We’ve just had a chance to review some of the conclusions reached in the 2010 Market Overview from Natural Foods Merchandiser, a sister publication here at Penton Media that covers the independent operator channel. What struck us is the level of optimism these indy owners have, in spite of the recession and continued high unemployment. Among the top-line findings:

• Net profit margins fell to 5% last year, down from 8% in 2008.

• Revenues remained in the $1.2 million to $1.5 million range.

• Net sales grew almost 9% in 2009, but when adjusted for store closings, and weighted based on the number of stores per category, sales grew 3.4%.

This channel, comprised of natural products stores, health food stores and supplements stores, saw overall food sales drop along with margins — but it’s not all due to the economy. MORE…

Sourcing local is a challenge, and selling it is no picnic either. So hats off to Fresh & Easy’s ambitious “Farm to Store in 24” program, which guarantees local produce will be on shelves less than a day after it leaves the farm. The Tesco-owned supermarket chain, which operates 150 stores out west, says the program has been a resounding success — so successful, in fact, that they’re going to expand it.

As much as 65% of Fresh & Easy’s seasonal produce comes from California farms, and that percentage is set to increase as the retailer takes on more growers. This isn’t as simple as going out and shaking hands with a few farmers and telling them the truck will be by next week, however. It’s a collaborative effort, full of the eventualities that come with seasonal growing. Both parties have to do their fair share towards meeting that tight deadline.

“Getting produce from the farm to the store in 24 hours or less is an incredibly tricky task, which makes it important to partner with strong local growers who share our commitment to quality produce,” said Justin Hill, Fresh & Easy’s produce manager, in a statement.

The end result is worth all the effort. This summer’s lineup includes table grapes from the Coachella Valley and strawberries from farmers in Ventura County and Watsonville, on land overlooking the Pacific Ocean. MORE…

In Baltimore, there’s a newly appointed “food czar”. In Detroit, inner-city grocers offering fresh foods receive financial support. And in Syracuse, N.Y., a “Mobile Market” truck delivers fruits and vegetables to low-income consumers.

The issue of food deserts — communities without access to fresh foods and produce — is no longer the elephant in the room for U.S. cities. Thanks to a considerable amount of advocacy and media attention, fueled in recent months by the Obama administration’s focus on the problem, municipalities all over are finding creative ways to increase the delivery of healthy foods to the people who arguably need them most.

Supermarkets are key partners in this process. Wegmans, for one, sells produce at cost to Syracuse’s Farm Fresh Mobile Market and offers access to its network of local farmers. Modeled after a similar effort in Oakland, Calif., the Mobile Market makes a dozen stops each week throughout the city and accepts food stamps, as well as EBT cards and WIC funds. Hen House Market in Kansas City, meanwhile, has taken a similar step, partnering with local growers’ co-op Good Natured Family Farms to hold inner-city farmers markets.

One of the most interesting new programs is Baltimore’s “virtual supermarket”. Customers can order fresh foods online, and then collect them after they’re delivered to a local library.

This and other programs are far from perfect, however. MORE…

Trying to gauge the impact of a soda tax is quite a workout. All sorts of figures get tossed about — starting with the amount of the tax. How much will be enough to change purchase behavior? One study claims that we would need a 1,200% tax — an extra $9 on a 75-cent can — in order to dissuade a noticeable segment of the population.

Extreme? Probably. But a 20% tax is nothing to laugh at, either — and that’s the number increasingly being used in various scenarios and studies. Indeed, that’s the number the Economic Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture used in studying the question.

The ERS has a wealth of data to pull from. They have inside access to the federal bureaucracy and know where to search for arcane statistics or find studies that will help us figure out whether such a tax works.

For instance, it found that a survey done on food intake between 1999 through 2004 that concluded Americans consumed more than 22 additional teaspoons of sugar every day, with one half coming from soft drinks and juices.

The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services has gone on record stating that a tax on soda and snack foods could generate almost $15 billion in the first year alone. MORE…

The Food and Drug Administration has tried for more than three decades to pass limits on sub therapeutic use of antibiotics in poultry and livestock. Each time, they’ve been turned away by Congress, which is lobbied heavily by agricultural and drug industry interests.

It’s a cyclical tale, for sure, but one that becomes more interesting as public interest and scientific evidence on the issue increases. Now, for the first time in several years, the FDA is going at the industry again. In a draft guidance issued yesterday, the agency recommended banning the use of antibiotics to promote growth in animals.

What’s at stake, the FDA and numerous health experts claim, is the future potency of antibiotics for humans. Drugs like tetracycline and penicillin transfer from animals to the people who consume them, and their overuse has given rise to new strains of antibiotic-resistant superbugs.

“Antimicrobial resistance, and the resulting failure of antimicrobial therapies in

humans, is a mounting public health problem of global significance,” the draft guidance document reads.

Industry groups like the National Pork Board, in response, say that the FDA is overreacting. They claim that there is not enough scientific evidence to support such claims. Furthermore, they point out that the majority of producers do give antibiotics for health reasons only, and not to promote growth. MORE…

Mention Alfalfa’s Market to Boulder residents and the superlatives flow: Best, hippest, most helpful and friendliest are part of everyone’s memories. The 11-store chain based in Boulder was absorbed by Wild Oats after a 1996 merger, but the reputation lingers.

There was even a period when Whole Foods — which in turn bought out Wild Oats in 2007 — considered restoring the Alfalfa’s banner to the site of the original store at 1651 Broadway. Such is the power of Alfalfa’s.

