One Trouble with Our "Pop Thinkers"

Here is the problem in a nutshell with the “idea fellows” of our time: consider this lengthy analysis of Whole Foods as a customer-centric institution, as a perfect example of “customer capitalism.” (Not a terrifically good coinage, but hey, you pump out what you can while you’re working on your TED talk.) Nowhere in this treatise does the fact appear that, um, one way Whole Foods interacts with capitalism and customers is that, while some prices make a lot of sense, SOME OTHER PRICES AT WHOLE FOODS ARE LITERALLY AS MUCH AS DOUBLE WHAT THEY ARE ELSEWHERE. And other prices are easily 30% to 50% more, for the same products available elsewhere. So yeah, you’re buying that loaf of high protein organic “men’s bread” for almost $9 at Whole Foods and the people who work there are fun and are super nice to you (and are also fairly well-paid, in the marketplace of “people working in stores”), but you can also go down to the hippie store (or the Fairway!) and buy it for $4-something. Hence, your analysis of capitalism is a failure because it does not actually consider the capitalism involved.