Peter Roy would make an ideal

political candidate. With his

winning smile and Southern

charm, Roy af firms the all -American

notions that good ideas and hard

work pay of f, that r isk has rewards

and vision has power. His story fol-

lows the amazing arc that voters find

irresistible. Too bad he is more inclined to

hit the hiking trail than the campaign

trail.

Imagine this campaign video: The camera

starts rolling in that humble institution, the

corner grocery store, where a boyish, ener-

getic Roy emerges heroic—proof that a col-

lege dropout can start out stocking shelves

and bagging groceries and end up running

142 | C H A R L E S T O N

W R I T T E N B Y S T E P H A N I E H U N T

The cofounder of Whole Foods Market learns the true meaning of living well

the charleston profile

••

▼

The NaturalP E T E R R O Y

Globetrotter: Retired from Whole Foods since 1998, Roy

serves on the board of National Outdoor Leadership School

(NOLS), travelling to Africa and beyond with the organization.

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the store. There’s a wholesome appeal—the

store happens to sell health foods. And to

clinch any undecided voters, the video cul-

minates with his fledgling natural foods

enterprise being crowned king of the organ-

ic food industry. Which is where Whole

Foods Market, Inc., the retail green giant that

Roy cofounded, is today—a Wall Street dar-

ling with more than 180 stores and $5.7 bil-

lion in annual sales.

But Roy isn’t running for anything. Having

served as president of Whole Foods Market

for five years during a period of robust com-

pany growth, he is now content with his out-

of-the-limelight life on Pawleys Island, where

passions for golf, fine food, and spending

time with family and friends top his agenda.

“I love telling friends that I live in the ham-

mock capital of the world,” he says. Not run-

ning, but not retired, the 50-year-old Roy has

merely shifted priorities.

Since leaving Whole Foods in 1998, he

has remained a key player in the natural

food and healthy lifestyles industries and

has lent expertise to the boards of Stony-

field Farms, WhiteWave Foods (makers of

SILK soymilk products), Mountain Sun

juices, and Acirca (brand name Walnut

Acres), among others. He’s a strategic

advisor to North Castle Partners, a private

equity fund investing in healthy lifestyle

businesses, and he currently travels to

some 20 board meetings a year as a

director for Avalon Natural Products,

the Naked Juice Company, Traditional

Medicinals, and West Marine. “I’m

working as hard as I ever have,” says Roy.

The difference is that now he defines

how he does it.

An Incredible RunOf course, when he was 19 and bagging

groceries, Roy never imagined those bags

would one day hold a lucrative career and

a life mission. He was always passionate

about the personal and environmental

health benefits of organic and natural

foods, but he didn’t set out to be the Titan

of Tofu. (“Actually, I was never a big soy

eater,” he confesses.) “My dad was a suc-

cessful doctor, and that was what I was

expected to do,” says Roy, who grew up

with four sisters in a fifth-generation New

Orleans family.

Studying, however, was not his strong

suit. “My dad would say I’d lost my way in

high school,” admits Roy, who preferred out-

door pursuits like golf, backpacking, and

scuba diving. His grandmother dangled a

carrot: “She offered me $1,000 if I finished

high school. I did, and I spent it on a NOLS

(National Outdoor Leadership School)

S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 6 | 143

Outward Bound: After graduating high school, Roy thumbed it to Wyoming for a daunting wilderness course.

His love of the outdoors continues as he and wife Gillian go on adventures, like this camping trip with the NOLS

trustees in the mountains of Alaska in 1999.

•

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144 | C H A R L E S T O N

Pushing the Limit: “One

thing wilderness does is

push you beyond your

comfort zone,” says Roy,

who is quick to note that

his early NOLS experi-

ence gave him a new-

found confidence.

course—a buddy of mine had done one and

it sounded cool.” The money didn’t cover

both tuition and a plane ticket, so Roy hitch-

hiked to Wyoming for a challenging five-

week Wind River Wilderness course. He

arrived with no hiking boots and no real

sense of the challenges that lay ahead.

On day one, with huge blisters from

stiff new boots and an aching body from

lugging a 75-pound pack, Roy asked his

trip leader for more mosquito repellent.

The guy laughed. “I knew I was in over

my head,” he says. “One thing wilderness

does is push you beyond your comfort

zone, but the end result is that your com-

fort zone gets larger. My NOLS experi-

ence was a turning point. I left Wyoming

with a sense of accomplishment and

belief in myself that I didn’t have before.”

The experience also nudged him toward

environmentally oriented Prescott College

in Arizona, which used a wilderness-based

curriculum. It was a fateful choice: The

college ran into financial trouble and lost

its accreditation after Roy’s first year. Out

of school and without a plan, Roy returned

to New Orleans and began working at his

sister’s new natural food store, Whole Food

Company. Three years later, he was presi-

dent of what had become one of the

largest volume stores in the nascent natural

foods industry, and he had created the

Natural Foods Network, a trade association

linking together other natural food entre-

preneurs. “Basically, I bought my sister out

for $800 and woke up 25 years later,” Roy

S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 6 | 145

“Success is not about title or money or theletters behind your name. Living well canmean being able to choose what you do,

where you do it, and with whom. That’s real luxury. I’m so thankful I had

the courage to embrace that.”—Peter Roy

Humble Beginnings: The original Whole Foods

Market opened in 1980 in Austin, Texas. Eight

years later, the store merged with Roy’s Whole Food

Company, and the rumblings of an organic food

market revolution began.

