Whole Foods is temporarily closing one of its San Francisco flagship stores just a year after it opened, citing concerns that crime in the area is putting its employees at risk.
A spokesman for Whole Foods said the company closed the 65,000-square-foot grocery store on Trinity Place in San Francisco’s Mid-Market district on Monday “to ensure the safety” of the store’s team members.
The spokesman called the move a “difficult decision,” adding that the store would only be closing temporarily and that all of the store’s employees would be relocated to nearby locations for the time being.
The flagship store opened on March 10, 2022, with Whole Foods touting its design as an homage to “classic San Francisco.” The location sold more than 3,700 local Northern California products, including produce from local farms and hundreds of wines from nearby vineyards, according to the company.
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As of Tuesday, the store’s website was gone.
Whole Foods did not elaborate on the specific conditions that led to the store’s closure. The San Francisco Standard, an independent newspaper, reported that Whole Foods had cited local crime and drug use as reasons for closing operations, according to a city hall source.
Whole Foods had previously reduced the store’s hours citing “grand theft,” the newspaper reported last October.
Disappointed but “not surprised”
Matt Dorsey, a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors representing the district where the closed Whole Foods is located, said on Twitter that he was “incredibly disappointed, but sadly not surprised, by the temporary closure of mid-markets Whole Foods ” may be.
He said the neighborhood’s problems with retail theft and drug-related crime were evident, citing the “neighboring drug markets” and “the many security issues associated” as known problems in the area.
Dorsey added that he was proposing a charter change, which he was calling “The San Francisco Police Department Full Staffing Act” to fully staff the city’s police force within five years.
“The closure of Whole Foods — along with many other security-related challenges we’ve seen recently — is evidence A of why San Francisco can no longer afford not to solve our police understaffing crisis,” he said Twitter.
Theft rings strike several times a week
Other shops in the area have raised concerns about retail theft.
Davis Smith, founder and former CEO of adventure accessories and apparel brand Cotopaxi, said in a LinkedIn post last year that “San Francisco seems to have descended into a city of chaos.”
“Many streets and parks are overrun with drugs, criminals and homelessness, and local leadership and law enforcement allow this through inaction,” he added.
At the time, Smith announced the temporary closure of his company’s nearby Hayes Street store after its “windows were smashed and thousands of dollars worth of product stolen.” He said at the time that the store was “hit by organized theft several times a week,” with thieves putting employees at risk. The shop is now open again.
According to the San Francisco Police Department, property crime has exploded in San Francisco in 2021 and 2022. So far, however, burglaries and thefts in 2023 are down about 10% year-on-year, according to SFPD data.
$100 billion problem
Industry groups have sounded the alarm about theft, and the National Retail Federation said organized retail crime costs businesses about $100 billion a yearaccording to a 2022 survey.
According to the survey, retailers saw a 27% increase in thefts from organized crime rings in 2021. They responded by investing more money in security measures to protect employees, customers and goods.
Many stores – from pharmacies to retailers of electronic goods – have also started to lock up more goods. This technique, designed to deter thieves, can sometimes drive away willing buyers who don’t want to wait for an employee to clear items for them to purchase.
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