Whole Foods' Walter Robb talks strategy in N.C.
When it comes to company management, Whole Foods co-CEO Walter Robb likes to take a hands-on approach.
When your company is based on food, who wouldn't?
In North Carolina for a Wake Forest University panel on “Capitalism with a Conscience” with former BB&T CEO John Allison, Robb visited with team members at the growing Winston-Salem store Monday night and sampled some collard greens.
He also walked through the Greensboro, N.C., store now under construction. That store is part of the retailer's growth strategy to open up to 60 new locations in the next two years.
“I was very impressed with Greensboro last night,” he said. “It’s coming along beautifully.”
Beforehand, Robb sat down to talk about the direction of Whole Foods (NASDAQ: WFM).
Sales for Whole Foods increased to $10.1 billion in fiscal 2011, up from $9 billion in 2010 and $8 billion in fiscal 2009. How much of the sales increase is due to growth of new stores as opposed to existing stores and why? By far, the greatest gain is in the existing stores. We started to adjust our store size. Right here in Winston-Salem you’ve got a store that is 30,000-32,000 square feet. It feels pretty intimate. We made our stores a little smaller again. We really got back to our roots about being a healthy eating retailer. I think all of those things have really re-emphasized our connection to the community and to local producers.
In a typical store, what percentage of sales growth comes from prepared foods as opposed to groceries on the shelf? We do say that close to 70 percent of our sales are from perishable products. It’s a good part of our business.
How would you describe your company’s target customer and how has that changed? The original customer was the natural organic person. Then the foodie customer came in. That customer started to come in because we had good, fresh food. We had fresh fruits and vegetables and good fresh meats. Now with the Millennials coming in, they are interested in things like fair trade and whole trade. What we’ve seen is that our customer has become more ethnically diverse as well. People think well it’s just rich white people. No it’s actually not. It’s students and people of all ethnicities that are interested in health. Health is the great common denominator, the great platform of the 21st century. Our business has grown a lot because our appeal to customers has broadened.
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