In 2016, Al Norman of Sprawl-Busters fame wrote a story for the Huffington Post that’s as relevant today as it was on the day it was published. In the story, Walmart vs. Food Co-ops: Taking Back Our Food Chain, Norman writes:

If you walk into any of the 4,132 Walmarts in America that sell groceries, you will find only 11 percent of its produce was grown in the same state where it’s sold. That’s Walmart’s definition of ‘local produce.

A few other highlights:

• The more dominant Walmart becomes, the fewer opportunities there will be for farmers markets, food co-ops, and neighborhood grocery stores.
• Walmart’s emphasis is a profit-driven, one-dimensional “industrial-local” model, while food co-ops are dedicated to regional agriculture and building a better food system.
• A 2013 report for NPR found there was “little evidence of small farmers benefiting” from Walmart’s local sourcing.

We don’t mean to pick on Walmart here. But it is an easy target. It’s also a typical one. The way Walmart uses local is similar to the way other big-box stores and food retailers use it, which is so watered down that it’s losing meaning to consumers. Our co-op has been offering local products since 1936, when a handful of families got together to arrange for discounts with local suppliers on potatoes, maple syrup, and gasoline and fuel oil. Today we have more than 400 local suppliers do nearly $20 million in local-food sales each year.

By contrast, giant megastores just jumped on the local bandwagon a few years ago. In the process, they’re stretching the definition of local beyond recognition.

“But there is another definition of ‘local’ in America, one that is not found in the cavernous superstores,” Norman wrote. “If you walk into any of the estimated 330 food co-ops in America, you will see an emphasis on ‘locally grown’ products.”

Norman is dead on. Unlike Walmart, food co-ops were local before local was cool, and they adhere to local standards their big-box competition can’t touch.