I guess there are people out there who don’t know what Whole Foods is so they want to know what is Whole Foods…
I am referring to the food market chain by that name, not merely what are whole foods in general, so if you were asking THAT question, you will be reading many many volumes and conflicting information since these days no one can actually agree on the general food question that asks What is Whole Foods. (What ARE Whole Foods would be grammatically corrector. [sic])
So, if you were searching for What is Whole Foods, as in the market chain, then you came to the right place!
As of the writing of this post, there are about 435 locations across North America and the UK.
They had been trying to also grow through domestic mergers and acquisitions, most notably of Wild Oats Market, but were blocked by the FTC and Courts due to antitrust concerns.
Whole Foods Market is HUGE and is now pretty much a household name in the areas where they operate stores.
What is Whole Foods is an organic market POWERHOUSE.
If you’ve ever been asking what is Whole Foods enough to travel to one of their stores, you’ll find a very large market that has departments that sell just about everything, from fresh produce, to organic and grass fed meats, dairy, seafood, bakery, vitamins and supplements, cosmetics, cleaning products, diet aids… even beer and wine (heck, I’m there!) … just about everything that you can find in a non organic supermarket, but these products are of an overall higher quality.
The company is involved in environmental initiatives and has been challenged by PETA to push meat producers into a system that more humanely treats animals raised for food.
Of course quality comes at a sometimes premium, but Whole Foods is more reasonable in the price area than you might expect. Many people think that one of these markets are just for rich people, and that’s simply not the case.
What is Whole Foods but a market chain that is evolving to serve a huge market across a large area.
When I was a kid there was just the odd “health food store” which was usually a hole in the wall store manned by the owner and you could really talk to them about health food and what it was all about. Of course you don’t really get that at a large supermarket chain, but the sheer quantity of what you can buy at one of these behemoth locations does kind of offset the loss of the small neighborhood store feel.
I hope that many small organic markets can survive the health food superstore, and I think overall they will.
What is Whole Foods is not is they are not a Walmart and I don’t think that they can ever be as big and ubiquitous as something like Walmart.
You won’t find them in every locale.
But, for the large population centers, Whole Foods really fills a necessary niche and provides a once stop location for everything organic, or natural, or healthy, as compared to the regular non organic supermarket chains.
I’m going to go to my local Whole Foods Market and snap some pictures and upload them to this article as soon as I can get over there, so stay tuned!
I am also going to update this article with interesting finds as time goes on.
I can say one thing, my wife will likely appreciate me going along to help carry stuff, but she will probably be annoyed with me disappearing to go take pictures of everything in the store!
Hey, if you can’t make blogging fun, then don’t bother!
The Looney Foodie strives to have fun with this blogging thing, whether it’s eating at a restaurant with family or friends and then reporting on it, or simply researching fun food topics to let you in on, or throwing out interesting recipes.
If it’s yummy, put it in your tummy, if you’re a foodie, you’re a friend of mine!
Here is our local Whole Foods in our corner of New Jersey, USA.
As you can see, Whole Food Market has very large stores. It’s a true “super” market.
As I walked in, I went around the perimeter of the store snapping pics, and I apologize if my phone camera didn’t focus every one perfectly. I was just in for a second as I had other things to do and wasn’t there to actually shop, but this is the store that my family shops at when we do a Whole Foods Market trip. I only got the perimeter, but as in any market, that’s where the best stuff is, but if they have all of this in the perimeter, imagine how many other goodies are in the center of the store! I didn’t get the dairy section on this trip. Maybe next time.
Here is the large produce section, and my picture DO NOT do it justice. Whole Foods Market has a large produce section and I couldn’t photograph it all.
So I was walking after the Produce section and looked to my right and there was a juice section.
Amazing!
Here is something I didn’t expect in New Jersey, since our food markets do not sell alcohol or beer, which are sold at liquor stores. I wonder how Whole Foods Market got around that regulation? Somehow they did!
I kept walking and looked to my left and ran into vitamins and other healthy body products.
Continuing our tour of Whole Foods we come to the Seafood counter and then a wall of Rose Wine, and then the Meat and Poultry counter.
Here I came to a warm beer and wine section where the merchandise is stacked out like in a liquor store. They really have some selection and who knew that there were so many organic type of alcoholic beverages for purchase? Next time I go I will look closer.
Whole Foods Market also has a cheese counter dedicated to all things cheesy.
There is a quite extensive Bakery section too at Whole Foods. It’s almost overwhelming the sheer size of this place and to think that it’s an organic market is mind boggling.
Whole Foods Market also has counters for desserts, salad bar, and hot food buffet.
You literally can get lost in this place!
And we end the tour with a Sushi counter. Sushi!
I’m floored!
Whole Foods surprises me YET AGAIN!
I hope you like this virtual tour of my local Whole Foods Market “store perimeter edition”.
Stay tuned for this What is Whole Foods exposition to grow in length and maybe some other interesting stuff!
