From looking at the success of coops in rural America, you can see a pattern of latticework: members of one supplies-purchasing coop are often member of the another coop to take their produce to market, a mutually reinforcing system of deepening relationships and community resiliency. In the recent economic downturn and this summer's drought, the number of cooperatives had shrunk while coop employment went up; the USDA speculated that a number of coops had merged rather than close.