I just found out today that a Whole Foods is going to be built close to my neighborhood. Too bad it’s not an Earth Fare.
While many crunchy, green mamas might rejoice at Whole Foods coming to town, I am in mourning because Whole Foods is basically on par with your “neighborhood”  Walmart.
There is nothing “neighborly” about Walmart or Whole Foods.
What a joke.
Whole Foods is just another cutthroat Corporate Bully dressed in organic, “let’s save the world”, “buy local” disguise with the shareholders in full throttle, profit taking control.
While Whole Foods is undoubtedly counting on health conscious Moms like me in the neighborhood cha-chinging away at the brand spanking new registers, let me just share with you that you won’t see The Healthy Home Economist browsing the aisles there.
I’ll be shopping at the 2 small, local healthfood stores less than a mile away where I’ve shopped for the past 15 years. Â That’s where my business loyalty lies.
I spend almost all my food money with local businesses and local farms. Â Not Whole Foods.
How could I possibly rationalize shopping at Whole Foods which has recently rolled over on the GMO issue in the United States by suggesting that we all need to “learn to live with GMO’s” by accepting the USDAs proposal for “peaceful” coexistence between organics and genetically modified foods?
Here is Whole Foods’ official statement on the matter:
The reality is that no grocery store in the United States, no matter what size or type of business, can claim they are GMO-free. While we have been and will continue to be staunch supporters of non-GMO foods, we are not going to mislead our customers with an inaccurate claim (and you should question anyone who does). Here’s why: the pervasive planting of GMO crops in the U.S. and their subsequent use in our national food supply. 93% of soy, 86% of corn, 93% of cotton, and 93% of canola seed planted in the U.S. in 2010 were genetically engineered. Since these crops are commonly present in a wide variety of foods, a GMO-free store is currently not possible in the U.S. (Unless the store sells only organic foods.)
Since the U. S. national organic standards do not allow the use of GMO ingredients and practices in the growing or production of organic foods, choosing organic is one way consumers can avoid GMO foods. The other is through labeling, of which we are strong supporters.Â
Hey Whole Foods, here’s a novel idea:  How about selling only organic and local foods then? That would solve the problem nicely wouldn’t it?
I don’t know about you, but that statement screams “sell-out” to me. Even more damaging, Whole Foods recently endorsed the peaceful coexistence option with regard to GE alfalfa rather than an outright ban. The unrestricted planting of GE alfalfa that starts as early as this spring threatens the entire grassfeeding dairy industry over the long term as alfalfa hay is an integral part of winter feeding.
Whole Foods is all about corporate profits and management can shade it and couch it any way they like, but the message is loud and clear: Â corporate profit and shareholder gains are more important than sticking to the basic sustainability ideals Whole Foods was founded upon.
Do you want your neighborhood healthfood stores and farmer’s markets to suffer revenue losses from business ruthlessly stripped away by a Whole Foods coming to town?
If not, you can choose to stay away like me and treat Whole Foods like just another supermarket or Walmart: Â a place of last resort where budget dollars are rarely if ever spent.
Note: as of July 2012, it appears that Whole Foods is still sourcing much of its “organic” produce from China which provides further verification of the video below.
In addition, as of June 2015, Whole Foods’ new veggie rating system can rank conventional produce grown in another country ahead of organic, local produce!
Sarah, The Healthy Home Economist
Don’t know if Earth Fair is along the ranks of Whole Foods, but I go to Earth fair for primarily my non-homogenized milk, otherwise I pay more than double the price to have it specially ordered to my local health food store. We are a single income family with a full house of children, so I choose to take the cheaper option. Our meat and dairy comes from small farms, and other foods primarily from food co-op. And I just don’t feel comfortable buying raw milk in “secret”.
I have been into health foods for more than a decade, and I don’t really have much use for the chain health food stores in general anymore.
Here’s the post I wrote about this last month, we’re getting one in Boise too, sometime this summer. I’ll be boycotting them along with the rest of you because I support my local farmers and health food stores.
http://agriculturesociety.com/healthy-living/8-reasons-i-wont-shop-at-whole-foods-when-it-opens-in-boise-idaho/
Yep, we’re having the same issue here in Boise, ID where I live. And I won’t be shopping there. Here’s the post I wrote about this matter, which was featured on the Organic Consumer’s Association web site:
http://agriculturesociety.com/healthy-living/8-reasons-i-wont-shop-at-whole-foods-when-it-opens-in-boise-idaho/
I actually got some comments on my FB page defending Whole Foods for “doing the best they can”. Well, that is never good enough for me. I’ll continue to support my local farmers and health food stores, thank you very much.
