Whole Foods 2011 Annual Report Download - page 18

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of material importance and actively defends and enforces such trademarks. The Company’ s trademarks are generally valid
and may be renewed indefinitely as long as they are in use and/or their registrations are properly maintained.
Available Information
Our corporate website at www.wholefoodsmarket.com averages approximately 108,000 visitors each day and provides
detailed information about our Company, history, product offerings and store locations, with hundreds of recipes and a
library of information about environmental, legislative, health, food safety and product quality issues. In addition, access to
the Company’ s corporate governance policies and Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) filings, including annual
reports on Form 10-K, quarterly reports on Form 10-Q, interactive data, current reports on Form 8-K, Section 16 filings, and
all amendments to those reports, are available through our website free of charge. As with our stores, the focus of our
website is customer service. We believe our website provides us with an opportunity to further our relationships with
customers, suppliers and investors; educate them on a variety of issues; and improve our service levels.
We have included our website and blog addresses only as an inactive textual reference. The information contained on our
website is not incorporated by reference into this Report on Form 10-K.
Item 1A. Risk Factors.
We wish to caution you that there are risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to be materially different
from those indicated by forward-looking statements that we make from time to time in filings with the SEC, news releases,
reports, proxy statements, registration statements and other written communications, as well as oral forward-looking
statements made from time to time by representatives of the Company. These risks and uncertainties include the risk factors
described below. The cautionary statements below discuss important factors that could cause our business, financial
condition, operating results and cash flows to be materially adversely affected. The Company does not undertake any
obligation to update forward-looking statements.
Economic conditions that adversely impact consumer spending could materially impact our business.
Our operating results may be materially impacted by changes in overall economic conditions that impact consumer
confidence and spending, including discretionary spending. There can be no assurance that various governmental activities to
stabilize the markets and stimulate the economy will restore consumer confidence or change spending habits. Future
economic conditions affecting disposable consumer income such as employment levels, business conditions, changes in
housing market conditions, the availability of credit, interest rates, tax rates, fuel and energy costs, the impact of natural
disasters or acts of terrorism, and other matters could reduce consumer spending or cause consumers to shift their spending
to lower-priced competitors.
Our growth depends on increasing sales in identical stores and on new store openings, and our failure to achieve these goals
could negatively impact our results of operations and financial condition.
Our continued growth depends on our ability to increase sales in our identical stores and our ability to open new stores. Our
operating results may be materially impacted by fluctuations in our identical store sales. Our identical store sales growth
could be lower than our historical average for many reasons including the impact of new and acquired stores entering into the
identical store base, the opening of new stores that cannibalize store sales in existing areas, general economic conditions,
increased competition, price changes in response to competitive factors, possible supply shortages, and cycling against any
year of above-average sales results.
Our growth strategy includes opening new stores in existing and new areas and operating those stores successfully.
Successful implementation of this strategy is dependent on finding suitable locations, and we face competition from other
retailers for such sites. There can be no assurance that we will continue to grow through new store openings. We may not be
able to open new stores timely or operate them successfully. Also, we may not be able to successfully hire and train new
team members or integrate those team members into the programs and policies of the Company. We may not be able to adapt
our distribution, management information and other operating systems to adequately supply products to new stores at
competitive prices so that we can operate the stores in a successful and profitable manner.
Increased competition may adversely affect our revenues and profitability.
Our competitors include but are not limited to local, regional, national and international supermarkets, natural food stores,
warehouse membership clubs, small specialty stores and restaurants. Their businesses compete with us for products,
customers and locations. In addition, some are expanding more aggressively in marketing a range of natural and organic
foods. Some of these potential competitors may have been in business longer or may have greater financial or marketing
resources than we do and may be able to devote greater resources to sourcing, promoting and selling their products. As
competition in certain areas intensifies, our operating results may be negatively impacted through a loss of sales, reduction in
margin from competitive price changes, and/or greater operating costs such as marketing.