It’s the Whole Foods/Trader Joe’s news you’ve been waiting for!  Here’s the release from the folks at Whole Foods…

365 by Whole Foods Market™, a concept grocery store that provides simple, affordable and convenient everyday shopping without sacrificing the quality standards and dedication to food transparency that Whole Foods Market pioneered, has chosen Decatur, Georgia as one of a select group of cities to roll out its new store and branding.
The new evolution of grocery stores by Whole Foods Market (NASDAQ: WFM) will be unveiled at North Decatur Square, a new shopping plaza to be constructed at North Decatur Road and Church Street by Fairburn-based developer S.J. Collins Enterprises.

“The 365 by Whole Foods concept will be a great fit for this new, growing retail corridor in the north end of Decatur,” said Jeff Garrison, partner at S.J. Collins Enterprises. “Close to downtown Atlanta, this location is ideal for shoppers looking for good, healthy and convenient food options that the grocery store will provide, along with several other chef-driven and fast-casual restaurants that we expect will fill North Decatur Square.”

The first 365 by Whole Foods will open in Silver Lake, Calif. on May 25, 2016, followed by about 10 more over the next year, including cities like Lake Oswego, Ore., and Bellevue, Wash., Santa Monica, Calif., Evergreen Park, Ill., Sycamore Township, Ohio and Gainesville, Fla., among others.

North Decatur Square will include approximately 90,000 square feet of commercial space, including the grocery store and additional retail and restaurant tenants. It is expected to open in Spring 2018.

What exactly is a Whole Foods “365”?  Buzzfeed describes it in a way that only Buzzfeed can…

1. The new 365 stores simply don’t carry the really expensive stuff you find at a regular Whole Foods.
2. More of the foods in the hot food and salad bar will be coming in pre-prepared.
3. The displays will be less elaborate.
4. There won’t be a butcher or a fishmonger.
5. 365 stores are smaller and cheaper to build.

And in case that’s not enough info for you, check out this Washington Post article titled “What to Expect From Whole Foods New Low Price Grocery Chain“.

Rendering of Silver Lake 365 store courtesy of Whole Foods Market 365 website

UPDATE: See our newest post on this story for location specifics.

The Atlanta Business Chronicle is at it again.  Casually dropping hints about a Whole Foods Market in “Decatur” and subsequently setting everyone’s hair on fire.  🙂

This time the mention occurs in an article about Whole Foods’ new “365” stores.   The full article is behind a paywall, but here’s the section near the end that mentions the Decatur store.  Bolding is mine…

The 365 store was designed to complement Whole Foods larger, traditional stores. The company recently has announced new stores in Atlanta, including a flagship, 70,000-square-foot Whole Foods in Midtown at 14th and West Peachtree streets. It also has new stores planned in Chamblee and Decatur.

The Shopping Center Group is assisting Whole Foods with its local site selection.

“With the 365 stores opening now, they’re going to take the smaller footprint, be very curated product mix, very focused on creating value for customers,” said David Lannon, executive vice president of operations for Whole Foods, said in a Feb. 10 call with analysts. “You won’t see small Whole Foods Market stores open up…365 stores can go into a lot of markets we think Whole Foods can’t go in with these bigger, more exciting boxes.”

It’s unclear from the article whether the Whole Foods would be inside the city limits or part of “Greater Decatur”.   We will update you with further news as we receive/hear it.

Whole Foods Midtown photo courtesy of Whole Foods website

UPDATE: Decatur Asst. City Manager Lyn Menne declined to comment on this story.

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A report in the Atlanta Business Chronicle this morning about Whole Foods opening a new store at Peachtree Crossing in Chamblee includes this little nugget…

Whole Foods is also scouting for another store in the Decatur area and possibly the Cumberland Galleria, according to people familiar with the talks.

With 600 new apartments being built in downtown Decatur, rising home values in the city and surrounding area, and an EarthFare opening a new location closer to Decatur at Emory Point than any existing Whole Foods, this doesn’t seem a huge surprise.  One question will be whether Whole Foods will open an urban location downtown or in a more suburban environment.

We’ve reached out to the city for comment and will update when we hear back.

Thanks to brianc for the heads up!

Photo courtesy of Whole Foods website

This past Tuesday the cashier at the Briarcliff Whole Foods asked my wife for her phone number.

And before I could get myself over the counter and all up in his biznass, he quickly explained that he was only asking because Whole Foods was scoping out new locations for a store and compiling a database to see where customers come from to shop there.  (OK, the first part of that sentence didn’t actually happen, but you get the idea.) This morning, TeeRuss reports similar activity at the Whole Foods on Ponce.

Sure enough the websites of those two Atlanta Whole Foods, and ONLY those locations, have the following message up on their calendar this week.

Why are we asking for your home phone number this week? At the end of your transaction, we’ll ask for you number, which will be used to generate a map of where our shoppers come from. Only home phone numbers work for this type of map, and the maps help ensure we are supporting our shoppers’ communities as well as designating areas for potential growth within the market. Trust that we will only use your phone number for the purpose of generating a map. We will not share your number with any other group. Thank you for considering this request.

So if you head to either of these locations before Sunday, May 16th AND you have a home phone, don’t threaten bodily harm.  Instead, make sure you give them your number so they have a record of all the Decatur-ish folks stopping by, so they can build a store here!

Better yet, you can CLICK HERE, scroll down to Contact Us via Email, select “Store Location Request” and just enter your name, email address and zipcode and you can show your support for a Decatur store location.  The fact that these two specific stores are asking location surveys makes it seem like we might finally have a shot at getting a decent grocery store IN Decatur.

A Decatur Metro reader writes…

Hello, I was curious as to whether you knew anything about the empty Advance Auto Parts or AutoZone building next to Eckerds at the five points of Scott Blvd, North Decatur and Medlock? This building has been vacant for over four years and seems like a prime location for a Whole Foods or Trader Joes.

Well, first things first. This property is outside the Decatur city limits, in unincorporated DeKalb County, so the Decatur Downtown Authority has no jurisdiction. Personally, I haven’t heard anything about developing the property at that intersection, so I welcome any further info in the comments.

While we may all wish for a Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods closer than Midtown and Briarcliff/Lavista, respectively, I prophesy it would be difficult to convince either of these high-end food stores to come closer to Decatur due to a lack of upper income residences to our immediate east. I think the most likely of all of these scenarios is a Trader Joe’s inside the Decatur city limits. The Midtown location is a drive even for affluent Druid Hills/Emory residents (don’t get me started on Monroe Cr. traffic) so a Trader Joe’s around Decatur could be quite profitable.

But when I wish for a Trader Joe’s in walking distance of my house, even I feel pangs of greed and gluttony. I mean seriously, how much Mandarin Orange Chicken can one man eat?

OK, a lot. Why not email Trader Joe’s and let them know how you feel? Can’t hurt!