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Grand Opening of Prairie Food Co-op Was Cause for Suburban Celebration
- Bob Benenson
- Jul 10
- 3 min read
Big Crowd Showed Up for Grand Opening Ceremony That Was 13 Years in the Making
It was a long hard road for the organizers of the Prairie Food Co-op Community Grocery in the west Chicago suburb of Lombard. But given the anticipation for the store, which was 13 years in the making, it was easy for the Co-op's team to draw a big crowd on Wednesday (July 9) for the ribbon cutting and an opportunity to be among the first to shop at the store.
Kathy and Jerry Nash, co-founders of the co-op, wielded the scissors for the ceremonial ribbon cutting. The audience included a number of Prairie's 2,500 owners (paid shareholders who gets benefits and a say in the store's operations).
The first impression upon entering the store is that it is, in fact, welcoming. Though relatively small at 8,000 square feet, it has enough variety to provide a one-stop shopping experience. The store's aisles are comfortably wide, and while the opening day checkout lines were long, there were no human traffic jams.
The inventory at the store leans heavily toward better-for-people-and-the-planet products. As a full-service store where sourcing practices are a work in progress, most of the products on shelf where from national producers. But I made an eagle-eyed search for local brands, and the photos below are some of those that I found.
Lifeway kefir is produced in the Chicago suburb of Morton Grove.
The store sourced meat products from Fischer Farms of St. Anthony, Indiana (top photo) and Jake's Country Meats (Cassopolis, Michigan).
Ernesto Rodriguez, founder/owner of El Molcajete Sauces (Evanston, Illinois), provided samples of his organic tortilla chips (fried in coconut oil), mole sauces, chili oil and fresh salsa.
Chomps, based in Chicago, uses pasture-raised meats in its popular meat sticks.
Local craft beer and spirits producers were well-represented in the beverage section.
Can't get more local: Spiritus Coffee Co. roasts and processes its beans right in Lombard.
Who's that old guy with the camera? I'm not a selfie person. But I was happy to run into friend Dave Abrahamsen, a local resident who is founder/owner of the Please Evolve brand identity and marketing strategy creative studio, who kindly took this photo.
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Prairie is the third food co-op to open in Chicago metro over 14 months. Food Shed Co-op, in the far northwest suburb of Woodstock, opened in May 2024, and Wild Onion Market in Chicago's Rogers Park neighborhood opened about one month later.
With the pre-existing Dill Pickle Co-op in Chicago's Logan Square and Sugar Beet Co-op in near west suburban Oak Park, the newer stores bring the number of food co-ops in Chicagoland to five.
What all of the newer markets have in common is that they were a long time coming. The organizers of Prairie Food Co-op started their journey 13 years ago; Food Shed and Wild Onion also took 10+ years to open. Chicago Market in the city's Uptown neighborhood is still under development after more than 10 years.
It is difficult enough to open any independent store in the financially challenging, chain-dominated grocery retail space. It is especially difficult to open a co-op store in Illinois, in part because of a 1913 law still in effect that places a tight limit on the size of investment that any individual can make in a co-op (which makes raising sufficient capital very difficult).
We hope that state policymakers will recognize the contributions that co-ops make to our local food ecosystems and will remove some of the obstacles that make it so hard to bring these projects to fruition.
Local Food Forum congratulations Prairie Food Co-op for successfully running the traps and wishes the best of success.
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