Beef, Actually

Whole Foods and Fairway share a problem: While the demand for wholly conspicuous consumables by the affluent and the aspirationally so remains insatiable, there are now lots of other stores that traffic in the food and drink that bear at least some of the key signifiers that many of these shoppers look for in order to to stave off death and properly convey their aesthetic and moral superiority, including places that the clearly non-so-affluent patronize, like Walmart. This has been bad for the signature national purveyors of these products.

While Whole Foods is articulated as much to the New York Times:

“Our products are not the same” as what other grocers are selling. He said he recently purchased four certified organic steaks at a mainstream retailer and had them analyzed. The steaks, he said, came from organic dairy cows that had been decommissioned at about 40 months — most beef cattle are slaughtered by 24 months for taste and food safety reasons. “Sure, those steaks technically meet the organic standards, but in terms of taste and flavor, they’re not the best example of organic meat,” Mr. Robb said.

You can just see the ads right now: Who wants to eat old, “technically organic” cow flesh? The baby cows, the spectacularly organic cows, that’s what shoppers want. And it’s only at Whole Foods. Because, while there’s a lot of vegan mayo, there really is only so much happy meat to go around.

Photo by Paul Swansen