Another thing to factor in: Whole Foods ain't union, and has actually fought union drives with twisted progressive or 'alternative' rhetoric. However, leaving them and big-box stores like wal mart and target aside, other than that retail food supermarkets are a bastion of organized labor in the service industry.  I'm writing an article about this for a magazine called clamor, and have been sort of surprised to learn that union density in many regions in supermarkets is like 80%!  !! !!  I was a ufcw member when I worked at a superfresh thru high school. Union-vended food tastes better.  I've done blind taste tests.  F'real. <div> <blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"> [WS:] I do not think Whole Foods is a good example of what I was talking about - I was thinking more of "alternative" food stores that sell much more grossly overpriced foodstuff together with snake oil and sundry products of quackery and witchcraft. Whole Foods is more like a specialty supermarket, a section of Safeway or Wegmans if you will, than an "alternative" food store.  To be sure, it is somewhat overpriced (vis a vis Safeway or Wegmans). I never buy their organic stuff unless it is substantially discounted (which they rarely do.) To me, Whole Foods offers mainly two benefits: - a selection of "gourmet" items (especially cheeses) not available elsewhere (this is true of most of the US, except New York City); - not having to run through the gauntlet of mostly right-wing tabloids prominently on display in the checkout line. But if you do not care about these things, I think you would be better off buying your chocolate chip cookies at Safeway or Wegmans. Wojtek </blockquote></div>