Oct 1, 2020
When this podcast was first launched in 2018, the very first guest was Whole Foods Market CEO and co-founder John Mackey. In that episode, we talked about his book Conscious Capitalism. Well, John has a new book out now, Conscious Leadership, and to commemorate our 50th episode, he rejoins the podcast for a second conversation and rest assured, John does not disappoint.
In this episode we cover a wide range of topics:
Enjoy the full episode, and all of these questions (plus more!) will be answered.
Discussed in this episode
Whole Foods Market History
Whole Foods Market was founded in Austin, Texas, when four local businesspeople decided the natural foods industry was ready for a supermarket format. Co-founders included John Mackey and Renee Lawson Hardy, owners of Safer Way Natural Foods, and Craig Weller and Mark Skiles, owners of Clarksville Natural Grocery. The original Whole Foods Market opened in 1980 with a staff of only 19 people. It was an immediate success. At the time, there were less than half a dozen natural food supermarkets in the United States.
In 2017, Amazon purchased Whole Foods Market for nearly $14 billion. As of 2020, the company operates more than 500 store locations.