I live in an older part of Dallas called Lakewood. When I heard that Whole Foods had bought out the tired old Minyard's supermarket, and was going to build a newer, better store there, I thought: Bring it on! The newer Whole Foods locations have great places on premises for families to eat and hang out. It promised to be a real boost to the neighborhood.
Well, Whole Foods has decided to give up on building an attractive big new store, and will instead settle on renovating the ugly big old store. Why? They didn't want to be pecked to death by city bureaucrats and neighborhood associations. An anonymous commentator on one popular Dallas blog cracked wise:
Gotta love the fratricide. Enviro-libs torpedo the store that bends over backwards to cater to enviro-libs. Bravo, retards. Bravo, indeed.
That's, uh, overinterpreting things, but still, I appreciate the irony. Here's another anonymous quote:
It is embarrasing that so many people on the East Side are so anti-change that even a good change, by what has to be the most enviro-friendly store in the State of Texas, gets torpedoed.I hope they are proud of themselves.
Understand that the choices were not "big box grocery store versus smaller, more manageable retailers" but "big box grocery store in nice new building versus big box grocery store in tired, ugly old building."
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Yeah, but the Central Market at Lovers and Greenville makes this place look like a 7-11. : )
Maybe Whole Foods will do an impressive job renovating the old building. That's what happened in my home town in the Bay Area.
The corporation, which is not without flaws, can absorb that kind of cost readily; some customers say their name ought to be "Whole Paycheck."
Kit, you have to be in Oakland.
I went by the new Whole Foods in almost-downtown Oakland last week. (Hey, I biked there and how good am I!!) In a former Cadillac dealership building renovated at vast cost, a block from the Archbishop's new palace, the Cathedral of Christ the Light, still under construction.
Wow. Talk about Whole Paycheck! Ordinary old foods, with uppsy-poopsy labels, for 150% of common retail price. "This Food Is Better Why" labels at huge price premiums. (No real government or other oversight, so who knows?) Tons of prepared gourmet foods, of The Very Best, expensive again. Righteous T-shirts even, of righteous materials detailed on the labels. Of course. Very Wonderful coffee bar. Lots of bike racks out in front. Hardly any automobile parking. (Oh, and it's at the very bottom of a huge hill which I live on top of. Virtuous shopping for the very young.)
(Kit, check out the Piedmont Market, halfway up the hill. Cheaper meat, actually, cheaper than Safeway in fact, still the "I'm in the upper class" ambiance if you care about that, without the pretensions. Also, an adequate parking lot.)
I have no principled objection whatever to all this. It's a free market economy. Anyone who shops at Whole Foods in Oakland, by definition, has access to discount food stores, Safeway, the Piedmont Market, Andronico's, Seven Eleven, any number of alternatives. If whoever shops there thinks these goods are worth the price for whatever reason, more power to them and to Whole Foods.
I wouldn't shop there on a bet. I'm trying to buy food. I'll find my moral righteousness elsewhere.
why is healthy competition not a crunchy concept?
Ah that Mark, he has that sharp, sharp tongue.
The question is who determines whether or not the competition is "healthy". The efficient corporation? The disgruntled mom & pop losers? The consuming public? Clueless journalists? Hillary Clinton? Ralph Nader?
Rod Dreher.
Ah that Mark, he has that sharp, sharp tongue.
Are you talking about me Susan?
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