Amazon Plans Cuts to Shed Whole Foods' Pricey Image (bloomberg.com)

When Amazon completes its acquisition of Whole Foods Market, Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos will try to keep the grocer's reputation for premium fresh foods while cutting prices to shed its "Whole Paycheck" image. From a report: Amazon expects to reduce headcount and change inventory to lower prices and make Whole Foods competitive with Wal-Mart Stores and other big-box retailers, according to a person with knowledge of the company's grocery plans. That included potentially using technology to eliminate cashiers. Amazon, known for its competitive prices, is trying to attract more low- and middle-income shoppers with its grocery push. The Seattle-based company already offers discounted Amazon Prime memberships for people receiving government assistance and is part of a pilot program to deliver groceries to food-stamp recipients.

Comments

Horrible article - its just guessing with no facts

[blahbooboo]

The article is click bait. As stated in the article, Amazon has not confirmed ANY of the assertions made in the article.

Austin Texas is different from Texas

[sjbe]

You do realize Whole Foods started in Texas

Austin Texas. A small bubble of something close to sanity surrounded by the rest of the lunacy that is Texas. Austin isn't much like the rest of the state. They call it weird but it's only really weird if you compare it to the rest of Texas. For people like me who visit Austin regularly but don't live in Texas, it isn't weird at all.

Re:New flash...

[Registered Coward v2]

Yeh, this is really sad - WholeFoods for all that it is pricy as hell also sells a bunch of really good quality things that you can't easily get elsewhere. Turning it into yet another Safeway is a real shame.

I agree, but Amazon is a logistics company masquerading as a retail operations; similar to Walmart in terms of focus although not quite as cutthroat from what I've seen. If Amazon can maintain quality while reducing supply chain costs and expanding the customer base to get greater economies of scale tehy could turn Whole Foods into a serious competitor.