Marketing Plan For Whole Foods Essay

Whole Foods Market started off as being Safer Way natural grocery store in 1978. However they were not

Whole Foods Market is probably the world leader in retailing natural and organic foods, with over 433 stores in North America and the United Kingdom (Whole Foodsmarket.com). With a commitment to provide the highest quality of natural and organic foods at competitive prices; they steadily continue to expand globally. This paper will provide some insight on the advantages and disadvantages of perhaps why we should invest in this company’s stock.

From your perspective, did John Mackey act in an ethical or unethical manner? Consider the perspective of those that defend and oppose his actions. Explain the reasoning behind your answer.

In his book, The Tipping Point: How little things can make a big difference (2000), Malcolm Gladwell highlights the power of intelligent action and the potential of little changes for starting epidemics. Concepts such as the law of few, the stickiness factor, and the power of context arouse epidemics both in macro-level and in micro-level. In detail, the law of few affirms the influence on communication. Connectors, mavens, and salesmen each has abilities to conjoin, collect, and cajole; they distribute information globally. The stickiness factor refers to a technique, which emphasize and allow information to stick in the minds of consumers. Last, the power of context stresses that both individual’s reaction and community’s cohesion can

A target market is a group of customers a company has decided to ultimately aim its marketing efforts towards. Whole Foods has two different target market groups that regularly shop at their establishments. The first is the primary group that ranges in age between 22-40 years old men and women with college educations who care deeply about the sustainability of the earth and favor all-natural goods. These people truly believe in the entire brand experience and make shopping at a health food store a lifestyle decision.

Whole Foods, just like any other retailer right now, has been struggling with the economy. The external environment has been changing in uphill and downhill motions daily, something that Whole Foods has never experienced before. Not only is there pressure on the financials of the corporation, but also there is the pressure to go green.

As with other superstores, Whole Foods offers a variety of products to their customers. These products include organic and natural foods of all sorts, body care items, and household care items (“Grocery”, n.d.). As with other grocery stores, these products are organized based on the category they fall into, as well as if they fit a certain dietary requirement (e.g. dairy, meat, cleaning products, vegan, gluten-free, etc.). The output efficiency is measured as with most companies by the profit brought in by each division. This past year (2013), sales improved to $1.29B from $1.17B in 2012, net profit improved from $466K to $551K with the net profit ratio improving from 3.98% to 4.26% (Yahoo! Finance, 2014). Additionally, Whole Foods’ return on assets improved to 4.26% from 3.98% in 2012 (Yahoo! Finance, 2014). All of these numbers show that Whole Foods is capitalizing on its momentum and continuing the success they’ve had in previous years. Another performance

A strategy of Whole Foods’ in 2014 and 2015 was to be disciplined and opportunistic with their real estate purchases. They prefer to open new stores in existing areas and then expand into new areas. Since 2011, Whole Foods’ has opened 100 stores, which is great for growth, but was a huge part of their decline in 2015. As previously mentioned, Whole Foods’ opened 38 new stores in 2015. This large expansion of stores allowed them to produce $1.1 billion in cash flows from their operations, invest $851 million in capital expenditures, and resulted in a free cash flow of $278 million. Those numbers were wonderful for the companies’ shareholders, who got $184 million in quarterly dividends. In 2015, they focused too much on opening new stores, rather than focusing on preexisting stores. Customers said their stores are getting “shabby with mediocre customer service” (Whole Foods’ Sales). This was a huge turn off for many people, especially when they can go to a store like Sprouts, spend less and get just better service, and natural food. The three-year trend for Whole Foods’ was doing very well until this year, as seen below (WFM Gross Profit Margin (TTM)).

Target store was formed about a century ago and is named since then as one of the most outstanding stores that have ever been formed in the US and has several thousand employees and branches working with it. It is a long time famous store and has items ranging from electronics to clothing as well as accessories. An assortment of home items such as furniture as well as kitchen appliances which are also the need when you arrange from Target store online using the web store and get recognition of this store marked as one you have been told about.

