Omni-Channel Analysis Of Whole Foods Market

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 Market is a superstore chain in Austin Texas that deals in natural and organic food products exclusively. The organization ranks among the most socially responsible organizations in the world, and the fourth placed in the US Environmental Protection Agency list. The trading organization exists within a market crowded with competitors from its area of operations, and those who offer contrary products to what it proposes. Therefore, answer to the question of how it manages to survive within such a competitive environment is only understandable if we evaluate the different types of market structures. The markets have different characteristics, which determine the strategies applied by the various organizations in the continuum (Etro, 2009).

Whole Foods Market carries out a series of operations but its main function is to supply customers with healthy and mostly organic foods. The company takes on an organic/natural version of a grocery store whose mission is to supply consumers with superior quality food. Although some products do contain GMO ingredients, the company makes sure these products are properly labeled to the public. This is why the company has grown rapidly with the rising concern of what we put in our bodies. One of the biggest trends in America today is eating healthy and organic foods.

Whole Foods has been adaptive in fitting its competitive strategy to its situation. The store first grew to prominence by being a stylish antithesis to the crunchy mom-and-pop organic grocery stores, providing a relatively normal but

The Open Systems Theory (OST) is described as a system that has input and output flows, representing exchanges of matter, energy or information with its

Whole Foods has also invested in modern information systems which have enabled the company to promote efficient communications (described in more detail below). With a well established and accepted vision, mission and market strategy, Whole Foods’ organization appears cohesive and has maintained its core business focus throughout its remarkable growth and expansion.

Anthony also brought up the growing obsession with health for customers. Whole Foods targets the consumers who live a very healthy lifestyle and are concerned with eating all natural and organic foods, especially younger customers. Anthony explained people are generally more informed as to what foods are effective to their healthy lifestyle especially by social media. The consumers find information about the brand through different social media channels such as Twitter and Facebook. The consumers also get information about the brand’s products, recipes, health tips, and nutritional information through the Whole Foods website and blog. Also, Anthony mentioned that the idea of lifestyle is one of the key factors that influence the consumer buying behavior.

“With great courage, integrity, and love – we embrace our responsibility to co-create a world where each of us, our communities and our planet can flourish. All while celebrating the sheer love and joy of food” (Whole Foods, 2015). This is Whole Food’s “higher purpose statement”. This statement expresses and delivers what Whole Foods, as an organization, believes and what must be apparent to the consumer. As an organization founded with the drive to bring the freshest and most natural products to consumers, Whole Foods must maintain alignment with that core philosophy. Created in response to

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.

During a March 12, 2012 Conference, Walter Robb, co-chief executive officer of Whole Foods, stated in his presentation at the UBS Global Consumer Conference in Boston that retail and technology are completely intertwined now, and customers are newly empowered through technology in all sorts of ways. The two initiatives for Whole Food Market are enterprise systems and customer-facing technology. As a first initiative, Whole Foods is working to create a unified point-of-sale platform that will seamlessly enable mobile and digital shopping. For customer-facing technology, Whole Foods’s checkout process helps customers to buy a few items from in-store

There are over 1.1 million men and woman amateur and pro bodybuilders alone in the United States. The IFBB has competitors age ranges from as young as 16 years to as old as 83 within a range categories for competition, The NutiBullet Pro is a necessary tool to assist the competitors in preparing for competitions fulfilling a need for a quick, convenient and easy way for bodybuilders to create their protein shakes, whey smoothies or one of their required 6 to 7 meals a day.

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.

With the launch of the 365 brand, Whole Foods is hoping to target and bring in a younger, more hipster demographic of customers. Their hopes are that these younger, more price sensitive shoppers will grow with the brand, become accustomed to the organic, GMO-free selection, and will transition into customers of the regular, more expensive, Whole Foods stores as they grow in their careers and begin making more money. The most important challenge Whole Foods faces when opening a new line of stores is successfully capturing their target demographic, and making their 365 brand the go-to destination for people to purchase their snacks and groceries.

Over the past decade, the consumer has taken the lead in online brand perceptions and conceptualizations. Multi-channel business practices are becoming more adaptive with its fast-growing and evolving consumer market. It is essential that retailers in the 21st century acknowledge the success of multi-channel businesses. The function of multiple-channel retail, also commonly known as omni-channel, is to coordinate a coherent way of managing, integrating information, and delivering service and products to the end-customer online and in-store. In both mass retail and in luxury retail, having more than one channel is