can someone from produce explain how that garbage cal-organic stuff gets higher ratings than local organics? talking the Good/Best stickers
WTF
6 replies (most recent on top)
The simple answer is that big farms like cal organic can afford to buy the "good/better/best" rating from wfm, who is selling the rating system as a marketing tool to sell more of their products. Small, family owned, local farms cannot easily afford the thousands of dollars it costs to be "rated."
The whole thing is arbitrary as hell and pisses a lot of small farms off. The rating stickers are intentionally misleading and designed to look like an organic logo. The idea is that dumb shoppers will buy a CV product labelled "best" instead of a local organic product that has an ugly gray "unrated" sticker (or isn't rated at all.)
No one that I know supports the rating system or even takes it seriously.
it just doesn't make any sense.
Excellent article on KQED. Thanks for the link. The company should automatically put a BEST label on anything organic. Otherwise, this marketing ploy does elevate certain conventional produce above its organic counterparts. I agree with the idea of recognizing the better conventional farms out there but it should be done with undermining the value of organic.
The ratings have nothing to do with the product quality.
Here is a good article that may give you some insight.
http://ww2.kqed.org/bayareabites/2015/06/12/organic-farmers-call-foul-on-whole-foods-produce-rating-system/
It was all just a scam to promote the slow moving items to increase turnover and decrease shrink. I lost trust in our values after I witnessed my Produce Team Leader go to a nearby mexican grocery store to buy a case of cilantro because the cilantro we were suppose to carry had been shorted/recalled. I had to chop that cilantro up to finish our "signature" guacamole. I'm sure there are more stories like this out there from other departments.