3 Takeaways - Whole Foods CEO on The Future of Food: More Than Taste (#237)
Episode Date: February 18, 2025Food. People are demanding more from it these days than taste. They want food to meet their personal health needs. They want it produced using methods that improve the health of the planet, respect th...e people who grow it, and more. Here, the visionary CEO of Whole Foods Market, Jason Buechel, shares his thoughts on the food of the future and how to satisfy peoples’ appetite for it.
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We all are increasingly shopping online. So why did Amazon spend nearly 14 billion dollars,
by far the most it's ever spent on any acquisition, to buy Whole Foods, a brick and mortar national
grocery chain? And how are the foods we eat changing? And how do the food choices we make affect the environment?
Hi everyone, I'm Lynn Toman and this is Three Takeaways. On Three Takeaways I talk with some
of the world's best thinkers, business leaders, writers, politicians, newsmakers, and scientists.
Each episode ends with three key takeaways
to help us understand the world
and maybe even ourselves a little better.
Today, I'm excited to be with Jason Beekle,
the CEO of Whole Foods,
which is the first and only certified
organic national grocery store in the United States. Jason has been at
Whole Foods for over 10 years, taking over from Whole Foods amazing co-founder
John Mackey, who's also been a guest on Three Takeaways. Jason was there when
Amazon bought Whole Foods in 2017. I'm excited to learn from Jason how people's food choices are
changing, how the food choices people make
affect the environment, and what the grocery store
of the future looks like.
Welcome, Jason, and thanks so much for joining
Three Takeaways today.
Hi, Lynn.
Happy to be here today to talk to you.
It is my pleasure. Are people eating differently now? And if so, how?
Yeah, I would say consumers compared to probably any other point in history care more about
not only what they're eating, but how their food was produced and what has happened upstream throughout the entire supply chain.
There's more awareness to what food does for individuals and their bodies than we've ever
had before. This momentum, I think, is going to continue to change as we go forward.
I think we have two polarities that go on. We've got a lot of folks who may not be eating the best foods and
are having a lot of processed foods. But as folks, as far as customers who really understand the
impact, they're really seeking out what is best for them, their bodies, as well as making decisions
for what's right for their families. And we bring that transparency to our customers.
We're very clear about the ingredients, the over 550
ingredients that we ban from the products
that we carry in our stores.
Our products are grown and produced
to the animal welfare or the sustainable seafood
sourcing that's taking place.
This point of history, we're probably
in the best position for having awareness and folks caring
about what they're consuming.
What should people understand about their food choices and their impact?
What is it that they don't realize yet?
Well, I think for many individuals, this comes down to what is important for them.
And so in some cases, you've got individuals who are looking for special diets
that might tie to their own personal preferences
around an outcome that they're looking to achieve. Or it could be a dietary restriction.
It could be on the impact that what they're eating is having related to the environment
or how it might impact animal welfare. And so I look at food as something that it's really
personal for an individual
and the different ethos and the buying decisions are going to be different for every single
consumer. And I think what complexifies that is when you look at a household, oftentimes
there's multiple decision points that have to come together. So there's many different
special diets. So there might be a dietary restriction and you might have some individuals
who are on a diet to achieve an outcome like losing weight as an example. Ultimately, it's being
able to bring together the information that you can have to help make those choices either
as an individual or as a household.
And I think we're in a spot right now where not only do we have the greatest transparency,
but we have so many different digital ways that consumers can help process some of this
information and be able to have the understanding around what they're eating and what outcomes
may come or understand the impact that's happening at a macro level based upon the decisions
of what they're buying.
And so for folks that really care about animal welfare standards,
understanding the differences between actions that are taking place. If you take, for example,
eggs, what happens when there's cage-free or pasture-raised processes in place versus a more
industrialized facility? And what's the impact that's having to that chicken through the process?
The same thing could take place as it relates for products
that are being grown in fields today.
The difference of what's happening with organic
and regenerative and what's happening with the environment
and the biodiversity that's taking place there
versus what might be happening
in a more industrialized farming practice.
I'm glad that you made it more concrete.
So what happens when somebody either buys or orders in a restaurant chicken breast meat?
What's the impact?
Well, I think the impact depends upon how that product was produced and grown.
And so in the case of, you know, a chicken breast, and this is a great example. Recently,
I had a chance to visit last year, one of our suppliers, Bell and Evans, and being able to see
firsthand the differentiation that they put into place and the care that they have for their
chickens through the entire life cycle versus what would happen in a more industrialized production plant. And so seeing this happy chicken through its very birth, through the entire supply chain
process and then seeing the quality of the product that gets to the consumer, there's
a difference.
There's a difference in the taste and there's a difference in that bird's life and all of
the different steps that have taken place throughout the supply chain.
