Ouch. News yesterday that Whole Foods Markets founder and CEO John Mackey used a fake identity on Yahoo message boards for years to bash his competition and flaunt his own company's stock has left us with a funny taste in our mouth.
Using the handle "Rahodeb" (his wife's name backwards scrambled), Mackey posted messages that put down the competition, and fluffed not only his company's image, but his own personal image ("I like Mackey’s haircut. I think he looks cute!")
Does this news change public opinion about the store? One could argue this was an isolated and albeit embarrassing peccadillo, but with little affect on the business. One could also argue that if the CEO of a Fortune 500 company is spending his time performing such shenanigans, he must have other ghosts in his closet. Are we, as shoppers, being deceived about what is organic, what is local? The question of trust, in this case, surely can't be ignored.
Mackey has a blog on the Whole Foods website, but so far there is no response to this piece of news.
So Mackey did something silly: how many will it stop from shopping at Whole Foods?
(via The New York Times)
How to Make Easy 3-Ingredient Energy Bars at Home
How to Make Fresh Pasta Dough in the Food Processor
Good Food to Share 
The Big Book of Small, Cool Spaces 
Apartment Therapy Presents 
The Eight-Step Home Cure 
TW Salt Mill by Wil...
Small Cool Lessons: Discovering Small Space Design Ideas That Really Work
Marisa and Peter's Playfully Eclectic Home
His wife is named bedohar? or debohar?
It just doesn't sound right ;)
Genevieve with a smile you made me laugh out loud.
I don't care who runs Whole Foods. The store is expensive and far from a neighborhood grocery so I just go there to get what I need. If the owner of my corner organic grocery, which I don't have, was a pompous dork I might think twice about giving him my money. In San Francisco I was happy walking to a number of different organic independent groceries in a number of different areas. I've got plenty of reasons to not shop at Whole Foods I just need some choices. Unfortunately any choices will be bashed and then gobbled up by the mighty Rahodeb.
I would like to know how much, how many pounds, how many tons of mediocre steamtabled, pre-cooked, dried out prepared foods Whole Foods wastes/throws in the garbage on a daily, weekly and yearly basis. There is no way all of that food is being consumed.
I don't see how you can jump to conclusions that just because Mackey did something like this, could mean WFs is lying about what's organic and local. I've heard people claim that WFs may be deceiving the public about this, but that's a huge claim about a very large and successful company. Lying is very different than posting juvenile messages, I think.
Whole Foods is clever because I'll bet most people think they are getting organic just because they are shopping there. Organic equals good, moral and healthy to many people and they know they can get this at Whole Foods. But how many people know which products are certified organic and which are not?
I wouldn't be surprised if the product for the ready to eat foods from their massive deli/pizza station/hot lunch line come off of a major food distribution truck.
I've been following this fiasco for awhile. Most of the reports I've read, claimed he was primarily bashing Wild Oats--a company he has been trying to acquire.
This won't affect my decision not to shop at WF as I rarely shop there anyway, only when it's the only place that carries something I need and that's rare.
I'm always amazed at how many people think the produce there is so great. To my taste--yes it's *looks* beautiful, but it has no flavor compared to what I can buy at the Farmers' markets here. Not to mention WF wants 3X more $ for it.
It's not so surprising that the founder used tactics such as these. Watching mom'n'pop groceries going out of business because of Whole Foods vulture-like policies makes a lot more sense now.