The CRC emerged as a union of all district UPOs into a single central cooperative. UPOs appeared after Lenin’s Decree on the mandatory cooperation of citizens of the RSFSR into district Unified Consumer Societies. Each UPO was divided into APOs—Additional Consumer Societies—according to various criteria (place of residence, workplace, etc.). Many enterprises created their own APOs with their own accounting, which led to their complete non-viability. APOs were very small and did not have sufficient funds to maintain their own administrative apparatus. To prevent the extinction of APOs, the party decided to merge them into central cooperatives.
The APOs объединенные into the CRC already constituted a fairly serious economic force, since they could use each other’s connections in the supply of raw materials and a broader sales market. Thus, for example, the Saratov CRC объединял industries such as flour milling, хлебопекарная (bread baking), confectionery, sausage production, garment making, and footwear. It also had 24 shops, including 5 general stores, 12 хлебо-grocery shops, 4 bread shops, and one each for textiles, meat, and meat-and-fish.
CRCs were not only an economic instrument of the authorities for providing the population with necessary goods, but also a political one.
On November 6, 1928, they began issuing bread by coupons. The coupons are kept in a withdrawal book for receiving scarce goods by CRC members. Workers are issued 1 1/2 lb. (600 grams) per day, others 1 lb. (400 grams). Everyone who has the right to this is registered with the CRC. Non-working elements who cannot become CRC members, and those who have no books at all, buy bread in private bakeries. The price is the same. A queue. They issue 2 1/2 lb. (1000 grams = 1 kilogram) per person. At first glance it seems that such people are better off than even workers, but this is not so. First, with the withdrawal book, bread is guaranteed for that day. Second, a single person can take 2 1/2 lb. and that is enough, while families must either stand in the queue anyway, or have family members stand. In the CRC, they issue according to the number of persons for whom the withdrawal book was taken, i.e., for the family, with the right to receive the ration for each family member. Many complain that a pound or 1 1/2 lb. is not enough. For now, such people still have to stand in line to buy from private sellers. However, the queues are still small. By withdrawal books they will also issue some other products: groats, pasta, salad oil or sunflower oil, according to the announced norm—whether per family member or per book is unknown; in the latter case, large families will be in a worse position.