Whole Foods Workers Call to Unionize, Farmer’s Fridge Raises $30M + More

Source: Yahoo! Finance

Every week we track the business, tech and investment trends in CPG, retail, restaurants, agriculture, cooking and health, so you don’t have to. Here are some of this week’s top headlines.

A group of Whole Foods employees sent out an email to workers at most of the 490 Whole Foods stores urging them to back their unionization drive, sparked by changes to corporate culture and diminished compensation under the ownership of Amazon. They are pushing Whole Foods and Amazon for better compensation, benefits and profit-sharing.

Farmer’s Fridge has raised $30 million led by Innovation Endeavors to scale its salad vending machines, bringing its total raised to $40 million.

Check out our weekly round-up of last week’s top food startup, tech and innovation news below or peruse the full newsletter here.

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2. Whole Foods Workers Push to Unionize – Wall Street Journal

Some Whole Foods employees want to unionize to address what they say are changes to corporate culture and diminished compensation under the ownership of Amazon. Workers want better compensation, benefits and profit-sharing.

3. Farmer’s Fridge Stocks up with $30M – The Spoon

Funding was led by Innovation Endeavors, with participation from Finistere Ventures, GreatPoint Ventures, and Danone Manifesto Ventures. New capital will be used to scale the business.

4. West~bourne’s Camilla Marcus on Her Failure to Launch [VIDEO]

West~bourne founder Camilla Marcus joined us at our Fail Friday this past June to share her stories of failure and lessons learned.

5. Uber Freight Launches New Platform Just for Shippers – Supply Chain Dive 

The digital platform is specifically targeted at shippers, enabling them to obtain instant pricing, tender a load, track their shipments and manage documents.

6. Walmart Partners with Delivery Logistics Platform Bringg on Last-Mile Grocery Delivery – TechCrunch

After announcing the launch of its last-mile delivery pilot program, Spark Delivery, the retailer’s newest partnership with Bringg will allow it to offer Uber-like or Amazon-like level of visibility to its delivery operations.

7. Here’s Why Coca-Cola Is Buying Costa Coffee for $5.1B – Fortune

While Costa does not compete in the US market, it is the UK’s leading coffee chain and operates several hundred outlets in China. Its parent company, Whitbread, also operates the Premier Inn hotel chain.

8. Sentera Raises $14M Series A from Syndicate of Leading Agtech Investors – AgFunder

Funding was led by S2G Ventures, with participation from Continental Grain Company and Middleland Capital. The company will use the funds to bolster its distribution channels, focusing on its existing partnerships.

9. Canters Restaurant Royalty Raises $9.5M for Ordermark, a Takeout Order Management Service – TechCrunch

Investors included Nosara Capital, with participation from Vertical Venture Partners, RiverPark Ventures, Techstars Ventures, and Matchstick Ventures. With the new capital the company is looking to expand into most of the major metropolitan areas in the US.

10. Picnik Raises $7.5M from KarpReilly – BevNET

The move will grow both the brand’s CPG and cafe businesses.

11. Bear Flag Robotics Raises $3.5M Seed Round to Automate Common Tasks on the Farm – AgFunder

True Ventures led the round, which will help Bear Flag grow its team with the most qualified robotics, machine vision and system engineers in Silicon Valley.

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