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As evidenced by this comment thread on Brownstowner, residents of hyper-quaint, Victorian-house-filled nabe Ditmas Park care an awful lot about the grocery store situation in the neighborhood. Fuss is being raised over the news that the Associated on Cortelyou Road, which has been there for 30 years, is being bought out by a local food co-op. Excerpted from the comments, a few quotes:
"I agree that the co-op is unreasonably priced. It's also disgustingly small and filled with morons, strollers and obnoxious brats."Also mentioned in the comments, but not fully explored: the degree to which gentrification/class issues are at play here. Organic produce shops are always so divisive."the Associated always struck me in a funny way. When I began shopping there I felt as though I had drifted into the only store in a small sleepy town. The place gave me a feeling of dullness. And tiredness...By the way, the Coop has narrow aisles. Yet the store, with its "health food" sensibility seems to attract a lot of people who can barely slip through those close passages. What gives?"
"I have long called the Flatbush Food Co-op the "very expensive compost store." A real flashback to the old days when "organic" produce meant "tiny rotting brown apples" and such."
· Streetlevel: Organic Boom on Cortelyou [Brownstoner]