![]() In mid-August shares hit a three-year low, representing about a 50% loss of market cap since October 2013. All of this Sturm und Drang has been reflected in the company’s stock price. The store’s numbers haven’t been pretty either: Same-store sales growth last quarter was at its lowest level since 2009, a fact blamed in part on the New York City investigation and on the longer-term concern that it is facing stiff competition in the healthy-eating ethos up and down the grocery food chain-from Kroger (KR) and Walmart (WMT) to Trader Joe’s and Sprouts (SFM). The company said it was a mistake, but the episode gave yet more currency to the notion that the chain dubbed “Whole Paycheck” was out of touch. Then, in August, comedian John Oliver spent three minutes on HBO’s Last Week Tonight mocking Whole Foods for selling bottled water laced with asparagus stalks … for $5.99. First came accusations, in June, that its stores overcharged customers in New York City-which prompted investor lawsuits as well. The same term would certainly apply to Whole Foods itself right now: The company is in a period of dissonance, one that makes the attacks on its Responsibly Grown program seem like small organic purple potatoes. “You need dissonance, and you need someone who is challenging things. “I am absolutely a contrarian,” he tells me at Whole Foods’ Austin headquarters in one of the first of our many conversations for this story. Indeed, if there’s one thing to be said about the man, it’s that he has never been afraid of pissing people off. The 62-year-old Mackey, for his part, seems utterly undaunted by the hullabaloo. In the end Whole Foods made some tweaks to the new program but hasn’t backed down. Says Peterson: “This was a hill to die on.” NPR broadcast a lengthy segment on Morning Edition. When Vernon Peterson of Abundant Harvest Organics in Kingsburg, Calif., brought the issue to the attention of the California Certified Organic Farmers organization, where he’s treasurer, they unanimously decided, “We should fire every bullet we had.” Eventually he and a handful of fellow farmers sent an open letter to Mackey, complaining that the new rating parameters were “onerous, expensive,” and shifted the cost of marketing to growers, “many of whom are family-scale farmers with narrow profit margins.” The New York Times picked up the story, airing it on the front page of the business section. ![]() Phone calls and emails flew from one local organic homesteader to another, with many fearing that the new rating system would undermine their brand. You could hear the blowback from Monterey County, Calif., to New York’s Hudson Valley. So in late 2014, Whole Foods (WFM) rolled out a new rating system called Responsibly Grown, which measures factors like energy conservation, waste reduction, and farmworker welfare. “We feel like Whole Foods should take a leadership role in this. “Organic is a great system, but it’s not a complete solution,” he says. ![]() And once farmers are certified as organic, Mackey believes they have little incentive to improve their practices. But they don’t address all the burgeoning issues-from excessive water usage to the treatment of migrant laborers-facing agriculture today. Its guidelines prohibit the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, which is a good thing, he says. In Mackey’s view, organic had grown stale. Never mind that co-CEO and co-founder John Mackey is almost surely the individual most associated with today’s organic movement and most responsible for taking it mainstream. ![]() Never mind that organic is the upscale supermarket’s largest product category, accounting for 25,000 items on its shelves. A few years ago Whole Foods Market decided that organic food didn’t go far enough.
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