Whole Foods Market

review

Is it a (free-range) bird? Is it a plain (bio-yoghurt)? Or is it just another supermarket?

Arriving as it did atop a tsunami of publicity, I was wary when this American juggernaut of the ‘green’ food movement landed in Kensington.  However, as I started to wander around, I confess that I came over a bit Charlie Bucket, albeit with a somewhat less sweet tooth. I found myself marvelling at the mounds of cheese; a fish counter that stretched from wall to wall and piles of artisan bread being churned out by the in-store bakery.  The variety of olive oils filled half a dozen six metre wide shelves and even their choice of eggs ran to the offerings from seven different types of bird: the other six being quail, bantam, pheasant, duck, goose, rhea and ostrich, in case you were wondering.

After a while, however, certain things began to niggle. “Organic when we can, local wherever possible,” goes the blurb.  Why then so many wines from the New World?  If WFM is committed to organics and local sourcing, where’s the justification in trundling bottles of conventionally produced cab sauv all the way from Australia?  If memory serves, France has been known to turn out the odd reasonable bottle of plonk, hasn’t it?  Although WFM has not emailed me with a reply to the questions I asked on the feedback form I completed a couple of weeks back, taking a wild stab in the dark, I’d predict the answer I may eventually get will be along the lines of: ‘to offer the consumer choice.’ Surely the choice the consumer wants when entering a shop that flies its ethical colours so high, is between products that have similarly green credentials?

“We genuinely care about our planet,” they say.  Well, I like their takeaway containers made from sustainable bulrush fibre but why then package nuts, rice, pulses etc in clear plastic containers that many, if not all, recycling schemes in West London refuse to accept? Surely there’s an alternative that would have a lower impact?  I also like the food court’s shape-coded recycling bins for different types of waste but why did the plate for my stonebaked pizza slice come covered in foil, for which the only end was the bin?

On the positive side, the quality of the produce was generally high.  Despite the alarming number of food miles some of their lines have clocked up, they do also stock a wide range of British produce, including English wines and some artisan cheeses that I don’t even recall seeing in specialist cheesemongers.  As for the experience, in their top to bottom renovation of the Barkers Building, WFM have created a pleasant shopping environment. But all good things come to an end and WFM’s single queue for around thirty tills started to bring me back to reality.  With no ‘five items or fewer’ lane, I waited for over ten minutes to pay for a single loaf of (very tasty) pain au levain.  When I then had to decline a plastic carrier bag for my solitary purchase, the chocolate factory vanished altogether. By the time I left, I was well on the way to thinking that WFM is just another supermarket, after all.

Whole Foods Market
The Barkers Building
63–97 Kensington High Street,
London
W8 5SE

Chris Young, MyVillage: , 24th July