Whole Foods v Trader Joe's

Yahoo is running a story playing up a rivalry between WF and TJ's. It's pure fallacy. There is no rivalry in the traditional sense of the word. WF is a true supermarket, a 21st century one albeit. TJ's is a specialty store. The reason they are so successful is they they realy don't have rivals of the same size or stature, much like Starbuck's.

I have none...

I go to them when they have the stuff I want, at a price I'm willing to pay.

Whole Paycheck for meat

Safeway for cereal

granted I've never been to one, but TJ's has the best, low-price cereal I've ever seen.

We get about 90% of our groceries at TJ's, the majority of the remainder at WF, and only use "regular" supermarkets for when we only need one or two things for which it would be absurd to spend an hour round-trip of driving.

And this year we purchased a share of CSA. First pickup is this Friday, looking forward to it.

aka tasteless fiber doses.

we like honey bunches of oats - outside of costco, safeway is cheapest.

up here.

Two of the four main grocery stores here carry organic produce and meat, and have a natural foods aisle. Quite possibly three. (Safeway maybe, but I detest them. Overpriced, and the crappiest produce around)

That being said, I still visit the organics store when the grocery store doesn't have what I need.

delivery from 500 miles away from the Organic Food Store LOL

Their prices are great, the produce, bread and milk products are very fresh.
Their cheese selection is second to none- with lower prices.

I like Whole Foods, but TJs really keeps the prices down.

I've noticed that the equivalent products (private label to private label)are priced exactly the same at Whole Foods and TJ's. As mainstream supermarkets like Safeway have tried to compete with Whole Foods, the prices for more products have been reduced at WFs and they have expanded their private label lines too. Pretty soon it will only be Half Paycheck.

I would prefer some other models (the old Bread and Circus chain in the Northeast, for example) but Whole Foods has Starbucked the natural gourmet segment of the market so they're the place to shop when TJ's doesn't have what we want.

Very, very flattering. I've been a Whole Foods customer for many years (Texas), and now we have a W-F super store in Greenville, SC. It stays PACKED!! What a goldmine! I hate it!

But where else can I find fresh shallots? Sherry vinegar? Sea salt? I mean, every thing on my mis-en-place ("meeze"). Certainly not at the detestable Bi-Lo's!

Wish we had a Whole Foods OR a Trader Joes, up here.

That, too, shall pass. Soon, I'll have the place to myself, just after re-stocking, at 10:30 AM on weekdays. Just me and Mrs. Robinson, studying cucumbers.

On edit: SmokingJacket, where are you? New York? You have the filthy Bi-Lo up there? I'm sorry to hear that. The only food chain worse is Food Lion (Food Lyin'). Never, ever buy meat at the Food Lyin'! Two Carolina based companies.

On the upside, I invariably run into someone I know there, which is nice. Cause all us hippies shop there. :D

it had expired?

I get excited just thinking about going to Trader Joes. I can't explain it, but many of my friends feel the same way. The people are really nice, the food is delicious, and the prices are far better for most items that overlap between TJs and WF. Obviously WF has more produce and a larger selection of different items, but their prices are sometimes just outrageous. I always walk out of TJs having spent less money than I expected and I always walk out of WF having spent far more than I wanted to spend. That makes the difference to me.

Anyway, I'm fortunate to live in Chicago, so I can find better and cheaper produce in the small local produce markets like Stanleys, Lincolnwood Produce and Oakton Market. And I have a fabulous cheese shop right in my neighborhood so I choose it over WF. I do love the olive bar at WF though.

http://www.myorganicmarket.com/

and the Takoma Park Coop
http://tpss.coop/

and Glut in Mt Rainier
http://www.glut.org/

I can walk to MOM. Make about 2-3 trips to Glut a month. I think TPSS is overpriced for a co-op and even more than MOM on most things.

and resided in the Cheapos building. There only rival here used to be the Wheatsville Co-Op.

I'd starve to death.

