ORGANIC FOOD: THE PARADOX - Foodopoly: The Battle Over the Future of Food and Farming in America - page 65

Advocates criticize Whole Foods for one of the company's most profitable practices: it primarily sells
conventional foods under the false illusion that they are better than products sold at conventional grocery
stores. When shopping in the rarefied atmosphere of a Whole Foods Market, consumers falsely perceive
that they are buying products screened to be healthier or even organic, and will pay a higher price.
Ronnie Cummins, national director of the Organic Consumers Association, is one of the company's
biggest critics. He charges that the store has “row after row of attractively displayed but mostly nonorganic
'natural' foods” that are marketed by a “sleight of hand” to seem “almost organic.” Truth be told, most of
the products sold at Whole Foods Market, even its best-selling private label, the 365 house brand, are not
organic. 11
Consumers who buy meat at Whole Foods are paying a premium for a product they definitely believe
is better. In February 2011, the retail chain announced a five-step animal-welfare rating system for meat
products that would be managed by an independent third-party certifier: the Global Animal Partnership
(GAP), a nonprofit organization actually founded and primarily funded by Whole Foods. In this less than
honest five-tier rating system, Whole Foods Market sells the bulk of its meat from the lowest tiers, giving
a false illusion about its level of commitment to animal welfare—a top priority of many of its customers.
Andrew Gunther, formerly employed by Whole Foods Market in the UK as the senior global specialist
for “animal compassionate product procurement and development,” confirms: “GAP has a very low
threshold for entry into their program, allows feedlots, and does not audit slaughter plants. It has trans-
portation standards that allow cattle to be hauled for up to twenty-five hours without rest, feed, or water.”
Currently the program director at Animal Welfare Approved—the nonprofit certification program started
by the respected advocacy organization Animal Welfare Institute—Gunther notes that the GAP program is
confusing to consumers and gives credibility to a production system known to be welfare-negative.
Gunther says that one of the most disturbing aspects of the program is the marketing of the five-tier rat-
ing system. The publicity pictures show bucolic photographs of cattle and chickens ranging and foraging in
farmyards and on pasture. He says, “This is deceitful, because the vast majority of the animals sold under
the GAP program are grown conventionally: caged hens with no access to pasture or to the outdoors, and
cattle raised in vast feedlots.” Gunther argues that this is why we need “truly transparent and independent
standard setting, rather than programs that just give industry a pat on the back.”
One of the least transparent aspects of the organics industry is distribution, the supply chain that enables
manufacturers, especially smaller companies, to sell their products to stores across the nation. Whole
Foods' primary supplier since 1998 has been United Natural Foods, Inc. (UNFI), the largest publicly traded
company involved in purveying organic and natural food in the nation. The two companies recently exten-
ded the contract making the UNFI the distribution company for Whole Foods through 2020.
Although Whole Foods accounts for 35 percent of UNFI's sales, the distributor also services independ-
ent natural food stores and co-ops that have few other choices for obtaining organic or natural products, be-
cause of the consolidation of distributors. UNFI maintains warehouses that stock products that are then dis-
tributed to stores. Small manufacturers are dependent on contracts with the distributor to get their products
to market. Conversely, small retailers often have to pay a premium price for products because of their de-
pendence on this distributor. The tiny number of companies in distribution—and their ability to charge high
prices to retailers—is one of the chief reasons that many food co-ops and small natural food stores have
been driven out of business. They cannot compete.
During the 1970s and 1980s, a variety of distribution companies served a diverse number of mostly
small natural food stores, buying clubs, and food co-ops. In 1983, there were twenty-nine cooperative-
owned distribution companies, twenty-three regional distributors, and one national distributor. Now the
little-known UNFI dominates the natural and organic distribution business. Its smaller competitor, Dutch-
owned Tree of Life, which has offered a more narrow range of products, was purchased in 2010 by the