Whole Foods buying biggest rival

CEO says Wild Oats deal came together in about two

weeks.

FROM STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS
Wednesday, February 21, 2007

Whole Foods Market Inc. is swallowing its biggest competitor in a $565 million deal that surprised analysts.

With the purchase of Wild Oats Markets Inc., Whole Foods will have more than 300 stores in 31 states, parts of Canada and the United Kingdom.

Austin-based Whole Foods is by far the bigger company, with 193 stores and annual sales of more than $5.6 billion. Increasingly, it is building bigger, flashier stores that feature sprawling gourmet sections, in-store restaurants and lifestyle offerings such as organic cotton clothes, baby items and massage services.

Boulder, Colo.-based Wild Oats, on the other hand, has annual sales of about $1.2 billion and operates much smaller stores that focus on traditional natural and organic foods. In Austin, it owns the two Sun Harvest stores.

Whole Foods executives said they approached Wild Oats after the smaller company lost its chief executive and chief financial officer.

"I called up their interim CEO," Whole Foods founder and CEO John Mackey said. "I thought, gosh, maybe this would be a good time to approach Wild Oats."

Mackey said Wild Oats Chairman and interim CEO Gregory Mays told him, "What's your price going to be?" He said the deal came together in a couple weeks.

Analyst Scott Van Winkle of Canaccord Adams said he thought the purchase was a defensive move.

"This is either a reflection that they didn't want Wild Oats going to a traditional supermarket chain or they believed that with the incremental buying power of adding $1 billion in revenue, they can now compete better against traditional mass market merchants," Van Winkle said.

Whole Foods is expected to close or relocate several stores as a result of the deal. Both companies have stores in Texas and 18 other states. Wild Oats has stores in five states that don't have Whole Foods, but the Austin company is planning to open stores in at least two of them.