Village Squire, 1980-04, Page 8Judi and Art McMichael have this sign
outside of their Goderich store.
Soon Vivien will be getting a partucr in the business, Eric
Eberhardt, manager of the Perth County Food Co-op in Mitchell.
Vivien's store, Gentle Rain, is named appropriately in the
Festival City. She took the name of her store from Shakespeare's
Merchant of Venice.
In Grand Bend, Mary Morrice chose the name "For
Goodness Sake" because it portrayed the light-hearted aspect
she wanted to convey. A friend jokingly suggested it and she
liked it and took it.
Mary prepackages everything in her store, except the spices.
She prepackages because of space limitations and in the winter it
allows her to keep items in cold storage upstairs. She finds
prepackaging eliminates guesswork and trying to visualize how
much an item weighs and costs.
Mary can barely keep up with the demand for her own baked
whole wheat bread. She admits though, when the business
increases in the summer, she probably will get baked goods from
another source.
ARVA FLOUR
Mary buys her flour from Arva Mills in Arva, Ontario who use
a slow milling process. Normally, vitamin B is lost because the
steel rollers produce heat and destroy it. But in Arva, the slow
milling saves the vitamin B. She sells it at the same price as the
mill does.
Like Vivien Dawson, Mary does not sell vitamins. She wants
people to get their vitamins naturally in food. She doesn't see
vitamins as a good substitute for practicing good nutrition.
Mary would like to sell dried and crisp banana chips. But all
she can find are artificially coloured and flavoured chips. But
when the day comes when she finds a natural banana chip, she'll
supply her customers with one of their favourite requests.
Fruit and nut mixes or trail mixes, are a popular seller in the
store. So are peanut butter, cheese and spices. Her best selling
PG. 8 VILLAGE SQUIRE/APRIL 1980
flour is a mixture of two thirds unbleached white and one third
whole wheat.
Jana Natural Foods sells the same items as the two other
stores, but there's a difference. Judi and Art McMichael sell
wicker items and wooden toys at the back end of the store. The
McMichaels stock a greater variety of prepackaged foods such as
salad dressings, teas, juice, potato chips and coffee subsitutes.
They even have an herbal cigarette with no nicotine.
A bread which Judi Flails unusual is essene bread. The main
ingredient is organically grown wheat. The wheat is sprouted. It
is very heavy and moist --darker and heavier than whole wheat
bread.
Other novelty items are arcauna eggs, which are light blue
in colour and fertilized. They also sell home made jellies --tomato,
pineapple and pepper flavour. A tasty snack is toasted
corn --expanded corn toasted but it's not popcorn.
For spring they are selling nylon kites, puddle jumpers and
pocket frisbees. They hope to expand into kitchen utensils and
local vegetables.
MUSIC IN THE AIR
One of their customers commented, "Ijust love the shop. I like
the atmosphere - there is music in the air. I can get products here
that I can't normally buy in a supermarket. I like the variety. And
1 like the idea of no additives."
In the store, customers can either measure out their own food
or let Judi do it. People can bring their own glass or plastic
containers for peanut butter, molasses and oils. Like Gentle
Rain, the customers are charged about 20 cents if they must buy
containers.
Both Judi and her husband Art are from the Seaforth area.
They now live in Dungannon. After having her fourth child, Judi
stopped teaching kindergarten Her husband
used to work away at construction during the week. Judi had
worked in a natural foods store before. It seemed a likely