visit the market’s website:

the mission

A full-service grocer, the Gem City Market offers affordable, quality kitchen staples, including fresh produce and deli, as well as specialty local and organic products. The store’s worker-owners ensure exceptional service. Third Perk Coffee House operates a café on-site. And our many partners, led by Expressions of Life, coordinate community health and wellness programs in the community room, teaching kitchen, and small health clinic.

the idea

The idea for a cooperative grocery store began with a series of community meetings in 2015 that were organized by the City and County Department of Public Health. At the meetings, residents reviewed opportunity maps that showed the disparities in health outcomes and access to fresh groceries across Dayton, with high rates of diet-related illness and low access to groceries on the West side.

the research

Residents and stakeholders formed a committee to focus on the issue of food access. Through their research, they were inspired by a cooperative grocery project in Cincinnati, Ohio, the Apple Street Market, and began a business planning process to determine if and how a cooperative grocery could be feasible in West Dayton. With support from the City and County as well as the University of Dayton’s Business Research Group, the committee commissioned a professional market study and administered a market survey.

the process

Once they confirmed that a grocery store was feasible, the committee incorporated the cooperative Gem City Market, adapting the bylaws from Apple Street. With leadership from Co-op Dayton, the Market’s Board and supporters:

Developed a business plan and financial model
Negotiated control of a site on lower Salem Avenue
Launched a capital campaign and membership drive, raising $6 million to construct the Market and engaging more than 3,000 members prior to opening day
Mobilized dozens of partnerships across our region
Coordinated the construction and operations planning process

In 2020 and 2021, we built the Gem City Market and hired our initial staff.