Cooperatives / Cooperativas

Of the three cooperative societies that were established many years ago in Funchal, with the purpose of supplying grocery items to their associates on advantageous terms, only the one from the 27th Infantry Regiment currently exists, established in January 1892 and whose statutes are dated September 30, 1891. The other two have long since disappeared, with the oldest of them, called the Cooperative Society of Consumption and Credit of Funchal, whose statutes were approved on April 29, 1875, having bought an excellent building on Rua do Esmeraldo, in front of Rua de Cristovão Colombo, where it set up a well-stocked grocery store.

This grocery store, which closed in 1880 because it only left losses to the shareholders, reopened shortly after under the management of two merchants who ran it for 5 years, receiving half of the business profits, finally being managed by another merchant, who kept it until 1888 or 1889, at which time the same grocery store was extinguished, due to the liquidation of the Society. Having the shares of the Cooperative of Consumption and Credit of Funchal been acquired at a low price by one of the shareholders, this person, without expending large amounts of capital, became the owner of the excellent building of the Society, which he managed to sell after many years, for about 40 contos.

The other cooperative we referred to was established around 1893, and lasted only two to three years. It set up a grocery store on the old Capitão street, but did not have its own property.

It is also worth mentioning a fourth cooperative, the Popular Cooperative, whose statutes were approved on March 6, 1919, and its establishments opened on April 8, 1920.