My boyfriend and I have been visiting this Natural Grocers for over a year now ever since moving to Elkhorn. We try to eat organic produce as much as possible and prefer to eat grass-fed meats, so we were happy to know that a Natural Grocers was by us. We had frequently visited the one in downtown Omaha when we lived there, so we thought this store would be just as good as that one. Over time, though, our enthusiasm with this store faded, and now, my boyfriend and I almost purely visit Whole Foods for our grocery shops.
To begin with, this store is hardly a grocery store to me - it is more like a snack stop. Aisle upon aisle is dedicated to chips, crackers, cookies, or other treats. Half of their coolers are full of ice cream, and they have an entire side of one of their aisles (which are limited to start with) dedicated to chips alone. If you eat a lot of this stuff, this might be great to you, but it is actually very restricting (in our opinion) and almost forces you to eat junk because that's primarily what they sell. They stopped carrying a lot of the actual food items we wanted and instead we noticed a lot of new cookie brands.
Secondly, because they are a smaller store, they have trouble with stock. As I just said, they don't really have a lot of items in stock anymore that we used to buy very frequently. They weren't obscure or anything - they just don't have them. We frequently would ask where the items were and a worker would tell us that the supplier was having trouble or the truck hadn't come in yet, but this problem persisted for weeks, so we aren't sure what was happening there. We buy our meats here, such as chicken, and there was a 5-day span or so where they just didn't have practically their entire meat section stocked. It was nearly empty, again because 'the truck hadn't come yet'.
Branching off of this issue, a lot of what they sell here is not the highest quality. Their organic produce hardly ever looks good and even if it looks good in the store, it takes it about a day to get moldy or old at home. It is like a weird magic trick because the produce they sell here goes bad FAST. In our opinion, the prices here are not the best, so it is very disappointing to spend a lot of money for a grocery shop only to have a lot of it hardly last. This has also happened with other items they sell, such as Bobo bars. We opened them up and they were moldy, right after buying them from the store.
Someone else mentioned the staff here and I just want to touch on that quickly as well. My boyfriend and I used to be vegan but we both encountered severe health problems (yes, we were doing it right), but it is important that you know that we highly respect vegan individuals. We both switched back to eating meat and, of course, started buying it at Natural Grocers. One of the cashiers at this store, every time she would scan through one of our meat items, would literally throw it to the side. I'm not joking, she would throw the meat and then nicely set down anything that wasn't meat. We frequently visit this store and it has become very evident to us that this given cashier is vegan, probably the reason for the meat throwing. I fully respect everyone's choices in life but I do not think professionalism should be sacrificed in any business situation. A lot of the cashiers here come off as very immature or judgmental, which really isn't what you want to encounter when you're just trying to get your groceries for the week.
My final point here is that I don't know why everyone picks on Whole Foods. Their prices are better. My boyfriend and I have spent many a trip comparing prices at both Natural Grocers and Whole Foods and we get FAR more for our money at Whole Foods. When we go to Natural Grocers, it feels like we buy 5 items and it somehow added up to $120. At Whole Foods, our cart is absolutely full and it is not much higher in price than the few items we get at Natural Grocers. Especially if you like any of the items on sale at Whole Foods and avoid fancy processed items, which aren't that great anyway, Whole Foods is absolutely a better deal. The only thing I would still recommend getting from Natural Grocers is meat because they do have 100% grass fed, pasture raised, cage free items and that is harder to find at Whole Foods. Otherwise, Whole Foods is better, cleaner, more pleasant, they don't play music that puts you in the twilight zone like Natural Grocers does, and you can genuinely save money. Sure, it is a longer drive, but it is worth it to get produce that lasts and enjoy lower prices from a staff that seems far more interested in their job than those at Natural Grocers. read more