Whole Foods

1. The main elements of the strategy being pursued by Whole Foods Market consists of offering the highest quality foods that are fresh, natural, non processed, and full of natural preserved flavor, and offering it to customers in a friendly and appealing environment. To pursue Whole Foods’ vision, they implemented different types of strategies such as growth, store location, product line, pricing, and merchandising in order to create a competitive advantage over rival companies. John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods Market, believed in this strategy because he saw that if these high quality natural and organic foods were marketed to more customers in more communities, that it would transform their diet so that they would live healthier and more pleasurable lives (Thompson, c-2).

2. Whole Foods’ strategy is very detailed and well matched to market conditions in the food retailing industry. Whole Foods Market was able to achieve success in this industry because of the following: 1. their “growth” strategy enabled them to acquire 10 companies over a 10 year period; their major acquisition being Wild Oats Natural Marketplace consisting of 74 stores alone. 2. Using their “store location” strategy Whole Foods located is stores in upscale urban metropolitan areas with high traffic shopping locations and popular real estate sites (Thompson, c-14). 3. The “product line” strategy Whole Foods offered 20,000 to 50,000 natural, organic, and gourmet food items along with natural non food products such as body care, nutritional supplements, and pet foods to meet every customer need. 4. The “pricing strategy” was to sell at the most competitive prices possible (Thompson, c-18). Whole Foods made a move to emphasize value priced items that were available by offering an in store value guide called “The Whole Deal” that offered coupons, low cost recipes and meal planning guides. 5. Whole Foods’ “merchandising strategy” gives them an advantage because each store layout is customized to fit...