Stock market today: Stocks rise as Dow tries to extend 6-day win streak
Hopefully you have May 15 off from work — the latest Consumer Price Index will be reported premarket and could trigger all sorts of market volatility.
I am sort of saying this tongue-in-cheek, sort of.
Nonetheless, the report is likely to show still elevated food prices for American shoppers. In large part those high prices are being found at the country’s grocery stores.
So I put this simply question to Whole Foods CEO Jason Buechel at the Milken conference this week: Is there any relief coming in food prices?
Buechel told me he is working double time to ease the food shopping pain continuing to hammer households.
“I mean, this has obviously been on the minds of customers for a while now,” Buechel said. “One of the things that we have been doing is working with all of our suppliers to find ways to minimize this impact. There are a number of ways that we have been doing this. One, we have increased the number of promotions for our customers, and as a result, we have actually seen double-digit [percentage] unit growth on promotional items.”
Buechel continued, “We have also been putting some price investments in for our 365 items [private label].”
To say inflation at the supermarket has been on the minds of consumers may be an understatement — it may end up deciding the presidential election in November.
The cost of groceries increased by 1.2% in March, according to the latest CPI data out of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). It marked the first month of year-over-year acceleration in US grocery prices since August 2022.
Dating back to the heights of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, the cost of food at home has risen a startling 24.6%.
So I appreciate the discounts at Amazon-owned (AMZN) Whole Foods, Jason.
Full watch of our chat below.