Sunday, December 13, 2015

Whole Foods: making an historic "365" marketing MISTAKE ... by gimleteye


Megalomaniacs are in charge of Whole Foods. They have now branded Whole Foods "365" on EVERYTHING in the store. What happened to consumer choice?

I understand that the logic to branding grocery items. Whole Foods did not start the trend.

Branding gives the chain power over suppliers. Whole Foods would also argue, branding is a stamp of quality assurance for organic produce.

But the visible imposition of the 365 brand is a turn off. I started shopping at Whole Foods because I wanted healthy, organic choices instead of industrialized food.

A more sensitive approach would have been to limit the 365 brand, not spread it throughout the store like a weed.

Consumers like a diversity of choice, and especially with brands they can identify as independent of Dow Chemical or ADM or Monsanto.

What Whole Foods is doing is with its branding is opening the market for smaller vendors of organic produce. Yes, Whole Foods has tremendous economies of scale, but it is losing sight of what made the store a major success in the first place and is eroding the confidence of consumers, without any outside interference.

I continue to shop at Whole Foods and have been a loyal customers, but when and where I have the opportunity to have more choices, I take it. The 365 branding is going to prove a colossal marketing blunder.

6 comments:

cyndi said...

I'm not sure why this is bad? 365 has standards they go by. http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/quality-standards
If I'm missing something let me know.

Anonymous said...

As they say in the old world:
The weather frog climbs the latter until he's cass la goel

Anonymous said...

365 branding just like publix Greenwise which are both a less expensive alternative. Trader Joes offers their own products throughout 90%+ of the store and customers are making that a success.

Anonymous said...

What happens is that the purchasing departments become bullies. Organic? Yes, Whole Foods if you say so and if we believe your propaganda.

Anonymous said...

I think they are opening new stores called '365' that target price snsitive shoppers. The 'Whole Foods' stores will still remain 'Whole paycheck'.

Seth Platt said...

Margins are smaller for them on their own brand items, hopefull;y some of that savings can get passed down to the consumer. As Trader Joes who follows this model extensively throughout its stores continues to eat away at market share I would expect more of this. It is a shame because it erodes quality.