Whole Foods Opens First Delivery-Only Store, Or An Amazon Warehouse For Food

Since the pandemic began and grocery shopping became even more stressful than usual, more Americans have been embracing online grocery shopping and delivery. Which, of course, you already know, because the difficulty of getting a decent delivery slot has become a widespread and acceptable topic of conversation.

Anyway, Whole Foods responded to this need by converting some of its stores to a delivery-only model for the duration. (Many of them have since been converted back.) But now it's opened a permanent delivery-only location in Brooklyn. The store has none of the frills one associates with Whole Foods, like a coffee or wine bar or prepared foods. In fact, customers are not welcome in it at all, even for pickup.

Instead, it's essentially a warehouse, designed for workers to assemble orders, package them, and get them ready to be shipped out again. This is not surprising, since the deliveries themselves are handled by Whole Foods' parent company, Amazon.

The delivery-only concept was already in the works before the pandemic began, Nicole Wescoe, Whole Foods president for the Northeast region, told USA Today. "We started working on this over a year ago and it was really an opportunity for Amazon and Whole Foods Market to come together and create this vision for the future of grocery online," she said. "Delivery is here to stay. People like options and this is an option that they really love."

Especially in a pandemic.