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FTC Approves of Amazon and Whole Foods Deal
- RJIb8RBYxzAMX9u 9y agoUntil Amazon credibly deals with its counterfeit problem, I'm not buying any foodstuffs from them. While it's likely that Whole Foods / AmazonFresh supply chains are currently separate, that's beside the point. If the problem goes unchecked, Amazon may consider expanding the strategy further. People are paying a premium for organic / fair trade / gluten free / $FAD_OF_THE_DAY groceries, so there is margin for counterfeiters IMO.
- azrazalea 9y agoI mean, quite a bit of that stuff people pay premium for is already counterfeit even at stores like whole foods. I don't know how common it is, but it does exist. Amazon probably wouldn't help much though yeah.
- RJIb8RBYxzAMX9u 9y agoMy complaint is not just that counterfeit exists, but Amazon's lackluster response in dealing with it (here's your refund; now GTFO). Secondly, I'd guess that WF may have 1 ~ 2 suppliers for a given product, but Amazon may have hundreds, if they eventually allow 3rd party sellers. So they would have a harder time vetting their suppliers just by numbers alone. Finally, Amazon's warehousing policy of co-mingling stocks from different suppliers exacerbates the problem further.
- gruez 9y agothere are third party sellers on amazon groceries?
- swalsh 9y agoThe system would seem setup to allow it, but at the moment there are not.
- jonknee 9y agoI can see “Amazon Farmers Market” now...
- mjevans 9y agoThat'd be a nice feature. Creation to Shipment handling logs. Know which field(s) you food came from and what lots/etc.
- ikeboy 9y agoYes. But groceries and anything that expires is not commingled so if you buy from Amazon you get Amazon's inventory
- RJIb8RBYxzAMX9u 9y agoThey're not co-mingled yet, but there's no assurance that they won't in the future. And if / when they do, they're unlikely to forewarn you.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- mdns33 9y agoGreat news for customers in general. Making real "food" affordable.
- orf 9y agoThe FTC is so weak.
- kornish 9y agoCould you expand?
- throwawayxu89 9y agoMy guess is that the parent thinks the merger is a bad idea and that the FTC is capitulating in some way by allowing it to go through. But I think you knew that.
- Dylan16807 9y agoBut it's not their job to block "bad ideas". And Amazon gaining control of 2% of the grocery market is clearly not monopolistic.
- norea-armozel 9y agoI agree that Whole Foods isn't a big deal merger but the fact that Amazon has a logistics system in place that could topple the other competitors is very scary. The silver lining to this is that it'll be mostly Walmart vs Amazon now rather than Walmart trying to destroy the regional chains (and Kroger to some extent on the national side of things). Hopefully this will add some competition on the Walmart front to force them to pull back where they're really not needed (or wanted).
- spuiszis 9y agoHow so? From an Anti-Trust perspective, the FTC recently blocked the Walgreens/Rite-Aid[1] and FanDuel/DraftKings[2] deals. I'm not sure this deal is anti-competitive and certainly doesn't come off as anti-consumer to me. However, as it relates to the FTC, I am concerned with the increasing size of Fortune 100/500 companies [3] and their relationship to the decline in entrepreneurship in the United States [4]. The biggest companies are getting bigger and growing faster than ever and the FTC affects that by reviewing M&A activity. [1] http://fortune.com/2017/06/29/walgreens-rite-aid-merger-ftc/ http://fortune.com/2017/06/29/walgreens-rite-aid-merger-ftc/ [2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/darrenheitner/2017/06/19/ftc-files-complaints-to-block-fanduel-draftkings-merger/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/darrenheitner/2017/06/19/ftc-fi... [3] https://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/big-business-is-getting-bigger/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/big-business-is-getting-... [4] https://www.inc.com/magazine/201505/leigh-buchanan/the-vanishing-startups-in-decline.html https://www.inc.com/magazine/201505/leigh-buchanan/the-vanis...
- castratikron 9y agoIf 1) Amazon let me buy the groceries online and pick them up at the store and 2) started carrying "normal" brands, they would have my business. I don't want to pay $8 for a gallon of milk, and I don't want to see a sign that asks me to let the cashier know if I'd like the conveyor belt wiped clean in order to preserve the organic integrity of my produce. Basically, just get rid of the attitude where you expect someone to pay $6 for asparagus in water, and we're good. (https://www.eater.com/2015/8/3/9090797/whole-foods-asparagus-water-wtf https://www.eater.com/2015/8/3/9090797/whole-foods-asparagus...)
- throwawayxu89 9y agoIf you want "normal" brands, you're more than welcome to shop at Walmart. It doesn't sound like Whole Foods is catering to you.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- throwawayxu89 9y agoGrumpy, grumpy downvotes. Pound sand, you miserable assholes.
- Spivak 9y agoApparent elitism aside, Walmart is actually specifically catering to what he wants. You can buy your groceries online, they have the kinds of products he's looking for, and you can ship them to your nearest store and pick them up or have them delivered to your house.
