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Food, unlike money, actually does grow on trees!

by Allyson Kenning on 31 May 2010
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Food, unlike money, actually does grow on trees!

 Way back in the day, when I was a kid, it was a big deal in our family when the West Coast Seafood truck stopped in town, bearing with it a variety of frozen fish, theoretically from the West Coast.  There was an ad in the paper announcing the day the truck would be in town, my mom would make a note of it, my brothers and I would be mildly excited, and then one day my mom would come home with packages of frozen sole she would proceed to cook in the microwave.  This was a treat, believe it or not. 

My mother and brothers and I all liked fish (my dad hated it and we would have to have it on a night he was at work because he couldn't even tolerate the smell) and there really wasn't much on offer at the old Super Value, other than, perhaps, the odd iffy-looking piece of salmon once in a while.

Back then there was not a lot of variety in local grocery stores.  Feta cheese was pretty much unheard of and God help you if you wanted a sun-dried tomato. We had a great butcher shop, though, and a decent bakery, and if you were around back in the 80s and 90s, you might remember we had a funky green grocer, too, where Drift now sits.

The landscape of grocery shopping in Rossland has changed drastically in recent times however, a fact I find very unfortunate.  We are now a one grocery store town, with two convenience stores - and that's it.  Though Ferraro's has an excellent meat department, and you can get lots of cheeses and deli items (including sun-dried tomatoes and feta cheese), and there is a fish counter, I find it lamentable that there is only really one place in town to do grocery shopping, mainly because, as a person on a budget and without a vehicle, I find Ferraro's expensive.  I feel doubly resentful about this, when, on the odd occasion I get to go to Colville to grocery shop when a family member is making a trip, I find the same items there for about 50 - 70% cheaper that I do at home.

Without a vehicle, it's difficult to do grocery shopping in Trail at the less expensive stores there like Extra and the evil WalMart, because hauling groceries home on the bus is as huge pain in the you-know-what, and it usually winds up being a nearly day-long venture. 

Believe it or not, there are many people in this town who find spending nearly $5 on a jug of milk a hardship.  But when you have no other viable options, what do you do?  I have been to the farmer's market, and the items on offer there have, in my experience, been even more cost-prohibitive than the same items at Ferraro's.  People on smaller budgets simply cannot afford to spend $8 on a small bunch of organic onions, I am sorry to say!

So, in order to rely less on stores, I have taken some measures.  I do my own baking - breads, and other basic items.  There is no excuse for me not to; I am a trained baker, after all.  Last year I started some basic foraging, mainly for huckleberries because it was such a good year for them.  I filled my freezer as much as I could and I still have some left over.  I have a source of rhubarb right next door to me at my new home, which for me is like finding gold.  I have a plot at the new community garden.  At my previous home, I did some small-time gardening as the space was limited, but I did enjoy producing my own veggies and I look forward to doing the same this year.  I also plan on trying to forage from the woods a bit more this year, now that I have done some more research.  I take advantage of neighbour's fruit trees if I can (which also helps the bear situation), and I have a family member with a hazelnut tree in Robson that I really enjoy clearing off in September.

With all the focus on eating and purchasing local these days, which I think are both good things to strive for, I think finding a balance is possible if you are willing to be creative and do a bit of work.  But I still wish food purveyors would kind of work with the locals to make it a bit easier, because, you know, I haven't purchased chicken at Ferraro's in a year because I just can't justify the expense, and if Safeway (located four blocks away from my day job) sells a jug of milk for 50 cents less than Ferraro's sells it, guess where I'm tempted to buy my milk? 

Comments

About Adrian's comment

by Charlie Callahan on 01 Jun 2010 at about 11:18.
Adrian, I respectfully disagree with two things you said in your comment. "... food costs today are half of what they were a generation ago, in adjusted dollars." "As for lower income people, that's a very serious and real issue." The point of Allyson's column is the plight of low income people to afford food regardless of where it is purchased. The fact that food costs are lower than a generation ago hardly helps her today with today's dollars. As to your second comment, I find it redundant to the column. I agree that politicians are the enemy (the usual suspects), but low income people will have long starved to death before minimum wages are bumped up. I do agree with you assessment of Walmart (they no longer use the hyphen) and their tactics. Woe is the local independent businessperson, be it a grocer, bookseller, or pharmacist, when Walmart brings their circus to town. Thank you for the opportunity to express my opinions.

 Thanks for your comment,

by Adrian Barnes on 01 Jun 2010 at about 18:49.

 Thanks for your comment, Charlie. I brought up cheap food costs as a way to segue into talking about the real culprit: low minimum wages. I should have added something to the effect of, 'despite these low costs, lower income people still can't afford food, which speaks volumes about how low our minimum wages really are'.--ed.

I have to comment

by Adrian Barnes on 31 May 2010 at about 13:16.

I have to say a few words in defense of Ferraro Foods as a locally-owned business and responsible corporate citizen. The local alternatives, as Ally notes, are Extra Foods and Wal-Mart--two chain stores that attempt to undercut locally-owned businesses through low prices. Then, as has been documented in the case of Wal-Mart, when the competition is decimated, they raise their prices, while providing low-paying jobs with no benefits, undermining the local tax base, etc. Wal-Mart even goes so far as to dictate terms to its suppliers, so large companies like Coke and Kraft are forced to lower their prices and quality in order to stay viable. Nasty stuff.

As for Colville, prices are cheap there but then so is human life. The social safety net south of the border is pretty thin. Like your health care? Be prepared to pay more taxes and, consequently, higher food costs.

And once that's said, it's still a fact that food costs today are half of what they were a generation ago, in adjusted dollars. Local costs more, pure and simple. But it's easier on the environment.

As for lower income people, that's a very serious and real issue. In BC, the minimum wage has stagnated for far too long and social supports are being steadily eroded. However, this has nothing to do with milk prices at Ferraros. The politicians who vote for these sorts of policies are the real enemy.--ed.

Adrian, Ferraro Foods

by stan on 02 Jun 2010 at about 08:00.
Adrian, Ferraro Foods (formerly Rossland Super Valu) may be a "locally-owned business" with friendly staff, but before you go touting it as a "responsible corporate citizen", I would suggest you talk to some of the former employees who worked there back in the day when it was still located in what is now Pro Hardware. You would then discover how this family-run enterprise (a la the Walton Family of Walmart) engaged in its own Walmartesque-style business practices to bust a union and rid itself of its unionized employees, the majority of whom had worked there well over fifteen years and many over twenty. How were these employees rewarded for their years of service when Ferraros, after years of trying, finally found a way to de-certify a store which had been unionized for over thirty years? They were told to either accept the loss of their benefits and hefty cuts to their hourly wages or find employment elsewhere. I wouldn't call that the behaviour of a "responsible" corporate citizen, would you? And just to fill you in on one more thing, it was big, bad Extra Foods who offered to hire these former Ferraro Foods employees and who agreed to honour their union contract. The fact of the matter is, whether it's a small, family-run, locally-owned business or a giant corporation, money is money, and no matter how much you have, you always want more, even if it may come at the expense of others.

Well, you and I have already

by Allyson Kenning on 31 May 2010 at about 13:44.
Well, you and I have already discussed this on email, so you know where I stand. High prices are high prices; you can afford them or you can't. For the record, though, I still do about 80% of my food shopping at the Rossland's Ferraro's! I don't think it's a bad store at all - that's not what this is about whatsoever - and I love the staff there!