Whole Foods: Nicer to lobsters than to its employees.
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14 thoughts on “Priority watch”
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By Dan Kennedy • The press, politics, technology, culture and other passions
How nice of Shaw’s to keep the world safe for overpriced convenience stores.
I have long suspected that Whole Foods is run by pious frauds. An employee once told me that a co-worker of hers was sick and had to go on medical leave. The other employees were encouraged to “donate” their own vacation time to this co-worker so that she could have a paid leave. Nice.
Of course they’re pious frauds; if they really cared about the well-being of lobsters they wouldn’t be selling them in the first place. After all, the poor crustaceans are going to die a painful death being dunked in boiling water!
What’s this about hypocrisy?I’m all for supply-chain adjustments that reduces ocean-to-cart time for lobsters, and makes them comfortable. They should be comfortable right up until a quick death in my boiling water. I’ve found that slowly asphyxiated lobsters taste funny. Whether by “Intelligent Design” or Evolution, we are an omnivore species, equipped to hunt, gather, and farm. We didn’t evolve canine teeth to tear turnips. As to hypocrisy, if I wasn’t willing to kill a lobster with my bare hands, I shouldn’t be willing to pay someone else to do in a cow for me, no matter how caringly and humanely. But I AM not squeemish about killing a deer for meat for the family, I’m just too lazy, so I’m ok with paying someone else to get messy. I realize some radical Vegans consider Organic Beef an oxymoron. Organic Beef is not an ethical contradiction: eating meat is natural for omnivores; eating meat with artificial hormones is not natural, nor is modern feed-lot or veal-pen practice. Organic beef should be raised naturally and killed ethically of course; so organic lobster should be transported and stored ethically. I’ll pay a bit more for that. But don’t expect me to switch to tofurkey. I am an omnivore and not ashamed to be at the top of the food chain … until the buzzards pick my bones.– Bill R
I work at Whole Foods and they asked for volunteers only to work that day, and offered to pay double time for the effort. No one in my department was going to be forced to work that day.
In some fields, the idea of holidays being guaranteed is totally foreign. In the human services, we don’t just shut down a hospital unit or a group residence or a crisis line or a treatment program because it’s Thanksgiving. I realize that a grocery store is a type of business where they can make the choice whether to be open, where my field is not, but I just generally find the whole “OMG you have to work on a holiday? That’s TERRIBLE!” sentiment rather offensive, since there are in fact many many jobs where the industry can’t just take a holiday. The needs of people with severe disabilities who require 24/7 care are a lot more important, to me, than my having a duty-free Thanksgiving each year. I’m sure these folks would love to have a holiday from being dependent for care, but they don’t have a choice. I’d feel extremely entitled if I were to say that I should get Thanksgiving off every single year, which would mean that the people served by my agency’s residential programs would starve and not get medications and not be supervised if all of us insisted on having Thanksgiving off. If a person really values holidays and insists on having every one off, there are fields they can work in where holidays are pretty much guaranteed. We can let people who have that preference choose a field where they won’t ever have to work on a holiday, and we can appreciate the nurses and firefighters and caretakers and clinicians who work on holidays, rather than offending them and the people they serve by pitying them.
1. Eeka’s post (above) is a textbook example of emotionalist propaganda. If you support meaningful public holidays like Thanksgiving, you must be in favor of killing the severely disabled. Earth to eeka: there’s a difference between emergency rooms and organic food boutiques. Oh, and BTW, the reason it’s “TERRIBLE” when my friends and relatives have to work on a holiday isn’t because THEY will miss football or freshly cooked comfort food, it’s because WE won’t get to spend time together with them as a whole family. Yeah, sure, we’ll all be together at the next funeral, but one of us won’t be around to enjoy it. For my family to make a sacrifice like that, there’d better be a good reason, and yuppies “just dying” for some ostrich meat doesn’t cut it.2. The fact that Whole Foods is willing to pay double on Thanksgiving is scandalous. They are a business, and they wouldn’t be trying to open if they weren’t going to make a profit that day. So if they can still make a profit when they pay their staff double, why don’t they do that every single day? (Because they can get away with it?) 3. As for Shaw’s being a “tattle-tale”, I say congratulations to them for standing up for their own employees’ rights. One good reason it’s been against the law (for millennia) to work on holidays is that when one merchant opens up, the others have to follow suit or lose business. The only way that anyone can afford to celebrate a holiday is for everyone to celebrate it.
If working that day is voluntary and volunteers get paid extra than more power to those who sign up. There shouldn’t be a law keeping people from being able to work on Thanksgiving. Maybe they have bills to pay and extra $ will help. Also, having a store open anywhere in the city on Thanksgiving would rock.