And so I think as consumers have more information
around what is that differentiation?
How was that product grown?
How was it produced?
You have a better understanding of what that impact is.
And I would say also different customers
have different inputs that are important to them.
It might be, you know, what is the carbon footprint
as an example
that was taken for this particular product? Or was it using sustainable seafood sourcing
practices and helping protect our waterways? And so I think every product tells sort of a story
of what that impact is to their surrounding stakeholders. Increasingly, as you mentioned, people want to know how their
food is sourced, how the animals are treated. Do you only work with suppliers
that meet certain standards, and if so, what are those standards? Great question.
One of our top differentiators as Whole Foods Market is the products that we carry
and the quality standards that we have in place. I mentioned a little bit earlier the ingredients
that we banned and that's sort of like the first step in the process. So a supplier has to meet
our requirements of not carrying those particular products. The second step is we have, based upon the category, other criteria that comes into place.
And so within our meat standards, ultimately animal welfare is really important.
And so we have something that we use.
It's a third party system called GAP that has different steps in place.
And our suppliers have to meet those requirements
to ultimately have their product certified at a particular step. We have a sustainable
seafood sourcing practices where again it has to be certified by a third party. One
of the things I'm really proud of that we've put into place with produce is a new pollinator
protection policy. And for us, it was really trying to help ensure
that we are supporting pollinator health
and looking at pest management controls
within the produce space.
And so in different categories,
we have different requirements.
And the way I like to think about it is
we do the homework for our customers
so they don't have to.
I take things like cage-free.
We were one of the key drivers
of helping change that within our industry.
And the other thing I'm proud of is,
we have our base standards that are in place,
but throughout the entire store,
you're gonna see areas where we elevate the standard
even further.
You know, in the case of eggs,
the work that we've done with a number of our partners,
including Vital Farms, who's based here in Austin as well, in what's happened in pasture raise.
And the work that we do through our Source for Good program, which is something that
we're proud of, we certify products where we started in produce where the products are
good for the environment, they're good for the communities they are grown in, and they're
good for the workers as well.
So we actually take a look at the working conditions as well
and try to say, how do we elevate the bar in those areas?
And so this is another way that we can work
with our suppliers, not just on achieving what we'd say
is the bare minimum or the floor,
but ways that we can further differentiate
and allow customers to choose in and say,
these are products I wanna to buy based upon attributes
that are important for me.
I have to tell you, I always purchase your Vital Farms eggs.
They taste different. They taste better, actually.
I fully agree.
And I was just making some eggs with some family members
over Christmas holidays, and I was using Vital Farms
eggs and I get the call out that folks absolutely can taste the difference. Yes. And are farmers
incentivized to support what's good for people or what's good for animals or what's good for the planet?
I believe so. Many of the suppliers that I've had a chance to talk to in this space,
Juan, we pay premiums for many of these products. One of the things that we've had a chance to talk to in this space, one, we pay premiums
for many of these products.
One of the things that we want to be able to do is showcase the value and the work that's
gone into this.
And ultimately there's a premium that comes along for these products.
And part of our transparency is making sure that customers understand that work that goes
into making sure that animals
have been taken care of, the workers have been taken care of, the community's been taken
care of, the environment's been taken care of.
These regenerative practices have been done, these organic practices have been done.
And so whatever the criteria it is, there's a premium that the farmers and producers are
getting for these products.
At the same time, there's a lot of other wins that come into place as well. So talking to so many suppliers where they're able to
eliminate and reduce the fertilizer that they need to, to the extra work that has
to go into maintaining their acreage, to the work that they're having to do in
upkeep and maintenance. When you can do things that are great for the
environment and great for the community and your workers, you can create an ecosystem where stakeholders together
can sort of win. One of the things that I get excited about as Whole Foods is we try
to find these win-win-win solutions. So it doesn't have to be for a customer to win on
value. All of these other stakeholders have to lose.
Plastic contamination seems to be pervasive.
Even trusted brands and organic foods are not immune.
Newsweek just published an article on a new study
which found that well-known brands like McDonald's,
Burger King, and Starbucks were all found to have products with high levels of micro plastic contamination.
And the products with high plastic levels ranged from cheeseburgers to milkshakes to kitchen staples like salt,
and even to organic products. And there was even one kind of Whole Foods organic rice.
What are your thoughts?
Plastics, as well as just packaging in general, is something that has been a big focus for
us in helping reduce not only the waste, but some of what can be the harmful or perceived
harmful impacts to consumers as well.
One of the things that we've been trying to do is look at ways by which we can reduce plastics
across the supply chain.
I think one of the tricky parts that we have here
is in general, customers say they want less of it,
yet when you bring offerings to the marketplace,
they're not always deciding
that they wanna purchase those.
And I'll give a real concrete example.
