Comments on: Greenwash Of The Week: Whole Foods’ Boycott Of Canadian Oil Sands.

By: dwhite2762

dwhite2762 — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 20:20:01 +0000

I read an article that said that Whole Foods employees pay more for health insurance if they have inherited disease or if they are overweight. I know that I have other local options for shopping and I pay a lot less. The joke about Whole Paycheck is still relevant in my town.

By: David

David — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 15:43:53 +0000

Thank you for correcting it here, Libba. Unfortunately, every media outlet is reporting this as a boycott, so I am curious where they got that info from. And as they are reporting it as a boycott, every supposedly “green” site is reporting it as such. Sadly, and as you are admitting here, this is not the truth. Will you also be going to each of these sites giving you free PR about boycotting oil sands and correct them, letting them know this?

Maybe you guys didn’t release this as PR, but somehow, somewhere, people got wind of it. And its being reported as a boycott when it isn’t one at all.

Thank you for taking the time to correct that misconception here on the site, I appreciate it. I know WF does a lot of great stuff, but I didn’t buy the idea of a “boycott” at all – it would be impossible to track. Keep up the good work that you are doing, we customers do appreciate the tangible stuff you do.

By: Libba Letton

Libba Letton — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 15:31:57 +0000

Hi, Libba with Whole Foods Market here. Wanted to comment on the idea that this is a PR stunt — check our web site, and you’ll find no press releases, no blog posts, no tweets or FB mentions about this. We’ve done zero outreach on this front.

Yes, it IS pretty difficult to determine where the oil that becomes fuel is sourced — it’s difficult, but not impossible. Whole Foods Market has a team of people who look at all aspects of our operations, from fuel used for distribution to green building practices and what kind of energy we buy for our stores (wind energy credits). That team”™s goal is to reduce our use of fossil fuel overall, and in the process looks for fuel that has smaller carbon footprints, like non-tar sands fuel. We also use biodiesel where possible in our distribution fleet. We work constantly with our fuel suppliers to stay abreast of the latest technology and fuels available, and they in turn are able to tell us where our fuel comes from.

Last, this is not a boycott — it’s a strategy of avoiding tar sands fuel where possible — we’re still using it in our Rocky Mountain region, where we weren’t able to find a supplier with alternatives. It’s a small step that does not rule out additional, future actions.

By: david

david — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 22:45:14 +0000

I hope they do go with the free-trade, cage-free, grass-fed, fair-trade stuff – but I also think that if they are going to put out press releases stating they are boycotting the oil sands, they should be required to back that up with proof. How can we be sure they are going to do it? How can they be sure that the bananas coming from South America aren’t being flown here using oil from the oil sands?

It’s way too big of a statement for a company to make, so they better start proving it 100%…or it’s a greenwash. And we should hold them to proving it.