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Fears grow over 'food swamps' as drugstores outsell major grocers

theguardian.com

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Re: Fears grow over 'food swamps' as drugstores outsell major grocers

#81

Post by amalcon »

momokoko wrote: post #29
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where real estate is expensive the only grocery stores that can stay afloat are fat margin chains that cater to upscale customers. The poor people are then forced to shop at CVS or wherever, sure it's more expensive than Walmart or a proper grocery store but it's still cheaper than whole paycheck. WF (or Trader Joes for that matter) simply doesn't sell value priced versions of a lot of items. CVS will sell it at a ri…

This is a massive misconception and nicely illustrates how much people are influenced by branding and merchandising. Whole foods 365 brand is actually cheaper than many grocery store generics. The data is available online if you want to explore this further.

This seemed like an extraordinary claim to me, so I tracked down an analysis by Consumer Checkbook for the Boston area. The basket of goods they examined cost over 20% more at Whole Foods than at e.g. Stop and Shop, and over 50% more than at Market Basket.

https://www.checkbook.org/boston-area/supermarkets/articles/...

Re: Fears grow over 'food swamps' as drugstores outsell major grocers

#82

Post by my_username_is_ »

mac01021 wrote: post #66
radcon wrote: post #61

I've noticed a similar thing happening with prepared food. If there are Wawa stores in an area, there usually aren't as many sandwich or salad places nearby as you'd expect. Where I work, your options are basically Wawa or bottom-tier fast-food chains (McDonald's, Taco Bell, etc.). I really wish there were more health-oriented quick-service options (even a Chipotle would be nice), but I don't think they can compete a…

I live in New England and have never heard of Wawa or Sheetz.

Wawa is a chain of large convenience stores, mostly in the Mid-Atlantic region. They typically have a sandwich counter inside, which I think is most comparable to having an in-store Subway.

Ask someone from Pennsylvania or New Jersey what they think of Wawa. In my experience, their eyes generally light up and they start raving in a way that most people don't talk about a gas station convenience store.

Re: Fears grow over 'food swamps' as drugstores outsell major grocers

#84

Post by dsfyu404ed »

mac01021 wrote: post #66
radcon wrote: post #61

I've noticed a similar thing happening with prepared food. If there are Wawa stores in an area, there usually aren't as many sandwich or salad places nearby as you'd expect. Where I work, your options are basically Wawa or bottom-tier fast-food chains (McDonald's, Taco Bell, etc.). I really wish there were more health-oriented quick-service options (even a Chipotle would be nice), but I don't think they can compete a…

I live in New England and have never heard of Wawa or Sheetz.

It's basically Cumberland Farms.

Re: Fears grow over 'food swamps' as drugstores outsell major grocers

#86

Post by simonsarris »

psadri wrote: post #83

Has anyone attempted a mobile grocery store that drives to food deserts on a fixed schedule? It could say be a container with a single aisle, stocked with the basics and a checkout at one end.

I don't think so, because "Food deserts" are what happens when the demand for ideologically congenial explanations for socially inconvenient facts greatly exceeds the supply. There is an assumed causal directionality which turns out to not be supported.

Most places are food deserts not because market forces don't work there, but because they do: People in those areas do not want to buy fresh vegetables and raw ingredients for cooking. They prefer to buy packaged/processed foods, regardless of cost or health comparisons they are making, or not making. This makes traditional grocery stores less worth it, so they leave if they can't make do.

There's a lot of literature on food deserts (as typically stated) being more or less a meme since 2015, here's one example with a couple studies to back it:

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/09/upshot/giving-the-poor-ea...

> Another study, published this week as a working paper by the National Bureau of Economic Research, looked across the country and found that no more than a tenth of the variation in the food people bought could be explained by the availability of a nearby grocery store. The education level of the shoppers, for example, was far more predictive.

And so on. So no I don't think your idea would work particularly well past the novelty stage :(

Re: Fears grow over 'food swamps' as drugstores outsell major grocers

#87

Post by masona »

radcon wrote: post #61

I've noticed a similar thing happening with prepared food. If there are Wawa stores in an area, there usually aren't as many sandwich or salad places nearby as you'd expect. Where I work, your options are basically Wawa or bottom-tier fast-food chains (McDonald's, Taco Bell, etc.). I really wish there were more health-oriented quick-service options (even a Chipotle would be nice), but I don't think they can compete a…

Wawa was a grocery chain long before they were a gas station, and I know they are imagining a future without the ICE. It's one of the ways they'll crush the BPs and Exxon that are first and foremost gas stations.

Re: Fears grow over 'food swamps' as drugstores outsell major grocers

#88

Post by samayylmao »

mc32 wrote: post #43
samayylmao wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't afford transportation you're limited to what you can walk to. In the area I live you cannot bring more than one bag with you on public transportation and it takes almost an hour to get across town on the bus. It would be cheaper to buy marked up food from a gas station or drugstore than pay for a taxi ride or waste half a day riding the bus. Edit: essentially, a lot of the time it is expensive to be poor…

Being poor doesn’t mean you can’t get a bus ticket. All it means is you are deliberate in your shopping and planning. You plan your trip to take advantage of transfer tickets and such. Sometimes you walk a mile or two or you bike or you bum a ride from someone. Being poor doesn’t mean you can’t plan and are helpless. Sure it’s not ideal and I prefer being able to shop ad hoc at my leisure, no doubt. But when I had to…

> Being poor doesn’t mean you can’t plan and are helpless.

obviously not. But anecdotally what I see where I live is that it is a large enough inconvenience that it makes an impact. If you work 8 hours, then have to spend 2-3 hours getting groceries you already have a 10-11 hour day not counting any other commuting you need to do. What if you have kids you need to get off a bus from school?

trying to blanket say anyone not willing to make that trip just isn't trying isn't fair.

It is well documented that low-income areas have less access to good education, healthcare, and other facilities. blaming the residents doesn't help them improve their quality of life. Not everyone will make it out of that.

Re: Fears grow over 'food swamps' as drugstores outsell major grocers

#89

Post by donretag »

In one neighborhood I lived in in NYC, the only local supermarket closed down to make way for a Walgreens. They tried to reassure the community that they would stock staples like (terrible) bread and milk, but obviously no fresh food like vegetables.

This neighborhood was not a poor one. Million dollar condos (forget houses), all around.

Re: Fears grow over 'food swamps' as drugstores outsell major grocers

#90

Post by rosensan »

bluntfang wrote: post #40
p49k wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming this is true: If you visit WF, your entire shopping needs won’t be met by the available 365-branded foods, which means you’ll either have to shop at multiple stores (extremely difficult if you are poor) or buy the remaining products at severely marked up prices, negating any savings the 365-brands products might have offered. In particular, produce, meats and other fresh products are absurdly marked up in WF…

can you give some examples of products you can't find at WF? I only ask because WF is the closest grocery to me and I don't have a problem getting everything I need. Granted, fresh fruit and vegetables don't have the 365 brand, but I'm assuming you don't mean that? I think the 365 brand is more about staples like milk, eggs, juice? Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong though, I'm sure I'm biased.

In my experience, every time I've been to Whole Foods they don't have basic produce, condiments and sauces, etc that I would expect to have at a normal grocery store. Common vegetables are just missing from the store for no apparent reason. And their selection of anything Asian is awful, much worse than even Safeway. It might be a regional thing (I live in a city) but where I live Whole Foods is expensive, bizzarely limited in selection, and caters to a very specific lifestyle and diet - I get the impression it caters to people for whom cooking for themselves is a special occasion and not a daily thing.
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