Training for the people grocers already trust.

Level 1 · Prerequisite

Rural Grocery Transition Specialist

Taught by the Rural Grocery Initiative at Kansas State University — the only national training program dedicated to rural grocery succession support. It is where every specialist starts, and it is the prerequisite for the Academy's Advanced Specialist course.

Level 1 Specialists are trained to address the single most common cause of a preventable closure: an owner who avoids transition planning until there is no time left to plan. Graduates know how to open that conversation and how to walk a grocer through the process once it starts.

Level 2 · 12 weeks · offered once a year in the fall

Advanced Specialist

A Level 1 Specialist can guide a transition. An Advanced Specialist can walk into a store that is years away from transition and make it worth more when the day comes. Open only to graduates of the Rural Grocery Transition Specialist course.

What you'll learn

• Business transition practice, including valuation
• Short-term survival strategy for grocery — profitability, pricing, and labor
• The psychology of identity transition, and how to support an owner through it proactively
• A proprietary approach to proactively building the value of a business
• Working knowledge of Healthy Bucket and Think Like a Buyer Before You Become a Seller

Ongoing · bi-weekly on Zoom

Community of Practice

Real transition cases, worked through together. Every new conversation adds to what the whole group knows how to do — which is the fastest way this work gets better. Open to Level 1 graduates and above.

• Live case consultation with other specialists
• Ongoing access to curriculum as it evolves
• A standing connection to the people doing this work in other states
• New Level 1 graduates join free for their first three months

A separate Community of Practice exists for certified Facilitators.