Gluttons Club

Organic foods have become a significant element in the nations food supply. No longer are organic products a rarity to be found only in certain stores and restaurants but they're now commonly found in the major supermarkets but are often marketed and displayed separately.

In the major supermarket chain in this area (greater boston), the organic veggies are in the produce section but in their own little area where they are displayed in a group rather than by type. The organic food products are located in an aisle or two at one end of the store. These aisles have different color fixtures, and are labelled "Wild Harvest" in a style and manner completely different than the rest of the store.

While its obvious that organic products are often packaged and marketed differently than conventional products made by huge companies, the need to separate them is curious. Just because they look different and are unfamiliar to some consumers, does that mean they need to be consigned to a separate area like a concentration camp for food?

Maybe the delineation is to highlight their esteemed status and apply an image of luxury to them--the supermarket equivalent of a velvet rope. This would be a grave miscalculation on the part of store managers--no one shopping in a place where coupon flyers and sale displays are prominently featured is looking to satisfy their ego, they want to save a buck. The result is an invisible barrier that keeps the traditional shopper out of the organic aisle on the assumption that it's not for them.

In my largely uninformed opinion, I think the supermarket would be best off eliminating the labels and letting the products compete on the same shelf. This being a fairly liberal part of the world, there are plenty of store options for the shopper concerned with things like organic products. If the mainstream store really wanted to compete directly with alternatives like Whole Foods, then they should open up a separate Wild Harvest store. The reason they haven't is that they know it would fail as a separate entity but persist in thinking it will thrive as an entity within the store.

If they want to offer consumers the option of organic products without changing their main business plan, then they should assimilate them with the rest of the merchandise. This way, the invisible barrier that keeps many people out of the wild harvest section is eliminated and the greater number of options makes everyone happy. Shoppers looking for organic products can find them in the logical place within the stores organization. Shoppers who don't seek them out will be exposed to them next to the conventional brands and might purchase them for health reasons, to try something new or purely by accident.