Our GM told you about our new market study recently (blog post if you missed the email) and some of you had questions we thought would be good to answer for all of you.

Q: Aren't market studies costly? Where do funds for this come from?

A: Market studies do come at a cost and we're happy to say that ours was written into the $75,000 grant funding we received this spring from the Chicago Region Food System Fund.

Q: Why do we need a new market study NOW?

A: It's important now for a few funding-related reasons:

• We will be fundraising this fall and our prospectus will need up-to-date financials in it, including a recent market study...and of course having this one come in strong as it did makes our prospectus offering that much more appealing.

• We need current market study results also for our bank loan and for the TIF funding we're pursuing; neither would accept our older studies. It's standard for co-ops to need more than one during development; early ones help you plan while the one close to bank closing makes the loan (and in our case also TIF) possible.

We are nearing the home stretch after years of organizing and will begin buildout once we're fully funded. As Dan notes, that's summer 2023 on the outside, but could be somewhat earlier if our community joins us in the fundraising quickly (more on that below!). Owner equity (being an Owner) is part of that funding, but we also need to raise beyond that in order for the bank to feel comfortable lending to us.