On June 16th 2017 Amazon announced that is buying the grocery store chain, Whole Foods for $13.7 billion. The Whole foods purchase is actually a merger agreement in which Amazon will assume the grocers debt and buy its stock for $42 dollars a share. The plan, at least for now, is that Whole Foods will continue to be a separate entity, keeping its brand and suppliers intact. John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, will continue to run the company.
Whole Foods is a grocery store chain that emphasizes high quality natural and organic foods as well as low priced daily staples. In purchasing Whole Foods, Amazon will be increasing its brick and mortar presence significantly. There is much speculation as to what Amazon's plans are. Some industry analysts believe that Amazon will use this purchase to try and go head to head with Walmart in the online grocery wars.
Some industry analysts think that Amazon may use its Prime subscription delivery service to offer free two day shipping to Whole foods customers, and give them better prices on groceries. While this may indeed turn out to be the case, there is also the possibility that they could use the Whole Foods purchase to move forward with its plans for a cashierless grocery store called Amazon Go, which Amazon is currently testing in Seattle.
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