Situation Analysis for Whole Foods Markets

promotes pride in team members. All employees have access to most of Whole Food’s financial

[6] See Appendix B for more about the Whole Foods Foundation. As a result of the green movement, Whole Foods has added the 3R’s to their green mission: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.[7] See Appendix C for more about the Whole Foods green movement.

Whole Foods Market, Inc. (WFM) lives through their motto of “Whole Food, Whole People, Whole Planet.” WFM opened their first store in Austin, Texas with 19 employees in 1980. Today, WFM has 311 stores in the US, Canada and the UK, and employs more than 72,700 employees. Whole Foods Market is one of the largest natural and organic food retailers in North America. WFM has grown to its size today mostly through mergers and acquisitions of such brands as Bread and Circus and Natures Heartland. In 2011 and 2012 Whole Foods Market was added to the Fortune 100 “Best Places to Work” list. Fortune Magazine (2012)

Whole Foods is a great example of democratic approach to store operation. In this organizational environment all team members have the ability to insert their input in decision making that affects their product/service area in addition to having input in store matters as well. Whole Foods has a stringent screening process potential employees are put through to ensure that the applicant is a good fit for the organization. Once an applicant is hired, they are assigned to a team and team leader, who then train the new team member to be knowledgeable on the product/service they are assigned to. Additionally, they are also trained on providing friendly customer service. Due to Whole Foods approach to using workplace democracy, it has created a positive

As our short-term objectives evolve with Whole Foods Market and Trader Joe’s, it is important to identify and clearly state our objectives the long run.

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

The purpose of this paper is to provide a preliminary internal look at Whole Foods Market, which was ranked 44th last year as Fortune’s Top 100 Companies to Work For. And even though the company is ranked 44th on Fortune’s top 100 and 218th on Fortune’s 500 top companies, they have remained in Fortune’s rankings consecutively for the past 18 years. This paper will offer a look at the organization’s vision, mission, and core values, as well as its’ major strategic objectives. I will also determine how and in what ways the theory of Full Range Leadership Development can support the core principles of Whole Foods Market’s strategy.

Whole Foods’ incredible rise over the past 34 years serves as evidence of their considerable ability to create a strategy and successfully execute it. Whole Foods differentiated itself by becoming the first Certified Organic grocer in the United States (1) and has stuck to the strategy of selling consumers organic and natural products. The successful execution of this strategy has allowed them to charge a premium for their products giving them higher net margins than nearly all of their competitors. (2) Their ability to earn such premiums has attracted the attention of industry incumbents who are now attempting to lure the increasingly health-conscious consumer with their own expanded offerings of organic and natural foods. For Whole Foods Market to retain their ability to earn such impressive premiums and sustain their growth they will have to execute on their strategy with even greater precision. “No firm can succeed for long without an intense focus on execution. Average executors are average performers, and poor executors risk decline and failure.” (3)

* In 1996 Whole Foods Markets acquires Fresh Field Markets picking up 22 stores located on the east coast and Chicago area for 4.8 million shares of common stock and an option for 549,000 additional shares. (Thompson, 2010; C-13)

Whole Foods grocery retailer maintains over 175 stores in North America and Europe and has been consistently nominated as “100 Best Companies to Work For” (Hill, 2006). Furthermore, this type of quality should be considered when reviewing a company because this involves much teamwork and ethical responsibilities.

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

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.

This paper is a company analysis on Giant Hypermarket Malaysia in general, but specifically focusing on Giant Hypermarket Sabah. Giant Hypermarket is a major supermarket and retailer chain in Malaysia. It is a subsidiary of Dairy Farm International Holdings (DFI) and is headquartered in Shah Alam, Selagor. In this paper, firstly we focus our analysis in identifying the Strength-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) of Giant; in addition, we constructed a SWOT Matrix for Giant where we identified the SO, ST, WO and WT strategies, which we think Giant should apply to improve their competitiveness. Next we focus our analysis on the external as well as the internal analysis on Giant. In the external analysis, we center our

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.