This story begins in 2005 at our former Menomonie location—the red brick building that sits at 521 Second Street East in downtown Menomonie. YouTube and Reddit had just launched, Myspace was the social media platform of choice, and Juicy Couture tracksuits were all the rage. Our little co-op was 31 years old and had just a handful of staff members hustling and bustling to provide delicious local foods. Enter the iconic velour bobblehead dog who remains unnamed to this day.

The origins of the bobblehead dog are a mystery, but he became a legend in no time among our staff. It started with Jenn and Rachel hiding him somewhere on the sales floor for the others to find in the future. Naturally, the rest of the team began to find the dog periodically, and it became a store-wide challenge to locate it while cleaning or stocking shelves. The reward: If you found the dog, you got to be the one to hide it. The only rule of the game at the time was that it had to be hidden somewhere in the store, not in the back room or the basement.

Rumor has it that Clayton was the best at hiding him, who would often tow the line between what was considered to be in the store versus what was technically the back room. One of the more “unique” features of that location was a small vent in the wall that connected the sales floor to the staff break room. The most memorable hiding spot was this vent, where you could only see into it if the break room light was on and you stood in just the right place in the room. Whether or not that was considered the sales floor is still up for debate, but to be fair, with the right lighting, you could see the dog from the cash registers. That same vent was the source of some of our best ghost stories too, but that’s a story for another newsletter. Who knew an air vent could create so many lasting memories?

Years later, Jenn was getting ready to move to a new state and left a little note inside the bobblehead that read, “Rachel and Jenn started hiding this dog from each other in 2005. If you find this, please hide it in the co-op so someone else can find it too. I wonder how long it will go on for?” Little did she know that we would bring the bobblehead dog with us when we moved into our Main Street location ten years later.

It’s now 2023, and the bobblehead dog has not been seen since sometime in 2019. He had four wonderful years at Main Street East before disappearing. Our friend Mali was the last person to find and hide it, or so the legend goes. As the Facilities Coordinator, she likely knew all of the best secret hiding places in this building, so it could still be around here somewhere! If not, we like to imagine a family got home from grocery shopping and discovered their kid acquired a mystery bobblehead dog. Maybe this article will solve a years-old family mystery for one of you or at least provide some fun memories of locations past.

This article was originally published in the May/June 2023 issue of our bi-monthly newsletter, The Morsel. If you’d like to read more stories like this one and stay up to date on the latest co-op news and events, pick up a print copy in-store on your next grocery run or find more news on our website here.