Co-op Seeks To Buy Herb Shop Property

BREWSTER – Great Scott. Great Cape is for sale.

The 15-acre property that’s been home to Great Cape Herbs since 1991, along with the Snowy Owl Coffee Roasters, Fare and Just Kitchen and On the Trail Electric Bikes, is for sale for $4 million. A cooperative of friends is trying to raise enough money to buy the property to preserve as much of it as possible as a community space, arboretum and a place for quiet contemplation.

“The goal is to keep a private property open to the public so we have a sanctuary where people can connect with nature, a special place. We will create a body for a shared vision of the property and you can be a part owner,” explained David Schlesinger, the Clerk of the co-op.

The herb shop is directly across Route 6A from busy Foster Square and adjacent to Ace Hardware so it qualifies as being a commercial center of Brewster. Stephan Brown has owned the land since 1972, a year before he opened the Eastleigh Nursery. He opened the Great Cape Herb Spice and Tea Company in 1991. The name was trimmed to Great Cape Herbs in 1995 with Brown as the herbalist, although home blended teas are still sold in the shop. The building fronts the 15 acres of trails, woods and plantings.

After 50 years of running assorted businesses, Brown wanted to transfer the land to a co-op but that was complicated when Brewster slapped the property with nine code violations in April of 2022. After a protracted back-and-forth, Brown, age 77, decided to move full-time to his other home in the Azores and left the co-op to finish dealing with the town.

“Originally we had Stephan Brown owner-finance part of (the hoped for sale),” Schlesinger recalled. “We were looking to get a loan of $2 million from the Cooperative Fund of the Northeast. That’s a cooperative lending group.” That group supports community-based, democratically and cooperatively managed enterprises. However those efforts floundered.

“So the property is currently for sale and listed by Sothebys,” Schlesinger said. “We still are trying to find investors or a joint venture with interested parties to buy the property.”

The Co-op has raised $11,653, mostly through $200 memberships, far short of the $4 million they’ll need. So the focus has changed to find a big donor, developer or organization to partner with.

“Our ask is [for] an angel to purchase it as-is with the three businesses and keep the open areas for public use - like a common where you can go that’s safe, Co-op Vice President Laura Kelley said.

She noted there are gingko trees on the land that Brown planted when he opened the nursery. The 15 acres grades into wetlands and abuts the rail trail. It contains herb gardens and plantings, an orchard, berry plantings, specimen trees, an open meeting area and various sheds and buildings, some of which will be removed.

“We set up a Co-op to maintain the grounds keeping it in the spirit of its founder Stephan Brown who had it for 50 years. Currently we seek an Angel to purchase this 'Jewel of Brewster' and keep it the way it is, private land for the public community to use respectfully,” Kelley said.

Since Brown left for the Azores, the Coop has been maintaining the land and dealing with the town to wrap up any remaining issues. Schlesinger has talked with the Brewster Conservation Trust and Compact of Cape Cod Conservation Trusts about the property but the $4 million price tag is steep for them. The land is also not in its natural state.

“It’s possible they might join in a joint venture we are trying to put together,” Schlesinger said. “We have 37 paid members of the co-op who are managing the property, doing restoration and cleaning up the violations.” He said the co-op might partner with a developer to develop part of the land and leave the rest as managed by the co-op.

“The co-op does have a five-member board and a steering committee that operates under the authority of the board,” he explained. The committee holds a remote meeting each Monday at 6 p.m., and members of the co-op have equal say in their class: general membership for $200, and the business class, which is comprised of businesses on the property and employees of the co-op. They all vote for board of director seats.

“That gives them an equal voice in the shared vision for the property,” Schlesinger said.

There is no deadline for raising the money or buying the property from Brown’s Realty Trust, the nominal owner.

“It’s open-ended and we’re in the process of negotiating a new management agreement,” Schlesinger said. “The current agreement runs out at the end of the year. Stephan Brown is out of the country most of the year. He is 77 and doesn’t want to be so involved anymore. The situation with the town was drastic,” Schlesinger said. “There were violations with the Fire Department, Conservation, Health, Zoning and building. We’re hoping to ratify a plan with the Conservation Commission. The town issued a cease and desist order for the property. So the co-op is working through a lot of these issues. We’ve lost money managing the property.”

If a buyer purchases the property and doesn’t work with the co-op the membership fee of $200 a year would be refunded by Brown, Schlesinger said. Any other financial contributions are considered donations and would not be returned.

“Our lawyer thinks we can find an angel investor or a grant,” Schlesinger said. “Also a developer is one member of the co-op and that’s a scenario more likely than an angel investor. Another option is a loan option but we need to firm up our investor base.”

Kelley, who runs an organic landscaping business, lends expertise on that and Jillian Douglas, Brewster former assistant Town Administrator is also on the board.

“She brings a background in housing,” Schlesinger noted. “It lends a lot of credibility having those two on board and the town is giving us recommendations.”

The co-op wants the businesses to remain and is working with Brown to extend their leases. The restaurant lease is up at the end of this year and the Snowy Owl lease expires in Dec. 2024. The goal is to extend both through 2025.

Anyone interested in becoming involved in the co-op can go to GreatCapeTinyVillage.com.

“We need help with grant writing and social media,” Schlesinger explained.

“We are a group of local people who care about this 15 acres in the heart of Brewster and are being proactive to help not just save it or protect it but keep it in the spirit that it has always been in,” Kelley added. She urged supporters to “allow this private land to be open to the public community to share its outdoor living spaces (large stone fire pit area, stage for musicians to play, many seating areas for coffee, swings for kids to play upon...signs educating what medicinal plants thrive naturally here, mature old large trees creating a canopy above, even some wetland areas with different natural vegetation thriving happily) so you can feel the environment around you changing as you walk trails cleared simply by people walking.”