selene

Whole Food Waits For Shoppers To Return

I have never understood why WFMI acts as though it thinks it's the only game in town (having bought OATS), yet during merger talks argued that there was plenty of competition. Obviously it doesn't think much of the competition. Here in Portland OR we have several local chains that focus on local organic food (one is almost a clone of WFMI except it has a lot more local food, and one also has a great selection of conventional food), one high-end chain that looks like a WFMI and has some organic food but mostly "gourmet," regional chain Fred Meyer (Kroger) that has added big organic selection to its supermarket side but also has one-stop-shopping a la Target, AND just about every other ordinary supermarket has added some organic. In other words, even if the appeal of WFMI is that it's upscale as opposed to organic, we got your upscale right here baby. Oh not to mention the bazillions of Trader Joe's. So no I don't see that WFMI has a compelling value proposition, although when I worked across the street I did do some of my shopping there. I am glad to hear it is getting to be that way everywhere.

I do think Mackey's haircut is cute.