A Tale of Two Grocers

To start off this assignment I decided to stop at whole foods first, so that I could capitalize on the cheaper prices at Langenstein's on cold cuts on the way back and avoid shlepping around with groceries in my backpack.  To begin to describe my experience at Whole Foods, I guess the best place to start is what I would call the grains and nuts aisle.  Whole foods was somewhat of a confusing store, just because of the sheer volume and variety of the items they offered, which often seemed unnecessary, an example of which can be seen in the grains and nuts aisle (pictured below).

I was blown away by the amount of different kinds of granola for sale in whole foods, (at least 6) as compared to the amounts of types of Granola I found in Langenstein's grocery, where I noticed one.  The sheer amount and variety of the various grains, legumes, berries, and nuts found in this aisle seemed absurd to me, but more absurd still was that somehow getting granola from a bird feeder made people feel like they were eating more healthy than by buying heartland granola by the box.  I found it confusing though that people were so willing to buy into the idea of organic granola merely because it came out of a bird feeder.  To be perfectly realistic, it's likely that the granola at whole foods was bought in quantities larger than the boxed granola at Langenstein's, yet somehow people are willing to believe that if something isn't in a box it must somehow be better.  To me this is indicative of the gross disconnect we have with our food in America, as corporations like whole foods manipulate the American consumer into paying more for organic with basic advertising tricks.  Multiple times I caught myself about to splurge on an item I knew I could get for less without even realizing I was falling victim to Whole Foods spending fever.  A good example of these inflatedly priced goods was the disparity in cold cut prices.  

Note the 25.99 per lb pricing

Solid bargain with the Langentstein's Roast beef at 5.99 per lb, as well as the 11.99 pricing per lb on their prosciutto.

Ultimately experiencing a true visit to Whole Foods for the first time was strange for me, particularly having been raised in a household where Organic was the standard without shopping at Whole Foods.  I was already biased against whole foods, but ultimately I didn't find any redeeming aspects to their store besides the abundance of prepared foods and niche items like quinhoa and all natural sweeteners (pictured below).  The problem I had with Whole Foods was that organic food as a concept is intended to get people to think about their food choices and understand where food comes from, and after looking at the five or six prepared food stations and eating a couple samples (the telltale heart of bulk sale stores), I didn't feel any closer to my food.  

My experience at Langenstein's grocery was significantly more satisfying.  Though Langenstein's at first glance looks like a warehouse for a canned food-drive, I found a significant amount of unexpected and niche items there.  Langenstein's selection for most types of things is pretty limited, for example they only have three types of peanut butter, (all of which are brand names and weren't accompanied by peanut grinding machines).  They also seemed to have a Kraft brand item on every shelf, which was impressive to say the least.  What was different though was the extent to which each shelf was packed with items.  Most of the time there was only one row of each item, as opposed to the rows upon rows of items at Whole Foods, which actually made it seem like people shopping at Langenstein's were buying all of the products they had to offer, making the items look functional instead of decorative.  In addition the approach to the management of the market was more traditional; they had a greeter at the door, people bagging groceries with paper bags, and used paper price labels as opposed to Whole Foods' electronic price tags.