Whole Foods Caters to Low-Income Shoppers in New Orleans

Whole Foods is pledging that its newest store, which opened Feb. 4 in New Orleans, will be accessible to mid- and low-income shoppers in the city's Mid-City neighborhood.

The area, which sits at sea level, was hit hard by Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and is still being rebuilt, nearly 10 years later. Along with four other tenants (all nonprofits), Whole Foods is opening not only a retail space, but committing $100,000 to community health outreach, the Times-Picayune reports. The new store is located in a 60,000-square-foot retail space formerly occupied by Schweggman's.

A manager of the store told a reporter from WWNO, “We’ll have value tours to be showing everyone around. We’ll also have two healthy eating educators that will do the value tours, so we can make sure the community understands how to shop on a budget.”