Which U.S. natural-food retailer began in Austin in 1978 as SaferWay Natural Foods?

Whole Foods Market began in Austin in 1978 as SaferWay Natural Foods.

John Mackey and Renee Lawson Hardy opened the small natural-food store after combining their interests in vegetarian food retail. The name SaferWay was a playful reference to the conventional supermarket chain Safeway. In 1980, Mackey and Hardy merged their business with Clarksville Natural Grocery, owned by Craig Weller and Mark Skiles, creating the first Whole Foods Market.

That Austin store offered a broader range of natural and organic products than many conventional supermarkets of the period. Whole Foods then expanded beyond Texas and became one of the best-known U.S. natural-food chains.

Amazon announced its agreement to acquire Whole Foods Market in 2017, and the acquisition closed later that year. The original SaferWay name therefore belongs to Whole Foods’ pre-merger history, not to a separate national chain.