It's been 36 years since 50 Duke students formed a club to buy groceries in bulk. A couple of names and locations later, the Durham Food Co-op (a.k.a. "Durham Co-op Grocery") is still a going concern, but one a little worried about its future.

"The Food Co-op is going through a little bit of an identity crisis," said Denise VanDeCruze, a board member who is also de facto manager -- by default, she said -- of the store at 1101 W. Chapel Hill St.

Sales are trending down. So is membership. How the establishment incorporated in 1971 is to compete with such "organic" food outlets as the Durham Farmers' Market, Whole Foods and even Wal-Mart is a question the Co-op has to answer.

Whether to stay in the relatively poor West End or move to a more promising market inside the Loop or at Central Park is an issue it has to decide.

A full-time general manager is an employee it needs to hire.

And then there is the Co-op Confidential Collective, a group of members displeased with the present management.

"They just don't know anything about how to run a grocery store," said Wells Eddleman, long a stalwart volunteer, the Co-op's former comptroller and a leader of the opposition.

"There has been some contention," said Michael Bacon, who describes himself as "just a member" -- but weighed in with a detailed analysis of the Collective and its purposes to his "The Bull in Full" blog on March 25.

Over the last year or so, VanDeCruze and her partner and fellow co-op board member Sven Rinke have taken on leadership positions in the organization.

Officially, they only have seats on the board, but VanDeCruze handles most day-to-day running of the Co-op's store and Rinke edits the newsletter.

"Almost everything they've done is concentrate power," said Eddleman, who is standing for a seat on the board of directors.

Eddleman described instances of financial irregularity, bylaw violation, employee alienation, among other alleged failings on VanDeCruze and Rinke's parts. VanDeCruze said Eddleman is "feeding misinformation."

"I think that Denise and Sven have ... made some mistakes along the way," said Bacon, "but have brought a tremendous amount of energy" to an organization suffering "severe dysfunction."

According to Co-op's annual report for 2006, sales had fallen from more than $536,000 in 2003 to less than $431,000 in 2005. While sales fell again in 2006, net income was in the black after two years in the red, due to cost cuts -- especially in payroll, down from $95,303 to $58,156.

"Even though we're dealing with the downward trend in sales, we've been able to increase profitability," VanDeCruze said. "Now that we're out of survival mode ... how do we halt this trend and start to reverse it?"

The Co-op has survived other crises. Some loans taken to cover a move from Broad Street to Chapel Hill Street went overdue in 1991, while vegetarian members argued that increasing trade by selling fish was immoral.

Ideologies and internal politics aside, the Peoples Intergalactic does have to deal in a changed marketplace.

Membership has fallen from a reported high of around 3,000 in the mid-'90s to about 350 today.

About the Co-op's future, Bacon said, "I'm very, very guardedly optimistic. ... If the membership is willing to say, 'Let's just bite the bullet and do something substantial, not just a fine tuning of what we've been doing.' "