We worked with a supplier in basically helping reduce nearly
all of the plastic in packaged salads,
which was one of the top areas that we had gotten feedback
from customers on wanting less plastic.
And so we brought this product to market.
We felt it actually kept the quality extremely well.
There was just a little bit of plastic
so you could still see some of the product.
But at the end of the day, the consumer still wanted to be able to hold up and see
every little piece of lettuce in the process. Even in something like pasta, which is another
area we innovated with some suppliers on, folks wanted to be able to see the pasta. And we had
alternatives where there was great photography of the product, but they were still leaning in the
ones that had sort of the plastic window in it.
So I think the piece that we need to work through is sometimes customers say things
that they want, but their buying behaviors don't always match up to it as well.
And so some of it's around the education of why we're doing some of these steps in the
first place.
One of the things that I'm excited about is there's a lot of alternative packaging that's coming to bear that is 100% compostable, plastic-free, but it has the look
and feel of plastics. And right now, in some cases, those are a little bit more expensive.
And so we need to be working through with our suppliers and how can we help bring these costs
down and make it affordable. And we can have a win for the quality of the food,
as well as the environment.
For me, that's some of the win-win-win solutions
I was mentioning earlier.
What does the grocery store of the future look like?
How will Whole Foods be different five years from now?
I think customers are going to be more focused
on making decisions that are very personalized
for them.
I mentioned one of my hypotheses that customers are going to buy based upon their own personal
biome in the future.
And so I think the ways by which consumers are going to pull information to help understand
what products they want to buy, whether it's relative to that or buying decisions on specialty
diets or different
things that have transformed through the supply chain and how the product has been produced.
I think we're going to find different ways by which technology is going to help fuel
and support that. I think you're also going to see a space where across the entire industry,
this isn't just Whole Foods, you're going to see more and more focus
on products that will be certified, regenerative, and organic as more and more consumers, especially
as the Gen Z consumer becomes a bigger part of the overall customer base. Understanding those impacts
is going to be important. I believe the grocery store of the future is going to have to be able to help share
those stories and share that information in a way that we haven't seen before.
I also think that we're going to have much more of a omni-channel experience where customers
are going to buy certain products in store more versus things that they're going to have
pantry loaded that will just be shipped to their houses. And we're starting to see some of those trends already.
I think we're gonna see that increase
as we go into the next several years.
And so you're gonna see a lot more focus
on ready to consume products physically in stores
that customers wanna grab and go.
You're gonna see a lot more focus around the products
that customers wanna select themselves in store
and having
more dedicated space to that versus what might be some pantry loading items that
can just be shipped directly to your home. And so I think our actual format
changes a little bit. And what are the three takeaways you'd like to leave the
audience with today? Well the first one is around our team members, which I mentioned
just a few times, but I'm so proud of the work that they do
every single day within Whole Foods Market. And a key part
of our relationship with our team members is the connection
that they have to the purpose in nourishing people on the planet.
And so I think for all leaders, thinking about what is the
culture that you're cultivating and creating every single day?
leaders thinking about what is the culture that you're cultivating and creating every single day.
My second one is I truly believe a business can only operate to its highest potential and be at its best when it's looking at a stakeholder model. And one of the things we
really try to work through is how do we support all of our different stakeholders, whether it be
team members, customers, suppliers,
communities, the environment,
and figuring out what those win-wins are.
And for me, it's always working backwards from the customer.
How do we do what's right by them?
And at the same time,
make sure that we're supporting all of our stakeholders.
The last one that I'll mention for a leader,
I believe to really live to their best potential,
it's making sure that you've got the right work-life balance and that you can authentically
be connected to that purpose of your company and ultimately make sure that you're taking
care of yourself and setting the example for the rest of the organization.
It's one of the things that I try to do as a leader and setting that example, I think is so important
and something I encourage all leaders to consider.
And so critical for any organization,
whether it's a business or a school or a nonprofit
or a government entity.
Absolutely.
Thank you, Jason.
This has been wonderful.
And thank you for your wonderful Whole Food stores, which benefit so many people, the consumers, your team members and all of your suppliers and farmers.
Lynn, thank you so much. It's just been a joy to be on the podcast and I look forward to meeting up with you in New York at some point and walk in a store. I hope you enjoyed this conversation about the food we eat and the issues around the care of the animals,
the workers, the community, and the environment.
If you're interested, we have a related episode about the 200 billion animals
which are raised for food each year, often in horrific conditions.
Did you know that the contribution of these animals to global warming is greater than
the emissions of all the cars being driven around the world?
Renowned Princeton bioethics professor Peter Singer shares on the impact of raising 200 billion animals for food on
episode 224 of Three Takeaways. If you're enjoying the podcast and I really hope
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I'm Lynne Toman, and this is Three Takeaways.
Thanks for listening.