I want to love Whole Foods. Really, I do.
But the reality is that the bulk of our food consumption needs are easily met by Ukrop's, Ellwood-Thompson's and the local farmer's markets. (Check back with me in January.) We hit Ukrop's for our staples -- drawing heavily on their lower cost Full Circle organic label -- as well as seafood and sometimes bread. Ellwood is where we do our speciality organic shopping, and occasionally pillage their wine and prepared foods sections. And, over the summer at least, we've probably gone local for upwards of 2/3 of our produce. Oh, yeah, we also buy 400 pound bundles of toilet paper at Costco once every six months.
That said, Nikole and Thea and I stopped by Whole Foods again today. We weren't dazzled -- at least not to the tune of driving 26 miles roundtrip to oggle the slightly broader selection of Tom's of Maine toothpastes.
So, while I like Whole Foods, I don't love it.
And while I'll stop by time and again on my way home from work to pick up some fancy item from their relatively over-the-top aisle of prepared foods, pizza, meat and wine, I doubt our family will drop everything for weekly field trips to Whole Foods.
I may change my tune when Trader Joe's opens.