Ever since California's grocery strike a few years ago, I do ALL my shopping at Trader Joe's -- and my weekly farmers market.

I would shop at WF all the time if I had the dough. I love TJ for their low prices, but have often found their products to be sub-quality and occasionally stale.

I can shop there for about 15-20% less than at my Harris Teeter or Giant. I just buy the same sort of stuff at WH as I would at the others, with an occasional treat. My milk is $1 less a half gallon at WH than at Giant, for example. The produce is also almost always cheaper, both organic and conventional, and better quality. Only the meat is more, but we eat very little meat.

The produce can be tricky, but that is about it.

Whole Foods has good produce, but pricey. It is a very nice store, but expensive.

but for healthy every day foods, I like Whole Foods.

Isn't Whole Foods the one that's imbroiled in a major scandal?

the stores are so small and cramped it's hard to navigate the place. The coffee just cant be beat

I prefer TJs (Aldi) because it is cheaper and they have lots of cheap wine. WF just pisses me off because they act like they are saving the world when in reality they are a bunch of phonies. But their butcher section is fabulous.

I am lucky in that I have 2 huge grocery stores, a TJs and the finest butcher shop in the world (Paulina Street Meat Market) all within walking distance.

Thier prices are much better. I do most of my shopping there or at the local food co-op because thier prices are much better than WF for the same stuff. Once in a blue moon I need something I can only get locally at Whole Foods (like chocolate chips processed on dairy-free equipment or a good selection of vegan candies for my kid's easter basket) but I don't find myself over there very often.

Other than that I go to Food Source which is a competitor to Whole Foods if there was actually a Whole Foods here in Delaware.

TJ has the worst picks for fruit and meats. I find it a waste of time to drive that far out of my way for poor product. (However I do get there about once every other month and usually buy several jars of the Cran Juice which I diulte with water)

Wet blanket time.

http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0502-34.htm

Actually, there is a lot to object to. A closer look at the company's business practices and Mackey's ideas about business and society reveals a vision not that different from a McDonald's or a Wal-Mart. In fact, the Whole Foods business model is more or less the standard stuff of Fortune 500 ambition. This is a vision of mega-chain retailing that involves strategic swallowing up (or driving out of business) of smaller retail competitors. It is a business model that objectively complements the long-term industrialization of organics (that is, large-scale corporate farms) over small family farms. It is also a vision in which concerns about social responsibility do not necessarily apply where less publicly visible company suppliers are concerned. Subsidiaries of cigarette manufacturers (for example, Altria, owner of Kraft's organic products) or low-wage exploiters of minority workers (such as California Bottling Co., Inc., makers of Whole Foods's private-label water) are apparently welcome partners in this particular eco-corporate version of “the sustainable future.”

None of this should be that surprising. Mackey's dream of a natural foods empire became possible in the late 1980s with venture capital provided by financiers Oak Investment Partners, Criterion Venture Capital Partners, and First Interstate Capital Corp., all firms with track records as profiteers in weapons manufacturing, as a Texas Observer investigation first reported in 1991. Yet marketing for socially responsible business can create the impression that there is such a thing as a clearly demarcated progressive business sector, reforming capitalism one sustainable mission statement at a time.

For the record, Mackey has not hesitated to defend McDonald's as a contributor to the public good. Nor does he have any problem with Wal-Mart, despite its atrocious labor record or the way it drives competitors out of business and pushes suppliers overseas to pursue rock-bottom costs.

Mackey's views on Wal-Mart became known to Hawken, author of The Ecology of Commerce, in the mid 1990s, when the Whole Foods CEO approached him about joining the Whole Foods board. The conversation was pleasant until the subject of Wal-Mart came up. Hawken mentioned that he'd been working recently to help some small towns in Vermont keep Wal-Mart out of their communities.

“What's wrong with Wal-Mart?” asked a surprised Mackey. Hawken said that since their time was limited, maybe it would be better to ask, “What's right about Wal-Mart?”

