Iconoclasm: Whole Foods eats Wild Oats

This week, natural and specialty foods retailer Whole Foods acquired smaller chain Wild Oats for a questionably wise offer of over half a billion dollars.  Whole Foods, which started as a hipster/hippie health food store in Austin, Texas, has become a natural foods giant.

Unlike most health food co-ops, which were founded to save money for a membership who were health- and penny-conscious, the giant health food supermarkets cater to an upscale "foodie" market that can afford to pay a multiplier for perfectly displayed organic produce -- or even perfectly displayed conventional produce. 

Meanwhile, conventional supermarkets are pushing organic sections and organic options are trying to convince their shoppers that there's no need to go to a second market.

Looking for cost effective whole foods?  Your best option may be an ethnic market.  In the Boston area, the best and cheapest produce and fresh fish may be available at the open market Haymarket, the cheapest whole grains at hispanic and south Asian markets, the cheapest olives at a Turkish market in Allston.  Even in a conventional supermarket, you may find that looking in the hispanic section will get you cheaper canned beans, whole grains and legumes, and sauces than their equivalents in the "mainstream" parts of the store.

Much as I support organic food, I wonder if we are going to see healthy eating in this country so long as it takes trips to five stores to do your shopping.  It's fun, but hardly cost effective or time effective even for those of us to have those options available locally.

Big chain specialty food supermarkets make it harder and harder for the smaller local health food store or co-op to make it.  This leads to higher prices for food, and less diversity of suppliers.  For example, Whole Foods is more likely to use the same suppliers for apple juice in all their stores, rather than looking for locally produced foods.

Development such as this merger makes one wonder what the future of healthy eating might be in this country. 

-- 

Shava Nerad, News and Opinion Correspondent:

Shava’s column, Iconoclasm, published several times a week to Gather Essentials: Newsis an examination of the provocative ideas emerging in media and world culture behind the news.

Shava Nerad has been working on the Internet for twenty-five years, at the boundaries of Internet and social issues.  She is executive director of The Tor Project as her day job.  She lives in Somerville, MA with her teenage son, her fiance (a professional magician and fundraising coach), and a corgi/dachshund mutt named George.

Opinions here have nothing to do with Tor. 

You can find all of Shava's Iconoclasm columns at http://Iconoclasm.gather.com

Keep up with Shava’s other postings and Gather activity by joining her Gather network -- just click here and select the orange “Connect” button on the left-hand side of the page (colleage connections only please, unless you know me on the street!)

You’ll find Shava and other News Correspondents, plus celebrity content and plenty of other News experts at News.gather.com