Marketed as ‘America’s healthiest grocery store’ the company has successfully grown to 408 stores across the world with sales of $14 billion in 2014 (Whole Foods Market, 2015). The firm is positioned as an upmarket grocery due to the emphasis on natural, organic origins, and as a result are able to charge a premium for their products. Through efficiently running its operations and stores, Whole Foods are able to maintain healthy 4.02% profit margins (Financial Times, 2015) and operating margins well above the American grocery store industry average at 6.58% (Bloomberg, 2015). Looking at 2015’s quarter 1 figures it is clear to see that Whole Foods have had a hugely successful year with sales of $4.7 billion, up 10% from the same period last year. Furthermore, they opened 9 new stores and have signed a further 11 new leases.

Whole Foods Market has expanded by a mixture of opening its own new stores and acquiring already existing stores. Today WFM does not follow this strategy, instead their motivation is to open its own large stores. This is due to noticeable sales differences in larger stores as opposed to smaller stores. WFM locates these newer stores in upscale areas of urban metropolitan centers and high-traffic shopping locations. Not all WFMs are isolated structures; some are located in strip malls. WFM offers a larger selection of natural and organic foods than any other grocery store. WFMs marketing expenditure is extremely small. They spend a measly 0.5% of their revenues on advertising. Their chief marketing strategy relies on word-of-mouth. WFM strives to meet or exceed customer expectations. This is so customers receive competent, knowledgeable, and friendly service and become advocates of WFM. The employees here have a decentralized team approach for store operations. This is so some personnel, merchandising, and operating

Whole Foods Market began in 1970 as a local supermarket. Over the past 31 years, Whole Foods Market has grown from a single store in Austin, Texas, to becoming one of the worldwide leaders in providing consumers with natural and organic foods. They have grown to over 300 stores in both North America and the United Kingdom. (Whole Foods Market, Inc., 2011) This report examines the chief elements of the strategy that Whole Foods Market has put into place. Also, it uses past financial data to provide an assessment of the condition of the company going forward. Those assessments include recommendations of future actions, along with concerns I have about the way the company is currently operating and some difficulties that may be on the way.

Inside the front doors of a grocery store, customers are presented with a diverse, vibrant display of fresh fruits and vegetables. With its inviting rainbow of bright colors, the produce section leads past the wafting, sweets smells of bread and pastries in the bakery and through winding aisles stocked with an assortment of goods. Linings the aisles and fillings shelves are rows and rows of boxes of pasta, pre-made meals, processed foods, and more snacks and sweets than one would know what to do with. Grocery stores present shoppers with a myriad of choices. The shelves and displays are filled with a variety of different brands and options to choose from, which offers customers a tough and potentially stressful decision when shopping. However, before a customer decides upon a specific brand or item, whether that happens to be a name-brand product, competitor, or store-brand, they are faced with an even more important choice; they must first make a decision on whether they want to buy whole foods and produce, such as fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and other healthy choices, or more processed “junk” foods like sugary drinks and snacks or enriched breads and pasta. Not only must costumers decide between specific brands and deals, but they must also choose which of these types of food is best for them and their interests. Consumers must constantly weigh the different factors that are presented when comparing foods; between price, ingredients, health, availability, and overall

This assignment is about marketing, where I will produce a marketing strategy for a new or existing product. This unit introduces the major principle and functions of marketing; I will look on customer needs, and creating a suitable strategy or marketing mix, which will satisfy customer needs. In this unit I will experience the marketing process from carrying out initial research about a market, investigating the principles of functions of marketing and the way in which it contributes generating income/profit in a business. Marketing is the process of planning and executing the conception, pricing, promotion, and distribution of ideas, goods, and services to create exchanges that satisfy individual and organizational goals.

The proposals that we are going to depose are a planning of continuous action in order to confront the challenges, which BT confronts. The most important factor is considered to be the fact that the marketing environment changed rapidly after the deregulation of the telephone industry. Up to then BT was operating as a monopoly, ignoring the competition and ways to face it.