WFM MW Grocery 2015 New Item Submission Guidelines
General Structure:
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Jurisdiction:
o This document specifically refers to Suppliers interested in being reviewed by the
Midwest Region Grocery Buyer for placement in most or all Whole Foods Market
Midwest stores across our 8 MW US states (IL, IN, IA, MI, MN, MO, NE, WI).
o If you are interested in local store or local market placement, please contact your local
store(s) directly and ask to speak to the Grocery Team Leader. They will drive the storeoptional and/or local process if interested.
Please review the attached Category Review Schedule and time your submission to the
appropriate category review to the best of your ability.
o If your category is not listed on the schedule, it may belong to another team. (For
example: Bakery Team, Specialty Team, Meat Team, Whole Body Team, etc.)
o If you believe your product to be a significant opportunity for WFM, suitable for offcycle consideration, please send product information electronically as detailed below,
but do not send physical samples unless specifically requested. Most product
submissions are consolidated into our Category Review Schedule.
Due to submission volume, e-mail is the preferred method of communication for Regional new
item submission. Please e-mail MW Region new item submissions to
Gabe.Weldin@wholefoods.com.
o Please fill in the 2015 WFM MW New Item Setup Form to the best of your ability.
o Please submit sell sheets using the 2015 WM MW Powerpoint Slide Templates or
similar.
Please send follow up samples (1 or 2 units of each sku being submitted is sufficient, a full case
of each sku is generally excessive and unnecessary) to:
Gabe Weldin
Grocery Buyer
Whole Foods Market Midwest Support Office
640 N LaSalle Street #300
Chicago, IL 60654
General Requirements:
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Please review our Quality Standards, particularly the list of Unacceptable Food Ingredients.
These standards are non-negotiable and central to our Core Values, please ensure that your
product meets these standards before submission.
All product labels must include a UPC and detailed ingredients (including detailed spices and
flavorings).
Free Fill – 1 free case of each sku to each store.
o Free fill offsets the administrative and labor costs required to physically slot products
onto the shelf at each store.
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Free fill offsets the shrink costs of any discontinued product pulled off the shelf to make
room for the new item.
o Free fill guarantees placement on the shelf for six months regardless of performance.
o Details are negotiable for small/growing/local suppliers, but generally speaking, a Brand
considering a Region-wide launch should be comfortable with this level of expenditure.
Promotions:
o Quarterly promotions at a minimum 15% discount.
o First promotion should fall the month after launch. (For example, a January new item
would ideally be promoted in February.)
o 15% off, 4 times a year, is the minimum expectation, but WFM MW Grocery has a wide
variety of promotional levels and structures available to initiate trial and drive sales of
your brand. See Promotional Opportunities document for details.
Distribution:
o We prefer to launch new items through a single Distributor for all markets (rather than
direct ships from the Supplier, or cobbling together coverage of multiple markets from
multiple smaller Distributors).
o With stores spread across multiple markets in 8 states, this primarily limits our options
to UNFI (we pull from UNFI’s Iowa and Racine warehouses) or in special cases our
internal WFM Distribution Center in Munster, IN.
o We are happy to explore other options, but generally speaking a brand should feel
comfortable doing business at the level of UNFI if submitting for a Region-wide launch.
(UNFI or similar is not required for individual local store-level or market-level product
launches.)