make more effective charitable contributions with what little funds are available than is presently being done, but could also improve the image of the Coop in the community.

Even if the group's takeover bid succeeds next week, the Coop appears unlikely to change very much. The movement to change the system from within, however, has at least raised some serious questions about the Coop's social responsibility. Whoever governs the Coop for the next year cannot help knowing that pressure is now on to reevaluate some of the Coop's basic employment and community policies.