I also watched the mature co-op grocery in Berkeley fail, many years ago.
To me this is an interesting phenomenon because there is no business simpler than a grocery store. The revenue is fairly constant, the inventory is straightforward and jobs are easily defined.
The grocery business does change at a steady pace. We have gone from organics, expanded frozen sections to take out to premade meals.
All businesses and institutions ossify. They almost invariably become so rigid and unable to adapt to changes of consumer tastes and technology that they fail.
What I noticed in this instance is that co-ops, that have very flat managerial forms, almost no management or inadequate management are more vulnerable to ossification.
Which is to say that one of the functions of management and particularly the authoritarian nature of management is to keep the institution alive longer while undergoing the changes necessary to accommodate the market.
We may have to look at the authoritarian nature of management a little more favorably when we understand it may be necessary for forcing accommodations to change on institutions that don't want to change.
The Catholic Church is highly authoritarian and has survived a very long time.