- notyourday 9y agoGP is absolutely correct. Whole Foods does not cater to the Walmart market. In SaaS terms, WF is Enterprise which sometimes dips into Premium with its 365 brand. Those complaining about WF prices are those that want to spend $5/mo on basic service. P.S. I want a Ferrari. I don't want to pay $150k for one. So I'm not Ferrari's market.
- tspike 9y agoAmazon won't raise any monopoly red flags until it's responsible for the vast majority of our non-public infrastructure; it is simultaneously growing toward becoming both a horizontal and a vertical monopoly in every field it operates while not technically meeting the definition yet.
- oconnore 9y agoI think the issue is that many people see monopolies as a good thing, as long as they are not being very blatantly abusive (and especially if you can say, "well look, they only control 80+% of the market!"). Examples: Thiel, Friedman, maybe there are others. The march towards efficiency, productivity, and profits naturally cuts into redundancy, diversity, and competition. Same goes for index funds, holding companies, etc. I wonder if there is any way we can find a balance, because it seems like there are so many cases where giving up some efficiency/productivity for some other traits is desirable (renewable energy, research and development, health, safety, etc.)
- TazeTSchnitzel 9y agoOne problem is the priorities of regulators. AIUI the US is concerned about direct consumer effects, whereas the EU is more concerned about whether competition is harmed. The problem is that consumer effects can be harder to spot, and if you have little competition, you perhaps don't know what you're missing.
- lithos 9y agoRecent monopoly enforcement in the US has been based on damage to the consumer. So it'll probably be Europe that tries to rein in Amazon.
- dang 9y agoUrl changed from https://techcrunch.com/2017/08/23/ftc-approves-of-amazon-and-whole-foods-deal https://techcrunch.com/2017/08/23/ftc-approves-of-amazon-and..., which points to this.
- 2017Dude 9y agoLet's see if those stores will become even more useless. Maybe they will start selling healing crystals?
- pen2l 9y agoCommentary of Amazon becoming a behemoth aside, I'm intrigued by the future we will be living in where everything will be delivered to us. Intrigued for two reasons: 1) I'm reminded of DFW's words about shopping at large stores playing 'soul-killing musac': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CrOL-ydFMI#t=10m8s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CrOL-ydFMI#t=10m8s This is going to make life easy for me. Grocery-shopping is stressful and time-consuming, I look forward to the day that I can do it all online without paying much extra. 2) Less people will need cars in the future of AmazonFresh/Grubhub/Blueapron. This is also why I love Uber pool incidentally... I feel like I'm saving the environment when I do that (vs. driving)! If you continue in this line of thinking, what you have is: one truck delivering 50 people their groceries via an optimized route vs. 50 cars traveling by stressed out people who are tired and just don't want to go the store. Less accidents, less pollution, less stress. I am really looking forward to the future of optimized infrastructure for travel/transportation.
- alaskamiller 9y ago1. David Foster Wallace is commenting how one has to do the work to manage stress and bias. That's the truth, you work for it. You running away the stress by deferring it to someone else to handle (the delivery person or the warehouse picker) undermines his whole point. 2. So now instead of 50 cars, it's 1 truck with 50 people's worth of individually packaged goods that gets trashed. Cattle also feel pretty good about fed three times daily before getting slaughtered.
- bllguo 9y ago1. A lot of the stress, at least imo, is in knowing what to get, how much to get, and balancing that against constraints like what's available at the store and price. Having to make a string of smaller decisions. Being able to do this online makes things a lot easier. I really doubt that outsourcing the mechanical part of it all - picking up, hauling, taking home the groceries - is going to stress out the workers to a comparable degree. 2. Sure, except a vehicle getting trashed will be much less likely if 50 cars are reduced to 1. Not to mention the increase in productivity due to 50 people not losing time by sitting in traffic, or being at risk of bodily harm. Don't understand your cattle point.
- swalsh 9y agoI had assumed this deal had already gone through. Amazon Fresh has gotten orders of magnitude better in terms of selection and pricing this last month. Perhaps they started working together before the deal finished?
- JunkDNA 9y agoI think the best take on this whole thing by far is from Ben Thompson: https://stratechery.com/2017/amazons-new-customer/ https://stratechery.com/2017/amazons-new-customer/ (Incidentally, his podcast is fantastic)
- vpribish 9y agoThe only angle I saw for an antitrust concern was in delivery where Amazon is already dominant (but not focused on groceries) and Instacart is a serious player who has long partnered with Whole Foods - anytime #1 takes out a significant competitor in a space the FTC could be needed. But there are several more competitors in grocery deliveries including all the legacy companies - Safeway, Kroger, Albertson's, and even Walmart. Basically, this wasn't going to hurt consumers.
- Joof 9y agoThere's some crazy speculation about the whole deal. One more simple and obvious optimization is stuff like Amazon Go that could replace the need for cashiers.