At this stage, no. The selective price cuts are a step in the right direction, but they are hardly revolutionary — at most, they bring Whole Foods into line with other retailers. Our checks yesterday reveal that outside of fresh — in areas like household and ambient groceries — Whole Foods remains considerably more expensive than most other grocers.

I would never suggest that Whole Foods focus on price to the exclusion of everything else, but I refuse to buy things like Vitamin Water there at a temporarily-discounted price of $1.39 when it’s $0.88 at Target! Others will feel the same.

Whole Foods has a lot more work to do on pricing before it captures a larger share of wallet of existing customers and draws in new shoppers. That said, I think over time Amazon is ultimately prepared to make this investment — yesterday’s cuts were just the opening headline-grabbing salvo.

I don’t see this as bringing in a much broader segment of the population. Their highly educated, disposable income-having target are less likely to rave that avocados are 30 cents cheaper but it follows Amazon’s pattern of dominating the news cycle with low prices. Whole Foods couldn’t make it work for many years and be profitable — Amazon can cut prices because of deep Wall Street pockets and their AWS. You have to wonder if it is really good for one company to be able to have such abilities divorced from being profitable.

Reports developed later in the day yesterday that many price cuts in the long run will only be available to frequent shoppers. That makes sense — business sense.

While Amazon has had the investor flexibility to run an unprofitable retail business online, there’s no indication investors will let that happen in Whole Foods where there’s risk of unprofitability rising to massive new levels very quickly.

But we will continue to see Amazon PR drive panics like yesterday where a mere announcement ends up reported far beyond what is actually said.

I did a fast price check at the site for Metro Market (one of the Kroger divisions operating here in Milwaukee, and the sister brand of Mariano’s in Chicago). Its prices on organic bananas, eggs, butter and Fuji apples are already at or slightly below the new pricing at Whole Foods. (Its price on lean ground beef is 50 cents higher as of this morning.) What this points out is that Whole Foods had a pricing problem (“Whole Paycheck”) that Amazon is taking aggressive steps to correct.

Based on what happened to Costco’s and Walmart’s stock prices since Friday, there is a typical overreaction to the steps that Amazon is taking. Just keep in mind that Walmart and many other grocers are already competitive and Whole Foods is just joining the party. Also keep in mind that the Whole Foods brick-and-mortar footprint has a long way to go before it catches up with its competitors, despite the smart moves that Amazon is likely to make.

As a consumer, I want Whole Foods to reliably drive down the price of organic so I can shop at Whole Foods for my family of five. Having said that, 14 items doesn’t make a new standard. It barely registers as competitive on price.

Probably more interesting than the 14 items is the speed at which an approved buy out has become operational control. I’m really excited to see how fast Amazon starts to move on getting craft brands into stores and how much more control they have before the official close of this deal at the end of the year.

So, the “Amazoning” of Whole Foods begins. If nothing else, this is causing a major buzz and resurgence of the announcement of the acquisition. Pricing may change at Whole Foods, but I doubt the level of quality, freshness, etc. will. That’s the reputation that Whole Foods is known for and wants to keep.

First of all let’s remember we are talking about Whole Foods here. Cutting their prices starts to bring them in line with market pricing — not exactly the most revolutionary concept in retail history.

I assume Amazon will continue its downward pressure on pricing but I don’t think that’s going to move the industry as a whole to a series of radical en masse price cuts.

For me, the real challenge to other retailers is that Amazon continues to surround shoppers with an increasingly complete “consumption environment” in which they only have to deal with Amazon to satisfy a growing percentage of their routine shopping needs.

If it works, it will be an-all-but unbeatable strategy.

Amazon continues to be the thorn in the side of most food retailers. Now that it has made a significant transition into the brick-and-mortar space, it is firing a warning shot across the bows of the competitive ships. In essence, Amazon is following the acquisition strategy of Safeway, Ahold and others who gobbled up many terrific independent food retailers. However, the key will be not to Safewayize Whole Foods, nor follow the Ahold approach of rolling these banners into existing Ahold formats. Instead, I expect Amazon to apply its noted resources, namely, sourcing, customer intimacy, logistical excellence, price transparency, etc. to a brand (Whole Foods) which has a terrific image, save for price.

Amazon is likely to see the biggest benefits of the Whole Foods acquisition to be rapid entry into the grocery market, particularly fresh produce, and the immediate acquisition of hundreds of points of distribution for the Amazon organization as a whole. As a result, Amazon will not be as dependent on the high margins of Whole Foods; rather, they would like to increase the traffic into the stores, which further benefits their ultimate goal — a physical presence across online and off-line.

I anticipate a gradual reduction of prices on commonly compared products across the Whole Foods product assortment.

As several have noted the price drops simply brought Whole Foods prices in line with the market. In short this is, as Shakespeare wrote, much ado about nothing.

You’ve got to give Amazon’s PR department great kudos for all the uproar. To use a part of a phrase from another Shakespeare play (Macbeth) — it’s “full of sound and fury signifying nothing.” I do agree that over time Amazon’s impact through its acquisition of Whole Foods may have an impact on food retailing, but not in the short run.

Amazon has lots to gain with low downside risk. I see them milking this acquisition for all it is worth in the press. Something they are an expert in. They will turn the store into another major perk for Prime members, and get to test things in 450 brick-and-mortar stores with a high-end customer base. It’s a great place to test new technology in the retail space like the automated c-store they demonstrated last December.