A quick break from our on-going soap opera inside the AFL-CIO to talk about, uh, organizing–you know, that thing that all this hoo-hah is about. I’m all for beating the crap out of Wal-Mart and the Walton family until it starts behaving. But, there’s another Wal-Mart looming: Whole Foods. And, if we want to control another Beast before it becomes one, we better get our act together now.
Oh, some liberals would say, they are such a nice company, selling shiny fruits and vegetables, chemical-free soaps and meats from grass-fed animals. Make no mistake about it: this is a staunchly anti-union company. The UFCW had an effort (which now seems dormant) to organize Whole Food workers and was met with stiff resistance by this touchy-feely company whose website spews platitudes that make me want to heave. You can read it all yourself by checking out the company’s glossy web presentation.
It may be a bit overstating the point that Whole Foods will match Wal-Mart’s revenues or international reach. But, there are eerie comparisons to the two companies. Wal-Mart started out under the radar screen as a company pushing its way out from Arkansas into the South and rural communities. The labor movement basically ignored the company until it started moving into the retail food markets. By then, it was an octopus.
Whole Foods is tracking a similar arc. It had ten stores in 1991 with 1,100 workers, racking up $92.5 million in sales; today, it has 167 stores in 28 states, Canada and the United Kingdom with 32,100 workers. It is now a Fortune 500 company with $3.9 billion in sales. It has 58 more stores in development. A monster is growing.
Of course, Whole Foods is going after a different market than Wal-Mart. While Wal-Mart feeds on the poor, Whole Foods is decidedly upscale–only a solidly middle-class and above person can afford to regularly pay the prices charged. But, like Wal-Mart, Whole Foods is seeking to dominate an entire sector: upscale food retailing. Whole Foods will grind up and spit out any small business that stands in its way.
There is one critical difference that gives union organizers a tactical advantage: Whole Foods customers. Wal-Mart argues that it brings low prices to poor people who can’t afford to shop elsewhere (okay, the Beast from Bentonville actually preys on people who have no choice) and that its opponents (read: middle class people) are denying poor people the wonderous Wal-Mart benefits.
Whole Foods, though, sprinkles its earthy philosophy on people who can choose whether to shop there or not; Whole Foods shoppers are, on the whole, people with disposable income (yeah, even a passle of those people are groaning under health care costs–and, in the future, I predict crushing debt when housing values tumble). Get the picture? I’m not using the word “boycott” here, just suggesting that people might find other shopping options.
We have to get off the dime on this. If we wait, we’ll regret it five or ten years from now–as we now regret ignoring the once-sleepy company from rural Arkansas.
