Posted on 07/25/2011 1:52:36 PM PDT by pabianice
Late Friday afternoon, an employee of the Whole Foods Market in Toronto sent this epic resignation letter to the entire company. It's an alternatingly amusing, enlightening, and occasionally infuriating read — but a good read, nonetheless.
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Dear Whole Foods Market,
My experience at Whole Foods was like an increasingly sped up fall down a really long hill. That got rockier with every metre. And eventually, just really spiky ... With fire, acid and Nickleback music. I was hired about five or six years ago. I appreciated and respected what the company said it's philosophies were at that time. The "core values" essentially. However, it didn't take long to realize what complete and utter bullshit they are:
Oh, you don't recycle properly? (Caring about our communities and our environment)
Oh, you throw out enough food to feed a lot of hungry university students. (Caring about our communities and our environment)
Oh, you're asking me to put latex gloves on the sales floor so customers can throw a pair out for every handful of gummy bears they take? (Caring about our communities and our environment)
Oh, you've installed massive television screens all over the store, sucking up energy and polluting the environment with tacky advertisements. (Caring about our communities and our environment, Supporting team member happiness and excellence)
Oh, you waste an absurd amount of energy, ink and paper in your offices for useless bureaucratic nonsense. (Caring about our communities and our environment, Supporting team member happiness and excellence, )
Oh, you just write off 10-20% of the product that you buy for your bulk department because the bins look nice. (Caring about our communities and our environment).
Oh, you sometimes intentionally order too much just to guarantee a full shelf, knowing full well the product will most likely be thrown out? (Caring about our communities and our environment)
Oh, you don't actually audit or evaluate each product you sell? (Caring about our communities and our environment, We sell the highest quality natural and organic products available)
Oh, you force team members to come in to work, on their day off, once a month, at 7 in the morning, knowing a lot of them live an hour away and the TTC isn't completely running that early in the morning and then force feed them useless updates on the company and embarrassingly artificial pep talks ([Redacted] once compared Whole Foods Market to religion... had to throw that in there. That was definitely a "Did she really just say that moment.")? (Supporting team member happiness and excellence, Caring about our communities and our environment)/
Oh, you buy poorly made, ugly t-shirts for your employees that will just be thrown in the trash and pretend they're gifts when they're really just advertising tools? (Supporting team member happiness and excellence, Caring about our communities and our environment)
Oh, the food here is really quite awful on average? Almost everything that prepared foods makes is terrible. The pizza used to be pretty good but the slices have shrunk, the toppings are sparser and it's usually extremely overcooked. The sandwiches are the stuff of nightmares. (It's amazing what advertising can make people think. It can even trick their senses.) (We sell the highest quality natural and organic products available)
Oh, you let some customers abuse your employees and then actually reward the customers for their behaviour and then trample on the integrity and honour of your abused employees? (Supporting team member happiness and excellence)
Oh, you practice discrimination by offering "healthier" employees better discounts? And you think having different rules for new smoker employees versus old smoker employees is a good idea? (Supporting team member happiness and excellence)
Oh, you purchase products from Israel (Or any distant country) if they're slightly cheaper than local alternatives? (Caring about our communities and our environment)
Oh, you've somehow created the worst computer program I've ever used to run your entire buying system? IRMA is some Windows 95 era stuff, guys. I could design a significantly better interface in 30 minutes on a pad of paper. I know several students who could create a superior program in their spare time. Was someone actually hired to create that thing? Was it the Realplayer dudes? Even Captain Picard couldn't facepalm hard enough to express the amount of failure in that... that, thing... (Supporting team member happiness and excellence)
Oh, you push employees into greater responsibilities without compensation? Often having them essentially do all the work of a higher position without the pay? (Supporting team member happiness and excellence) Oh, you ambush employee's [sic] using two managers when you want to write someone up? No warning. No representation. All reasons and excuses fall on deaf ears. (Supporting team member happiness and excellence) Oh, you'd rather attempt to create some sort of fake "culture" with signs and forced meeting than let it happen naturally by letting employees socialize lightly as they work? (Supporting team member happiness and excellence)
Oh, you like to manage "systems" instead of people? You don't hold critical thinking and discretion in high regard? You encourage blindly following rules? I.e., no recourse in challenging write ups. Employees given cold shoulder when they attempt anything like this. (Supporting team member happiness and excellence) Oh, you want us to politely call and let you know if we'll be late... but you'll still write us up when we arrive? Kind of a dick move, guys. (Supporting team member happiness and excellence)
Oh, you actually think being 20 minutes late matters? You know Whole Foods Market is just a grocery store, right? (Supporting team member happiness and excellence) Oh, you don't believe inflation exists? Cost of living raises aren't given here? (Supporting team member happiness and excellence)
I notice a trend... Honestly, I could go on and on and fill out the details but since most people will just dismiss this email I should probably not put too much effort into it. I should have kept a blog…
Now the employees have lost a lot of their former power and the store is being sucked into some centralized monster. Quality is being thrown out in favour of the people at the top having to do a little less work. Competition is being destroyed and you're not even pushing that many healthy products. Every second endcap is potato chips or pop or some sort of salt filled snack (Promoting the health of our stakeholders through healthy eating education). A lot of the stuff in Whole Body doesn't even work or has absolutely no credible evidence to back any claims up. You're kind a faux hippy Wal-Mart now. Great. Job.
The responses are great.
Pure left wing gold...
Progressives and wanna be progressives hate Whole Foods. It’s a pro-union thing.
“Oh, you purchase products from Israel”
Do you HAVE to be anti-semitic to be a lefty or is that kind of hatred something that comes to you later on?
Yes, and you also have to be an illiterate who cannot write grammatically correct sentences.
What a spoiled brat.
How ‘bout this? You are lucky to have a job.
This gauge wearing, tattooed, living-in-a-fantasy-world douche, would not last ten minutes in a real company.
Good luck.
It’s also a Obamacare thing. Whole Food CEO John Mackey has the audacity to offer his employees Health Savings Accounts. He penned an article in the WSJ touting the advantages of HSA over Obamacare. He will never be forgiven for that.
I have to work?
In a free society under capitalism, you are free to quit your job if you don't like it and find another that you like better. That is why capitalism is better than the socialism that you libtards like so much.
I wonder if this little dreamer has ever used the term “Faux News”.
That has happened to me before. Had to do the work of two. And if that wasn't bad enough, the boss complained because I wasn't doing both jobs fast enough.
Maybe she can open a grocery store that will do all of those things.
And you're working at Whole Foods....???
“Oh, you actually think being 20 minutes late matters?”
I can think of no business that likes it’s employess being late. I can also think of no for-profit business that liberals like.
Wait a minute.....
Rotten and outdated food? You want the HHS to shut us down?
Oh, you're asking me to put latex gloves on the sales floor so customers can throw a pair out for every handful of gummy bears they take?
We are scared of the government health inspectors.
Oh, you've installed massive television screens all over the store, sucking up energy and polluting the environment with tacky advertisements.
Big Brother and Janet Napolitano made us do it for national security reasons in case of emergency they can throw up messages and stuff. and the ads helped pay your salary.
Oh, you waste an absurd amount of energy, ink and paper in your offices for useless bureaucratic nonsense.
It's called government. It's what you voted for, moron.
This last bit was good.
Dude, it’s a grocery store. Just quit already.
I don’t.
I’m pissed at Whole Foods because they didn’t have “Mary’s Gone Crackers” Sticks and Twigs in stock yesterday. Great snack food.
Bush’s fault she no longer has a job.
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