Biography|John Mackey — The Austin Headquarters on the Day Amazon Bought the Chain
· 2017-6
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Biography|John Mackey — The Austin Headquarters on the Day Amazon Bought the Chain
kevin
On 16 June 2017 Amazon announced an agreement to buy Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion.
John Mackey was still chief executive.
He had co-founded the company in Austin in 1980 and had held the top job from the first store onward.
The announcement was a corporate filing, not a ceremony on Lamar.
The public home of the company that day was already this block.
The 2005 flagship stands at 525 North Lamar Boulevard.
The offices stand at 550 Bowie Street.
Mackey stayed through the close.
He remained CEO until he retired in 2022.
Jason Buechel succeeded him.
The grocery on the ground floor kept the Whole Foods name.
For Austin the sale did not move the pin.
The chain that began in the 900 block of Lamar was sold from the headquarters a few blocks south.
Mackey later started another food company.
That chapter belongs somewhere else.
This corner is where the independent Whole Foods ended.
Amazon kept the stores.
It kept the Austin flagship open.
A visitor in 2026 still shops the same block Mackey used as headquarters.
The deal closed a 37-year run that started with 19 people and a floodplain shop.
Photo: LoneStarMike, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (headquarters, July 2010). Portrait: Mike Gifford, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons, 2017.
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