“A lot of people still call it Alfalfa’s, even though it’s gone through two name changes,” said Mark Retzloff, co-founder of the Alfalfa’s chain and one of the three guys who plan on bringing the operation back to life in the very location where it started out back in 1983.

Retzloff, along with business partners Barney Feinblum (of Celestial Seasoning tea fame) and Hugo van Seenus, won rights to the Alfalfa’s name as part of Whole Foods Market’s ongoing divestiture of more than two dozen former Wild Oats locations, as ordered by federal regulators. The trio’s A-M Holdings LLC beat out Topco Associates for the intellectual property. Retzloff told me this afternoon by phone that he’s missed the retail scene, and bid eagerly for the Alfalfa’s name.

“The Alfalfa’s legacy is still very, very strong here Boulder. The name has a lot of equity. For a number of years it was named the best supermarket in town. It’s known as a place where a lot of community events were initiated that are still going on today.

The team has plans to update the 32,000-square-foot space that is currently occupied by a Whole Foods. That store will close by July 4th weekend, with the reborn Alfalfa’s to open later this year or in early 2011. Retzloff told us that 24,000 square feet will be reserved for retail, with an emphasis on fresh foods, local and regional items, in addition to community spirit.

“Our goal is to differentiate ourselves. A big part of that is being much more community-oriented, being a community-focused store,” he said. MORE…

In 2006, Wal-Mart raised a lot of eyebrows by announcing it was going to start stocking organic foods. One of the world’s more controversial mega-retailers — vilified for steamrolling expansion and bland uniformity — was entering a category founded on principles of scale (small), authenticity (local) and stewardship (sustainability). How was this possibly going to work?

The solution lay in scale: It was about this time that big manufacturers like Kellogg, General Mills and Coke ramped up their own organic operations, either acquiring their way into the category (as Kellogg did with Kashi in 2000) or converting their own brands to natural/organic (many began including organic options in their conventional lines).

Club stores also became fans of natural/organics, and quickly became a preferred niche for many manufacturers, who liked the absence of slotting fees. The retailers liked having product that appealed to the “treasure hunt” mentality of many club shoppers. As long as the item’s volume remained in the category’s top three spots, it stayed.

Then, there’s the online component of the business which, after some fitful starts, has established itself as a viable business model that is entirely capable of handling home deliveries of some commodities and brands. MORE…

There’s a big difference between counting calories and computing them — the same way there’s a distinction between hearing and listening.

The “calorie conundrum” is among the top findings in a joint survey released just today by the Food Marketing Institute and Prevention magazine. Nearly half (43%) of consumers polled said they’re paying more attention to calorie counts than they were two years ago.

To be sure, counting calories is as old as food itself, but the researchers here point out that more shoppers than ever are demonstrating an increased level of concern about the nutritional content of what they eat. The poll shows that one-quarter of shoppers are buying more low- or zero-calorie products than last year.

But dig down a bit and the true picture is revealed. In picking apart the number of calorie counters, Shopping for Health 2010 reveals that more attention to calories does not necessarily translate into action (or more precision, for that matter). Apparently, a majority of shoppers “just loosely” monitor their caloric intake: MORE…

MOM’s Organic Market is a retailer on a mission. It has rigorous nutrition standards for all of its products, including no high fructose corn syrup, preservatives or artificial flavors. In 2005, it became one of the first supermarkets in the country to eliminate plastic bags, and last year it did the same with imported bottled water.

And it has a president, Scott Nash, who says things like this:

“Societies are truly addicted to plastic, much in the way we are addicted to oil.”

This level of dedication is rare in the retail industry, and it has brought MOM’s a great deal of success through die-hard customer loyalty. It’s also made the company one of the few that sets the curve for industry health and wellness.

It should come as no surprise, then, that MOM’s has a new mission — one that’s a pretty big leap, even by its own high standards:

Eliminate plastic from its stores.

Or at least comes as close as possible. As Nash’s quote conveys, MOM’s doesn’t feel it’s being a truly sustainable retailer by letting all those bags and containers make their way into garbage dumps and ocean gyres. The company already has an extensive recycling program, shows a preference for biodegradable packaging and pressures its manufacturers to use less plastic. This week, MOM’s announced it will go even further, eliminating all bottled water, bagged vegetables, and petroleum-based wax paper from shelves. It’ll offer biodegradable bags and paper instead, and allow customers to use their own bags for bulk purchases. To fill that need for healthy, portable hydration, MOM’s will have water filtration machines in stores. MORE…

Health and wellness is going to the dogs — literally, it seems. The Natural Marketing Institute just released its annual Trends Database report, based on research conducted during the last quarter of 2009, and involving more than 5,600 U.S households.

Total industry sales topped $125 billion — no small achievement given the recession and consumer reluctance to spend on premium products. That represents a 5% increase over the year before, which is about on-target with the numbers found in other studies.

Every segment covered in the study enjoyed improved sales, though primarily in the single digits:

• Functional/Fortified Foods & Beverages: $41B (2%)

• Vitamins, Minerals, Herbal & Dietary Supplements: $25B (8%)

• Organic Foods/Beverages: $25B (5%)

• Natural Foods/Beverages: $15B (5%)

• Natural/Organic Personal Care: $10B (8%)

There was one exception to the single-digit trend this year, and that was the natural/organic general merchandise category. For the second year in a row, the category — covering pet food, household cleaning and apparel — exhibited double-digit growth of 15%. According to NMI, “the proliferation of these products in mainstream shopping channels was likely a major factor that contributed to this growth.”

We’ve done plenty of writing already about the power pet ownership has over purchase decisions. We’ve also noted the growing appeal of green cleaners, particularly families or with those suffering from allergies. MORE…