“Okay, what's right about Wal-Mart?” Mackey responded.

“Nothing,” said Hawken.

~~~~~~~~~~~


"The ridiculously high turnover rate, wages that are lower than the industry standard, pervasive lack of respect, constant understaffing, absence of a legally-binding grievance procedure, and other poor and unfair labor practices-all of which have led to widespread low morale-highlight the simple fact that workers ultimately have no say in the terms and conditions of their employment at any Whole Foods Market-not just Madison. Workers are not recognized or appreciated for their contributions. Instead, Whole Foods relies on worker apathy and lack of investment in their jobs to keep turnover high, and for the most part, wages, benefits, and other working conditions poor. This environment should be unacceptable for any workplace."

~~~~~~~~~~~

It's a bleak commentary on the current social climate when a management team that spews some of the most backward anti-union rhetoric this side of the last 150 years is still considered socially responsible by liberal investors and others spellbound by any company that combines talk of all things sustainable with record profits. In 1998, when the United Farm Workers (UFW), an early campaigner against the dangers of pesticides in food production, asked grocery retailers to endorse a pledge to support humane work conditions for California's strawberry workers, Whole Foods notoriously refused, making clear it was a matter of principle that the company would not cooperate with the UFW or any union.

Since Texas doesn't have Trader Joe's yet, my favorite "upscale" grocery store is Central Market. www.centralmarket.com/cm/index.jsp

Not that I avoid Kroger--or our own local chain, Fiesta.

there. The prices are great and they have all the types of food I want/need. And yes, there's is something almost magical that happens when I'm doin' my shopping. The staff is always extra nice and in really good moods most of the time. The other shoppers also are alos normally very pleasant. There's something really special about the vibe. I walk in and out feeling better about everything...it's even kind of weird (plus, the one by me usually has some pretty good music on). I don't get the same feeling at Whole Foods and they are definitely more expensive.

As an aside in an article where the founder was speaking to a business group.

All other things being equal, i'd rather support unionized grocery store workers. Aside fromt that, shopping at a place that tries to pay decently is good.

On Edit:

Found this via buyblue:

http://www.workforce.com/section/06/feature/24/06/51/

The core of this allegiance is a wage and benefits package that is typically far more competitive than that of most companies in the supermarket industry. Wages may attract high-quality employees, but wages are not necessarily the reason they remain loyal, as any human resources expert can attest. Employees stay because Trader Joe’s has created a culture of success: an environment in which everyone does the same job at one time or another and a place where people’s opinions are respected and talents are nurtured.

On first blush, this sounds a bit like the West Coast communes of the 1960s, where sharing everything from work to food drew a generation of young idealists. But at Trader Joe’s, it’s just good business. Indeed, the retailer, which also prides itself on the opportunities it offers everyone, from young workers putting in just a few hours a month to help pay for college to store managers, has been cited as one of the best places to work by Fortune magazine, joining the ranks of such estimable employers as Harley-Davidson, FedEx, Ford Motor Company, and Southwest Airlines.

Maybe it's because I live in Los Angeles and we have plenty of both, but I never really thought of the two as competition. I guess I can see it, though. Personally, I would choose Whole Foods for produce and "deli" items. I pretty much only went to Trader Joes for Two Buck Chuck and Orangina until I descovered Gelson's also had Orangina and I had a baaaaaad night with too much 2 buck Chuck.

We don't even have a Trader Joe's in my city. We do have a Whole Foods, but their reputation for dear prices is not exaggerated; I stick to Sunflower Market*, a regional chain with a health-food leaning, because their loss leaders on produce are clinically insane. Last week, I got a pair of two-pound cantaloupes there for one dollar!

*http://www.sfmarkets.com/retailer/store_templates/shell_id_1.asp?storeID=69610B99DE2C416A84CC8693150E7216

Whole Foods has the bakery and the deli.

I prefer TJ's unless I want something from the bakery or deli, which is very expensive.

I wish we had TJ's in Miami.

WF just has the best.