Whole Foods: a Whole-Istic Strategy

The organic food industry has seen a huge spike in growth that is expected to continue into the future due to an increase in consumption. This will provide Whole Foods Market with huge opportunities. In addition, a wave of ethical and responsible consumption has swept across America. Whole Foods’ decision to pursue sustainable activities will certainly give consumers an added incentive to purchase its organic products.

A weakness that Whole Foods have is their reputation. A reputation for a grocer is key to its survival and they have the reputation of being very expensive or some call it “whole paycheck.”

Whole Foods is a retailer that specializes in organic foods and it has done an excellent job of determining its target market and how to position itself. Instead of going head to head with large food retailers such as Wal-Mart, Whole Foods has found a niche market that works perfectly for itself. This niche market is one that prides itself on being health conscious and environmentally responsible and Whole Foods has done a great job of positioning itself in the same way through its environmentally safe actions and its use of the local community to stock its stores. However, as Whole Foods grows and expands, a person has to wonder if the company will be able to maintain this same position or will have to make

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.

While the foods retail industry is highly competitive, Whole Foods has established a reputation and maintains a brand loyalty with its customers. Increased rivalry will occur in the larger grocery chains like Wal-Mart and Kroger, because of their flexibility in the products they can offer, and the pressures they can put on the sales growth and overall profits of Whole Foods. They have a larger cash and customer base, and the ability to better advertise their products, while Whole Foods still generates most of their

Whole Foods Market, Inc. has long been admired as an innovative company with quality standards, a devotion to community and environmental responsiveness, a healthy growth model and highly-regarded employment practices. However, the company has faced recent difficulties as a result of the economic recession, increasing competition, and complications from acquisitions. To revitalize the company from historical lows in its toughest year in history, Whole Foods Market must reassess its costs, refocus its expansion strategies, and promote its brand to compete for the diminishing consumer spending dollar.

Consumers view Whole Foods Markets as being very expensive and have given the retailer the nickname “Whole Paycheck”. Whole Foods carries a wider variety of organic foods and healthier brands besides their private brands. Whole Foods is experiencing a decline in sales due to other stores; like Wal-Mart, who are stocking organic foods at much lower prices; which has decreased differentiation (Lutz, 2014). Its decentralized business model decreases efficiency in procurement, distribution, and marketing efforts.

This would suggest a weakness within the Whole Foods organizations as it only targets consumers who are willing to pay higher than average prices for groceries. The cost of

Whole Foods recent launch of their new stores, 365 by Whole Foods Market, is a way of trying to take a stab at Trader Joe’s niche. The one way Trader Joe’s has fought back was by lowering their prices. With other competitors joining the ranks of the organic food market, Trader Joe’s may be thinking ahead with other strategies, and may be in for a good fight as others want to duplicate their

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

Whole Foods’ strategy on pricing is to set competitive prices on their top quality products. Unlike regular grocery stores, Whole Foods’ prices are typically higher but it is a result to Whole Foods growth and how they advertise their organic foods/lifestyle. With the higher prices, one would assume that consumers would stop shopping at Whole Foods but that is not the case. People are still shopping at Whole Foods because the store has a wide selection of goods along with Whole Foods enjoyable shopping

Whole Foods offer a huge selection of different organic foods which are high in quality.

From the pitfall that I have found, there are several things that Whole Foods Market needs to improve, which are organic foods and green suppliers. Start with organic foods; although Whole Foods Market faces with high competitive in the market, they cannot avoid or pay less attention on their practice or commitment. The company should encourage more and provide a supportive education on green practice and sustainable agriculture to not only organic farmers but also conventional farmers by showing them benefits of doing sustainable agriculture. The second thing is a green supplier that the company gives the commitment with customers. The company needs to pay more responsibility

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.

According to Harrison (2014), “Whole Foods Market has grown into a natural and organic food empire, with nearly 400 locations, more than 80,000 employees, and annual sales exceeding $12 billion,”, and it has continued to expand to 460 locations since then. Amazon is looking to amplify their business through Whole Food’s numerous locations all over the world. Whole Foods has acquired the nickname “Whole Paycheck” due to the high prices of their groceries (Wingfield & Merced, 2017, para. 8), and because of this aspect, they struggled to compete with stores such as Walmart and Kroger who have reasonable pricing. They often have better and healthier products, but consumers are drawn to lower prices. Struggling to attract customer has led to Whole Foods losing “a fifth of its value in the last three years” (Gensler, 2017, para. 5).