Whole new venture as food giant opens shop in Fulham

12 April 2012

London's first organic supermarket is to open a new branch in west London.

Whole Foods - which has shops in Kensington High Street, Camden, Stoke Newington, Clapham Junction and Soho - has taken out a lease on a 22,000 sq ft site in Fulham Broadway. The company recently announced that it is also opening a 20,000 sq ft store in Richmond in 2013.

It comes after the US-owned Whole Foods Market in Kensington last month announced its first profit since its launch in Britain four years ago. Its arrival in Fulham next year will put it into direct competition with Waitrose and a number of specialist butchers and food outlets - including nearby Union Market which claims to source 80 per cent of its produce from Britain.

But Union Market, which opened in July, said Whole Foods' arrival would be good news for Fulham. Retail operations manager James Thompson said: "We think it's positive and we welcome them. This town is becoming more of a foodies' area all the time and competition is good."

He added that they offered different products and services. "We focus on local British produce, while they are a big American corporation. It might make us focus even more on that arm of the business but our ethos will stay the same," he said.

Whole Foods is set to move into a site currently occupied by the Blue Elephant restaurant, which has been there for 25 years.

The US chain suffered losses in the first three years after its launch in the UK. It previously admitted that its 80,000 sq ft store in Kensington was too big and lost out to supermarket rivals because of a lack of parking.

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