Whole Foods Market Sends Team Members to Health Immersion Program

by columbus, October 18, 2009 | Permalink

Disclaimer

I am a Whole Foods Market team member who has been given a tremendous opportunity to share my experiences while I’m on my Health & Wellness Immersion Program. I am voluntarily providing this information so that others may benefit from my experiences. The thoughts shared here are my own and do not necessarily represent those of Whole Foods Market, their employees or their affiliates. Thank you for reading!

Program Background

Here’s the scoop on this blog and why it’s even being written.

I am a Whole Foods Market (WFM) team member and have been so for over seven years. I am deeply connected with the culture of the company and truly believe that it is one of the smartest, most thoughtful, most revolutionary businesses in the world. So, my thoughts here will be biased. Let’s be clear. I love Whole Foods. I plan to retire from this company one day.

Several months ago John Mackey, our CEO, and the team from WFM’s global office introduced a seventh core value: educating our stakeholders on healthy eating. Now, our other core values are very literally the guiding statements upon which every one of our business decision are made. I know this because I see it every day in what we do: from the products we sell to our recycling in the cafés to the employee benefits I receive to our community and vendor partnerships that each of us help to nurture and beyond. WFM and its team members don’t just talk the talk, we walk the walk.

So, what’s this new core value all about? Here’s my summary: it’s about going back to our roots as a company. WFM was founded by John and his buddies when they realized that their community needed a place where people could buy good-for-you, wholesome, whole foods. They stocked their shelves with truly all natural foods, lots of organics, and more and all of it was fresh and presented in its natural state, just as it was grown on this earth. Core value number seven comes at a time when our society is in turmoil. We are all touched by diseases and afflictions that we ourselves cause through eating poorly. John believes (and I do too) that WFM can affect change in our society if we recommit ourselves to educating our customers and to selling honest-to-goodness wholesome food.

All of that is a whole lot easier said than done, but WFM has faced great challenges before and we have succeeded. WFM’s first step is to educate our team members. To facilitate this, WFM Global offered a voluntary immersion program where team members from across the nation could learn more about the role diet and nutrition plays in creating a healthy body. It didn’t take any convincing for me; this is an opportunity of a lifetime! To successfully fulfill our seventh core value, I needed to learn to walk the walk. The following blog entries are my experiences during my 5-day program with Eat Right America and Dr. Fuhrman in Princeton, New Jersey.

Thanks for reading,

Angel

Leave a Reply

Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on topic and not abusive. For more information, please see our Comment Posting Guidelines. If you have a store-specific inquiry, please contact your local store.

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Website