when grocery shopping becomes rocket science
and why the middle class should protest whole foods

I am just perusing the internet when I come across an article on SILive, the Staten Island Advance's online mag. Trader Joes, an organic, reasonably priced, bulk grocery store may or may not be setting some roots on Staten Island in the near future. That's awesome. No really, I love buying organic, holistic foods at unusually low costs. I shopped there quite frequently when I was living in Brooklyn.

What really grabbed my attention though was a statement regarding other gourmet grocery stores that were courting the island. Apparently, if you want a Whole Foods in your neighborhood, you need a college degree. Yep, that's right folks. If you want access to privileged tomatoes and soy milk, you need to have worn the ole' cap and gown.

"Whole Foods, he said, requires 42 percent of the population around its stores to hold a bachelor’s degree — a criterion the Island doesn’t meet." Slepian, Do Say it's So: Trader Joes, SILive.com)

It's like that song: I'm all lost in the supermarket, I can no longer shop happily...

Someone on the message board argued that's because people with degrees tend to have higher paying jobs and are therefore less likely to be on public assistance.

This gives a new definition to the term, "smart foods". My immediate reaction when I read this was that the people behind Whole Foods, the CEO's and big shots in an office somewhere, are primarily white and that doesn't automatically mean they are smart. Staten Island, for instance, does not meet their requirements for high education minimums. However, there are tons of families-- middle class and affluent, that would patronize their stores, hence bringing up their revenue and spreading their products even further. It is true that people from towns and neighborhoods in a place like Staten Island tend to be loyal customers, so their sales would be fairly consistent.

Now, I think that people with higher education degrees would be less inclined to shop at a place like Whole Foods where you can get anything you can get at Trader Joes or the organic section at Pathmark or Shoprite, at double (sometimes triple) the price. Do the math. While the company may argue that their products are of higher quality, I think it is a no brainer that they appeal to neighborhoods where mindless folk will splurge to buy Thai Jasmine rice from the rarest rice farms in the world, when you can just as easily buy Goyas Jasmine Thai rice from Key Foods at a fraction of the cost. I know this because we once went looking for rice in Whole Foods and were astounded (well, not really) that they did not have rice in bulk and did not have reasonable prices.

I think this is an elitist requirement to open any store and I am all for higher education. Yet, I am not very surprised. I thought supermarkets were there to provide people with the foundations of healthy, well stocked kitchens and homes without much discrimination. I have a degree (two, in fact) and do not have a high paying job. And it is a fact that I prefer organic, natural foods and household products. So, I welcome Trader Joes, a place where you can get those things at very decent prices. Poo poo to Whole Foods, we'll leave you for the unknowing tourists at Union Square. 

-m