- Vitamin Cottage Natural Grocers
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Vitamin Cottage Natural Food Markets, Inc (commonly referred to as Vitamin Cottage or Natural Grocers) is a Colorado based health food chain founded in 1955 by Margaret and Philip Isely and now owned and operated by their children. The company operates 50 retail grocery stores in Colorado, Texas, Utah, Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico and Wyoming with approximately 1300 employees.[1] Products include vitamins, dietary supplements, natural and organic food and natural body care products.
The company is a longtime proponent of consumer education about health and nutrition, and runs an ongoing free lecture series with nutrition and health experts for both customer and employee education. Each store provides a free trained "Nutritional Health Coach" (nutritionist) for its customers. All education activities are science-based, refer to most recent published studies, and not related to specific product brands.
The company is best known for its manifesto entitled "What We Won't Sell You and Why", which is a list of substances not proven to be safe or where there is not enough scientific evidence to back the manufacture's claims for the product. These are not allowed in any product sold by the company even though government agencies allow their use. This list includes artificial colors and flavors, artificial preservatives, irradiated food and GMOs among others. All products ingredients and claims are screened by highly qualified committees before being accepted for sale. Only 100% certified organic fruits and vegetables are sold. The company differs distinctly from "gourmet natural supermarkets" like Whole Foods in that it refuses to promote or sell many indulgent but often unhealthy and expensive processed foods. As a consequence, its customers tend to be highly aware of and focused on the link between a good diet and improved health, using the Natural Grocers stores as a "food farmacy". In August 2009, Whole Foods acknowledged its longtime lack of focus on nutrition education and the link between diet and health, and vowed to repent its "gourmet luxe" market positioning.
Many of the company's guidelines for ensuring product purity and quality, developed over many years due to the previous lack of existing government standards, were used as the foundation for the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994 (DSHEA) legislation of 1994. Company founder Margaret Isely contributed to forming the precusor group that became the international trade group Council for Responsible Nutrition. The company maintains an active role in regulatory affairs and scientific nutrition research.
Natural Grocers is the only major retailer operating "Bag Free" stores, asking customers to bring reusable bags for their purchases or take a recycled box in place of plastic or paper bags. [2] The company also operates an all-green retail location in Northglenn, Colorado, employing geothermal heating and cooling among other features.
In March, 2009, company executives were invited to testify by former Representative Diana Degette (D-Colorado) before the United States House Energy Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations regarding its successful food safety plan in light of the Peanut Corporation of America peanut recall. Congressional staffers and representatives suggested that retailers were responsible for on site food safety inspections of all manufacturing facilities, because local health departments, state departments of agriculture, the USDA, and the FDA could not ensure the safety of the national food supply. Natural Grocers, testifying alongside Kelloggs and Nut King, reminded the staff lawyers and committee members that it would be physically impossible for a manufacturer to host thousands of inspection visits each year, and that eliminating contamination from outside the plant, especially from visitors, is normally a key concept in food safety. As for completed product testing, the congressional lawyers were asked how much of a 5,000 pound lot of peanuts they would like retailers to test in hopes of finding spot contamination. When the lawyers were flumoxed by the question, the retailers at the hearing suggested that government oversight of existing, site specific Good Manufacturing Practices was the agreed standard, and that therefore the government agencies responsible for food safety had clearly failed. Subcommittee chair Stupak then showed a slide depicting dead rodents, feathers, and other debris near the plant air intakes system. Food safety experts in the audienced noticed an exceptionally well designed stainless steel air intake cover with large, medium, and small mesh grates that had clearly been successful in keeping out the hungry rodent, feathers, and debris from the surrounding agricultural environment. Surprisingly, the slide was used as proof that the plant air ducts contained the material that this grate had kept out of the plant.AWARDS AND RECOGNITION
In 2006 the management team reached the Rocky Mountain regional final for the Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year competition.[3]
Natural Grocers by Vitamin Cottage received the Best Gourmet Grocery Store award from Denver's Channel 7.
In September 2009 Natural Grocers was named [4] Colorado Top Retailer of the Year by CoBiz magazine.
Vitamin Retailer magazine named Natural Grocers as Vitamin Retailer of the Year in 2010.
References
- ^ Davis, Joyzelle (2008-03-14). "Vitamin Cottage stressing food in new name". Rocky Mountain News. http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2008/Mar/14/vitamin-cottage-stressing-food-in-chains-new/. Retrieved 2008-07-02.
- ^ "Natural Grocers by Vitamin Cottage to Go Completely "Bag Free"". Reuters. 2009-04-09. http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS39562+22-Apr-2009+BW20090422. Retrieved 2009-09-27.
- ^ "Entrepreneur finalists named". Denver Business Journal. 2006-05-25. http://denver.bizjournals.com/denver/stories/2006/05/22/daily38.html. Retrieved 2008-07-02.
- ^ "CoBiz 2009 Top Companies". Colorado Business Magazine. 2009-09-15. http://www.cobizmag.com/articles/top-company-finalists-2009/. Retrieved 2009-09-27.
External links
Categories:- Retail companies of the United States
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