Walmart Just Opened An Organic Fast Food Restaurant

Source: Grown

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The in-store location is the latest from former Miami Heat player Ray Allen's healthy eating chain.

Whole Foods has already cited competition from other retailers, like Walmart, in the organic grocery space as one of the reasons the chain is seeking to cut costs and lower its prices. And Walmart isn't just stopping at selling organic groceries, either. This week, Walmart has doubled down on organic food by opening Grown, an organic fast food restaurant in the store’s outpost on Narcoosee Road in Orlando, FL.

The restaurant is a collaboration with former Miami Heat basketball star Ray Allen and his wife, Shannon and is marketed as "slow food for fast people" with all the buzzwords that go with that mission—farm-to-fork, local, sustainable, and free of everything from GMOs to BPA to processed sugar. The menu is crammed full of fresh, healthy choices like açai smoothies, cold-pressed beet-apple-orange juice, lettuce wraps, and grain bowls with wild-caught salmon on quinoa. If Gwyneth Paltrow ever shopped at Walmart it sounds like she'd be in heaven.

The Miami outpost of the restaurant is a sleek, minimalist space clad in 100-year old reclaimed barn wood and features “a floor-to-ceiling living wall full organic, edible herbs,” according to the website. While they can’t totally replicate the vibe inside a Walmart, it's a similar aesthetic, and it seems clear that Walmart is determined to make the partnership grow, along with their organic food sales. "Operating grown inside of Walmart makes the store accessible to every family, regardless of their mean income, making the move a game-changer for consumers," a Walmart representative told Delish. That said, Walmart customers used to getting a bargain at the big box store, may be a bit surprised when hit with a $16 price tag for their chimichurri chicken and long-grain rice bowl. But if you're saving money by shopping at Walmart already, why not splurge a little on a quick, organic.

By Melissa Locker
August 23, 2017
Source: FoodandWine.Com