Whole Foods Naming New Line Of Stores After Its “365” Brand

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(AlishaV)

If you have been waiting on the very edge of your seat to find out what Whole Foods would be branding its new line of smaller stores with lower prices, today is your day. After filing various trademark names to throw everyone off, the company says it’ll be calling the chain “365 by Whole Foods Market.”

Those familiar with Whole Foods will know that’s not a random number chosen by the company, but a nod to its “365 Everyday Value” house brand. Co-CEO Walter Robb told the Associated Press that while those 365 products will anchor the stores, they’ll also sell other items and national brands.

Whole Foods got clever with this one, shooting off a slew of trademark filings over the last month to keep people wondering which might be the name: Clever Egg, DailyShop, Greenlife, Small Batch and Swiftgoods were all on the table. And they were all part of the game.

“Those were all decoys,” Robb told the AP, before adding that maybe he was just saying that as another decoy to keep people from guessing other plans. Is he trying to incept us?

The new chain is slated to open next year, with Whole Foods planning to open between five 10 of the new 365 stores around the country next year, with the potential for the chain to one day have as big a footprint as its parent.

There aren’t many other details about the plans for 365 stores. Though the initial announcement had Whole Foods chasing the younger set, saying the stores would be “geared toward millennials,” Robb says that though that group inspired the idea, the new chain is for anyone who wants a quick shopping trip.

Robb’s fellow co-CEO John Mackey had only hinted before that the stores’ insides would be like what sounds like an Apple store but with actual apples — a “streamlined, hip, cool technology oriented store, unlike any store anybody has ever seen before.”

Robb also isn’t coughing up many details, telling reporters to envision a place “that’s fresh, that’s clean” with a smaller, more neighborhood feel, a “streamlined” selection and “technology woven in.”

Does this mean flying shopping carts? Robotic shopping assistants? Who knows, but Robb says the 365 stores will have the same quality standards as “the mothership.”

“It’s not going to be a dumbed-down thing,” he said.

Whole Foods: New chain to be named for ‘365’ store brand [Associated Press]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist