Whole Foods Market: Changing The Shopping Experience. German

John Mackey and Renee Lawson Hardy, the co-founders of the current Whole Foods Market, simply wanted to provide quality healthy food to the American consumer. This was about three decades ago when the first store opened. According to Mackey, making money was not the first priory, but helping people to eat better was. Happily for Mackey and Lawson, the residents of Austin Texas were hungry, no pun intended, for just this type of product. At the time, though there were several small independent healthy food stores, there was not a full sized grocery store. This is what set Mackey and Lawson apart from their competitors, their enormous sized health food grocery store was a huge success and now Whole Foods Market (WFM) is not only a

The mergers with great reputation brands not only elevated Whole Foods Market’s character, but also stabled its market position. In 1991, Wellspring Grocery joined Whole Foods Market. Similar to Whole Food, Wellspring Grocery started with a positive attitude toward changing the market. Unlike other grocery stores, it wanted to bring healthy diet on shelves, rather than pills and canned food. This idea brought attention to what people are consuming daily. Second merger happened one year after Wellspring Grocery’s success. Bread and Circus, a company that used to sell natural food and wooden toys, valued costumer’s opinion. Costumers were happy to shop in Bread and Circus. Its expeditiously expansion caught Whole Foods Market’s attention. In order to stable its market not only in Taxes, it decided to purchase Bread and Circus. Last, Mrs. Gooch’s, a grocery store that targeted on allergic

On averaged their stores are roughly 38,000 square feet and their locations typically carried 21,000 SKUs. They make two-thirds of its revenue by selling bakery, perishable items, and prepared foods. (Ager & Roberto, 2014). Peoples tend to shop at Whole Food Market because of their high-quality natural and organic food. In today’s world peoples are more concern about health concise and effect of pesticide products, more people choose to have organic fruits and vegetables. Whole Foods get most of their produces from local people which are natural and organic, which will help them gain more customer than other company because of increasing demand of organic food (Whole Foods Market History, n.d). They also have a strong brand image and they were the first supermarket who commit to completely eliminating disposable plastic grocery bags to help protect the environment. They also sell many USDA-certified organic

Whole Foods Market Inc. is a popular retail destination for natural and organic foods and byproducts, since its establishment in 1980 by four local businesspeople in Austin, Texas. It is notable for supporting sustainable agriculture, promoting the reduction of waste and consumption of nonrenewable resources and encouraging environmentally safe cleaning and store-maintenance programs. The company showcases its ethics and social responsibility through its green mission, foundations, and Whole Trade Guarantee.

I would not invest in Whole Foods stock. WF ranks 284, on the Fortune 500 list of 2010 and Store Growth was up and compounded annual growth was high. However, they’re stock has been consistently declining in the last several years. Their once high-flying Whole Foods stock is down a remarkable 30% for the year-to-date and has been trading sideways since May. Kroger (the nation’s largest supermarket operator)

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

* Whole Foods Market was founded in 1980 working with natural and healthy foods in Austin, Texas; it’s one of the world’s largest of natural and organic foods supermarkets. In 2009, the sales total $8 billion and had 289 stores in the U.S. The Whole Foods Market plans to come up with strategies to help improve the company but to do so understanding the core values plays a major role in the company’s planning. The strategies

After 30 years of success it was felt that the limits had been reached and a new direction was needed. In 1978 Mr. Mackey opened Safer Way natural grocery store that provided only organic foods in limited selections and only catered to vegetarians. Thus, a merger with Craig Weller and Mark Stiles of “Clarksville Natural Grocery” was formed in Austin, Texas in 1980 (Pearce & Robinson, 2013). To compliment the growth, the purchase of Allegro Coffee Company in 1979 served as the distribution center and Pigeon Cove is now the seafood processing facility which was purchased in 1996. In 2003 Whole Foods Market purchased the Produce Field Inspection Office and Select Fish, that serves as the West Coast Seafood processing facility. Whole Foods Market also has eight distribution centers and seven regional bake houses and four commissaries (Pearce & Robinson, 2013 p 29-1)

After dropping out of the University of Texas in 1978, John Mackey and friend, Renee Lawson (Hardy) were able to borrow $45,000 from Mackey’s family to open a small health food store, Safe Way Natural Foods, in Austin, Texas. A few years later in 1980 they met Craig Weller and Mark Skiles, who owned the Clarksville Natural Grocery, they decided to merge their stores. Thus Whole Foods Markets was born.

As of September 2015 Whole Foods Incorporated had 431 stores in the United States, Britain and Scotland. Over the years since its inception Whole Foods Incorporated has grown steadily recording high revenues that have made it to be recognized as a Fortune 500 company. It has accomplished this by sticking to its original mission of retailing organic foods in a market where other retail stores mainly retail processed foods that are high in calories and hydrogenated fats. During the 2008 recession, revenues in Whole Foods Inc. dropped as this company struggled to meet its operation costs with a receding number of shoppers, this caused the company to close some of its stores in Britain for failing to meet is profitability targets (Market, 2008).

Whole Foods Market focuses on expansion, primarily through new store openings in existing trade areas as well as new areas, including international locations. During FY2012 and FY2011, the company opened 25 and 18 new stores, respectively. During the 16 weeks ended January 20, 2013, the company opened 10 new stores. Besides, the company is also expanding in the UK.The company opened a 22,000 square feet store in Giffnock, Glasgow in November 2011, and plans to open a 20,000 square feet store in Richmond, London in 2013. Further, the company estimates to open 32–34 stores in FY2013 and 33–38 stores in FY2014. The company 's strategy to grow through identical store sales growth, acquisitions and new store openings has enabled it to grow at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 26% during 1991–12. Since the natural foods retailing industry is highly fragmented and comprises many small local and regional chains, growth through store expansion provides the company access to desirable markets, apart from enabling it to expand its reach to a wide customer base and diversify its revenue streams. Strong focus on right sizing of stores Whole Foods Market is focused on the right sized store for each location. During 2008–09 recession, the company downsized 20 leases by an average of 13,000 square feet each. The company reduced approximately 1.4 million

Two years after opening his SaferWay store, John Mackey merged with Clarksville Natural Grocery in Austin, Texas. This resulted in the opening of the original Whole foods Market in 1980. In 1984, Whole Foods expanded out of Austin into Houston, Dallas, New Orleans, and one store in California (Whole Foods Market, 2008b). This expansion was accomplished in significant part through many acquisitions of other natural food chains throughout its three decade history.

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.

The demand for natural and organic foods has grown by 5.1% over the past several years, primarily dominated by Whole Foods specializes in the shopping experience, product quality and take outs of premium selections. This increase has gained the competition from like competitors of grocery food chains closing the gap on this market niche where profits are being jeopardized.