[mcrae]

As great as its image, in my view Whole Foods just isn't that great of a grocery store.

They were out of ground pork the other day and the staff at the butcher counter insisted they weren't allowed to grind more pork, despite it being on display. Bizarre.

They are regularly out of things just beyond the norm, like polenta.

Seems less like a grocery store for normal people and more of a spot for yuppies to buy $8 kombucha or whatever. Blows my mind.

Why can't we have HEB in California?

[Kalium]

> Why can't we have HEB in California?

I think most grocery companies are really food logistics companies under the hood. Expanding requires building out the logistics.

With that in mind, the answer seems to be "We can't have an HEB in California because there's a bunch of AZ and NM between Texas and California".

If you want something HEB-like, there's always Safeway or Sprouts.

[neuralRiot]

I don’t buy kombucha but I’m vegan and since Amazon bought it the quality and diversity of the products i used to get has gone down, luckily local supermarket chains seem to have noticed and started to get more variety of those products since.

[jasonv]

I like Whole Foods but a good number of the vegan products I buy are available cheaper at Target now, esp frozen. So I make the rounds... Safeway, Sprouts, a local gourmet shop, etc.

I don’t like what Amazon has done to the selection, and they seem out of things more often these days. Guessing it’s a mix of supply chain issues and contractual sourcing pressure that keeps some products out of stock because Amazon is very selective on product mix, pricing and delivery volumes. When you ask in the stores, they never seem to know. Peculiarly, they’ve been out of dry chickpeas a lot, recently.

The stores can be very different from location to location. The Park City store looks nice but is horrible. Sedona, Reno and Lafayette are great, IMO. Etc.

[grawprog]

>Seems less like a grocery store for normal people and more of a spot for yuppies to buy $8 kombucha or whatever. Blows my mind.

Is that not what it's always been? Even before Amazon bought them? It's pretty much a meme at this point.

[ev1]

In my experience [pre-covid, city], Whole Foods was just a place to pick up lunch then walk back to your tech office tower or hipster coworking space.

I don't see much value in it other than either an Amazon Fresh staging point or picking up lunch and a sparkling water - in general I don't even see people using carts. At best a basket, typical they just carry a beverage in one hand and a paper box of whatever they got from the hot/cold bar with the other.

[masonhensley]

Speaking of HEB, I’m in the hunt for some black market mixla tortillas up in Virginia. (Recently relocated from Houston)

[odysseus]

Try Trader Joe’s - they have similar corn & flour tortillas under their house brand.

[icedistilled]

Wholefoods is mostly overpriced, but good for niche items like high quality milk or Strauss ice cream. California has TJ, costco, and more of all else.

Anyway, it's an upscale grocery store and at least in my opinion is better than Gelsons. Although again, I only go there for like 2 items.