Provincial Congress, I love your post. Right on the button.The lobster worry seems like a pander to a more forceful and successful animal rights mafia. They are worried about Lobsters crowding but not being chowed into peoples’ stomachs??? Frauds.And you are staying open on one of America’s two most celebrated days when not even stray cats can be easily seen on streets for what reason again?? Bad cooks?? Sorry, I can sympathize but if an accident happens, canned food will do. Thanksgiving is more about families gathering and less about culinary success. It is a side benefit, not a reason to make employees miss precious time with their families.You don’t need to look far to know that WF is a fraud of a PR stunt company: Look at their prices and their selections. Higher prices on ANY item you imagine. Smaller packages with smaller quantities with higher prices with the earthy-crunchy look and feel to make them the perfect bait for their target audience.They pray on consciencious liberal souls who want to feel good about their purchase and food and want to feel they are eating healthy and not contributing into the big so-called GMO infested big supermarkets. But if you look at those sandal and birkenstock-wearing souls, they are scrawny and often don’t look like like they make that much beyond 30k a year. If you are a wealthy liberal who shops at WF, God help you, I am not worried about you.What I am worried about is WF targeting a certain profile and bilks them out of precious money. One example is selling them so-called natural anti-perspirant at twice the price and it doesn’t even clean right nor prevent odor.It is a fraud of a company and anyone regularly walking there is an idiot. If you are looking for good natural groceries, you can do better in the awful mess called Haymarket than on the overpriced WF stands. And have you looked at their bakery cases for good sticker shock??The company may be based in TX but I bet you they don’t have many stores in rural Texas or middle America.Only in Liberal Northeast, kids. Only in Liberal NE.N.
“2. The fact that Whole Foods is willing to pay double on Thanksgiving is scandalous. They are a business, and they wouldn’t be trying to open if they weren’t going to make a profit that day. So if they can still make a profit when they pay their staff double, why don’t they do that every single day? (Because they can get away with it?)”This is specious. There’s no evidence that Whole Foods makes a profit on the days it pays double to its workers. Furthermore, the grocery industry is characterized by very low margins, in many cases 1 to 2%. (I am not making this up: Per MSN Money’s website, theNet Profit Margin for the industry is 1.1%. Whole Foods’ margins are 3.5% for the latest quarter, and have averaged between about 1.5 to 3.5% per quarter for the past several years. Compared to other industries, that’s nothing special.) They are likely a bit higher because of the supposedly “high end” nature of its product lines (someday, someone will have to explain to me why the flour in one loaf of bread is worth more than the wheat in another). It is doubtful that its stores make much if any profit on Thanksgiving, especially since sales are probably relatively low that day.
P.S. N., you are off your rocker. Please seek help.
There’s no evidence that Whole Foods makes a profit on the days it pays double to its workers.This is question begging. For what reason would a public company intentionally operate at a loss? To steal business from competitors who choose to stay shut during the holiday? Per MSN Money’s website, the Net Profit Margin for the industry is 1.1%. Whole Foods’ margins are 3.5% for the latest quarter, and have averaged between about 1.5 to 3.5% per quarter for the past several years. Compared to other industries, that’s nothing special.This is a red herring. Profit margin is not the sole factor determining profit per employee. But since Whole Foods has significantly higher margins than its competitors, it is reasonable to ask whether those higher profits are shared equitably with all employees.
This is question begging. For what reason would a public company intentionally operate at a loss?Did you see the news today? Did you see the stampedes at WalMarts across the country? Does a $400 laptop (as WalMart was advertising from 5-11 am Friday only) suggest a profit margin? Unlikely. Companies, public and otherwise, run loss leaders all the time. The reasons are myriad.But since Whole Foods has significantly higher margins than its competitors, it is reasonable to ask whether those higher profits are shared equitably with all employees.Oh, I don’t know. Do their employees give back salary/bonuses etc. in the quarters the company doesn’t fare as well?
Companies, public and otherwise, run loss leaders all the time. The reasons are myriad.It wasn’t a rhetorical question. Wal-Mart ran at a loss that day for a reason, to get publicity, to attract customers. The only reason Whole Foods would run at a loss on Thanksgiving (assuming we can’t accuse them of ingratitude) is to ingratiate themselves with shoppers, i.e. to be the store that’s open when most stores are closed. IOW, they directly intended to reap the commercial benefits of breaking the public holiday. You know well, I’m sure, the market pressure such an act would mean for Mom & Pop groceries, let alone Shaw’s and other supermarket chains.Do their employees give back salary/bonuses etc. in the quarters the company doesn’t fare as well?I never suggested determining compensation on a quarterly basis, but of course you can’t pay someone with money you don’t have. Corporations don’t need my advice to know to cut benefits and FTE’s during lean times. Ideally, this burden would be shared equitably (read: fairly) among the employees, so that at least a living wage can be paid to all and none are let go.