Good grief, this post got people’s hackles up!
I would just like to add to the scintillating conversation that whether or not you shop at WF for whatever reason, they are a huge corporation with the power to influence food policy and push for meaningful reform and restrictions concerning GMOs.
They have this power, but they refuse to use it. They could make great strides in revealing the truth about GMOs, educating their consumer base, holding their suppliers accountable and at a bare minimum advocating for labeling laws.
So many of their products contain GMOs without labeling, as do other stores — but the difference is that many shoppers have the mistaken impression that WF has higher standards along these lines and have weeded out such products. Everyone should demand that they step up to the plate and take the lead in this effort, rather than giving it lip service and backing down to the pressures of Monsanto, DOW, Cargill and the like.
This is a matter of citizen and corporate responsibility. Unless we all take responsibility and speak up, there will be a point at which GMO contamination will wreak such widespread harm to the planet and to us that it will be irreversible.
Please tell me what “crunchy” means. I have heard it several times and have ask a few others to explain and they never have.
I don’t have a health food store like yours around here. I will go to the farmers’ market, but how would I know if anything was gmo (like the corn)? I wouldn’t mind a Trader Joe’s, I would take my WAPF shopping guide with me.
Sarah, I don’t really think the comparison between WFs and Walmart is fair. While I think WFs has issues and the prices are high, they do (at least my WFs) have some local produce–not from China. But, just like any store, you have to read labels and see where items are produced, etc.
Our local health food store has basically the same packaged items as WFs which are going to contain GMOs. They don’t have different products. Our local health food store has some local organic produce but also has a lot of organic produce from Mexico which I don’t usually buy because I don’t trust it.
I know there are a lot of co-ops that are better, but we don’t have that here, and while I prefer to shop at our local farmer’s market, I still shop at WFs. I’ve done a lot of research on Wal Mart. I have not done as much on WFs, but I really don’t see that they are the same. Of course, I can be convinced, but I would need to see a break down of how they are the same, not just hasty generalizations.
Also, is there a way we can see when new posts are posted besides coming back to the thread? I like how for other blogs, the new posts get sent to your email.
Lori
We call Whole Foods, “Whole Paycheck” in my neck of the woods because it’s ridiculously overpriced and doesn’t even carry a huge selection of everything you need in an organic version. In my city we are fortunate to have a very well-established food co-op grocery store that sells mostly organic, locally grown food and other big name brand organic dry good items.
But not everyone is lucky enough to have a co-op in there area – it’s a delimma!
I agree with you…at this point if I boycott all of the thigs that I’ve been reading about I can basically buy nothing and shop nowhere. I’d love some suggestions…Whole Foods & Trader Joes ( I’m sure there will be a call to boycott them any minute now) are the only places in the winter time where I can get organic fruits and veggies.There are no longer any “local” healthfood stores anywhere near me. So while I’m waiting for the CSA to start and the local farmers markets (which are only here once a week) to begin and my own organic garden to start producing…
We live in north central Iowa and there are no health food stores for about +100 miles from where we live (at least that I have found). Nor is there a Whole Foods. We have a couple of gardens in our yard during the summer/fall and plant as much as we can to last us the rest of the year. What we can’t grow ourselves, we buy at the grocery store or farmer’s market. One of the grocery stores near has a decent selection of organic/natural foods in both it’s own isle and in the produce section (but meat/cheese are non-existent when it comes to organic). The down side here, is that the largest farmer’s market in a 25 mile radius has about 10 stalls and only 1 claims to be organic. We’ve boycotted Walmart for about 5 years now and try our best to avoid all of the other box-marts as there really isn’t much difference between the Chinese crap sold at any one of those stores–same stuff, different color, different price. We refuse to buy food from China, period. We make a couple of trips in the summer to my parents in Minneapolis to go to a big farmer’s market there–always a fun family event. But the sad thing here in Iowa, is that everyone is so pro-GMO-corn (and soy) it’s ridiculous. I gave up corn for Lent and was nearly shunned by everyone around me…they look at me like I’m some sort of crazed lunatic, freak. Glad I’m not from here originally.
Although I am a believer is supporting local as much as possible, I am so thankful to have places like Trader Joe’s and Earthfare near me. We are in placer right now in which we need food assistance and no farmers around me accept ebt. I am thankful to still be able to provide my family higher quality food and I work very hard to make what we get go the farthest it can while still being healthy.