•

146 | C H A R L E S T O N

says. “It’s been an incredible run.”

The Luxury of ChoiceIn 1988 when Roy merged his Whole

Food Company with Whole Foods Market,

the organics sector was still small beans.

Hoping to expand, he and partners John

Mackey and Craig Weller approached ven-

ture capital firms. “They thought we were

crazy, that health foods were a fad, but we

knew it was a trend,” says Roy, who time

and again has had prescient business

instincts—like three years ago when he

“took a leap” and invested in some crazy

rubber shoes called Crocs that some

friends in Boulder were pushing. (“Lucky

me,” Roy says, a rubber-soled understate-

ment.) In 1989, Roy, his wife Gillian, and

young daughters Emma and Molly moved

to California to expand the Whole Foods

concept into the Bay area. In 1993, Roy

became president of Whole Foods, and by

1998, the Austin, Texas-based company

had opened 100 stores in 20 states and

was doing more than $1 billion in annual

sales. But such rapid growth had a price.

“I had gone from wearing an apron to

work every day for my first 10 years to

spending most of my time doing investor

relations on Wall Street. I wasn’t having

much fun anymore.”

This is where that imagined campaign

video would zoom in, the music getting

intense—Peter Roy’s pivotal moment. He

was 45 and had recently lost his father, his

youngest daughter was leaving the nest,

and while driving into New York City to

meet with yet more financial analysts, Roy

Family Man: Roy with his wife, Gillian, and daugh-

ters Molly (left) and Emma.

•

Southern Brew: A fifth-generation New Orleanian, Roy gets back to his roots every year with an annual crawfish

boil, transforming the terrace of his Louisiana-inspired house on Pawleys Island into Cajun-central.

•

“Peter connects people and ideas

better than anybody I know... [He] has a

way of movingthrough the world

with grace and graciousness and a

sense of integrity andfun. People like

working with him.”—Lex Alexander

had what felt like a heart attack. He

reevaluated; he resigned. He stepped

away from the power, prestige, and pay-

check that came with being top dog in

one of the country’s top retailers.

Roy writes about this definitive deci-

sion in his forthcoming The Book of Hard

Choices, coauthored with James Autry and

due out in December. “Interviewing peo-

ple for the book, we found that the diffi-

cult issues are rarely about money or the

bottom line, they’re about relationships,”

he says. Roy had built his career on giving

consumers healthy options, and now his

own hard choice involved “defining what

success meant to me—it’s not about title

or money or the letters behind your

name,” Roy realized. “Living well can mean

being able to choose what you do, where

you do it, and with whom. That’s real lux-

ury. I’m so thankful I had the courage to

embrace that.”

Roy understands the relationship busi-

ness. The Whole Foods ethic affirms the

interrelatedness of healthy food supplies

and healthy communities; its manage-

ment strategy, extending from executives

to grocery baggers, is team-based, and the

148 | C H A R L E S T O N

Lessons Learned: Roy and coauthor James Autry

interviewed leaders for The Book of Hard Choices, which

explores methods for tackling the tough ethical dilemmas

that businesspeople face during their careers.

•

To learn more about Bill and how he can work for you, please visit his website,www.billjohnstone.net, and find your perfect property.

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For the perfect property,

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company’s early expansion stemmed

from the ties Roy developed with his Nat-

ural Foods Network. “Peter connects peo-

ple and ideas better than anybody I

know,” says his friend and former Whole

Foods colleague Lex Alexander, who sold

his North Carolina-based Wellspring Gro-

cery stores to Whole Foods largely

because Roy was part of the organiza-

tion. “Peter has a way of moving through

the world with grace and graciousness

S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 6 | 149

At 45, Roy reevaluated and

resigned. He steppedout of the limelightand away from thepower, prestige, andpaycheck that came

with being top dog in one of the country’s

top retailers.

To Your Health! Roy in Berlin for his 44th birthday•

150 | C H A R L E S T O N

and a sense of integrity and fun. People

like working with him,” Alexander adds.

Living near the coast along the pristine

Waccamaw River, giving time and energy

back to NOLS as a two-term board mem-

ber and former board chairman, and trav-

eling to Africa and beyond on NOLS-relat-

ed expeditions are part of the gracious, no-

regrets Lowcountry lifestyle that Peter and

Gillian now enjoy.

Their daughters live and work in Austin

but come home often, especially for

Peter’s annual New Orleans crawfish boil,

when the brick terrace of their Louisiana-

inspired home is transformed to Cajun-

central. Gillian, a former dancer with the

National Ballet of Canada, is now, thanks to

several NOLS trips, “an absolute born-again

sea kayaker” and passionate environmen-

talist, serving on the Board of the Coastal

Conservation League and championing

local land-use issues. “In the business com-

munity, she was always Mrs. Peter Roy.

Around here, I’m Mr. Gillian Roy,” her

proud husband says.

Relaxed and comfortable in his tan

Crocs, eating a salad topped with his all-

time favorite whole food, fresh shrimp,

Peter Roy looks like a man content with

his choices—which is exactly what

Life Is Good: Although Peter and Gillian now

make their home on Pawleys Island, both contribute

their boundless energies to environmental organiza-

tions; Peter maintains his involvement with NOLS,

and Gillian serves on the board of the Coastal

Conservation League.

•

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S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 6 | 151

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