There is a specific type of tomato that is no longer found in nature, or rather, it does exist but is rarely found on grocery store shelves. It’s the one that tastes better than its neighbors but appears to have lost a battle; it’s the lopsided one with a faint green shoulder. Instead, you are greeted by a wall of produce that is so uniform that it almost seems uncanny when you walk into any major grocery chain in America or Britain. Apples are polished to a shine. Shrink-wrapped cucumbers become stiff little soldiers. The majority of consumers may no longer be aware of this. The trick is that. The baseline is now the illusion.
As former Trader Joe’s president Doug Rauch once stated, “The perfect has become the enemy of the good.” He pointed out that supermarkets simply decided that we would only purchase food if it appeared to be perfect, not because nature actually produces perfect food. When you think about it, there’s something almost theatrical about it. Bright lighting at the perfect angle. systems for misting lettuce that maintain its dewy appearance for hours after cutting. This is not an accident. It takes teams of consultants, lighting designers, and behavioral researchers their entire careers to figure out how to make a pepper look better than it actually is.
This wasn’t always the norm. Older consumers recall markets where a carrot with two legs was just a carrot, sold for the same price, and consumed silently. Cosmetic perfection subtly became a requirement for sale sometime between the mid-20th century, when supermarket chains began to grow, and the present. Retailers found that even when none of those statements are strictly true, abundance sells, freshness reads as quality, and abundance reads as freshness. It’s been an incredible chain reaction. An estimated 40% of food produced in the US is never consumed, and a sizable portion of that waste begins in the field, where it is culled because a potato is too knobby or a peach is too small.
Sitting with that for a moment is worthwhile. Because a buyer somewhere down the chain has already determined what “fine” looks like, farmers are walking their own fields and throwing away food that is perfectly good to eat. Years ago, Tracie McMillan wrote about how she invited a professional chef into her own disorganized kitchen and watched her turn a depressing, half-dead refrigerator’s worth of vegetables into something truly delicious. It wasn’t a bad meal. Simply put, it wasn’t photogenic. Observing such a demonstration gives us the impression that we have all lost the ability to identify delicious food that doesn’t look the part.
Food researcher Marion Nestle has spent decades arguing that grocery stores are not neutral spaces but rather designed environments with a single objective: selling as much as possible, as profitably as possible. The arrangement, the lighting, the positioning of the milk at the rear, and the necessity of walking past a thousand alluring items you weren’t looking for. She has argued that profit and health are frequently at odds, and supermarkets don’t care which one prevails. Whole Foods gained a reputation by outlawing hundreds of additives, but even in that case, the marketing and the hot bar tell a slightly different story.
The peculiar thing is how voluntarily we take part. Perfection psychologically conveys safety; an apple with no flaws feels safer than one with a bruise, even if the bruise is superficial. There is some truth to the artist Gabriel Orozco’s description of the supermarket as a self-contained, orderly, perfect universe. The world is manufactured. The question of whether it’s an honest one is quite different.
It’s still unclear if consumers are actually resisting. Over the past ten years, the number of “ugly food” startups and imperfect produce boxes has increased, indicating a desire for change. However, old habits, particularly those related to vision, fade gradually. It’s difficult to ignore how flawless the performance is when strolling through the aisles today, and how infrequently people pause to consider why a piece of fruit needs to look this good to be deemed worthy of consumption.
FAQs
What is the Supermarket Illusion? The fake sense of perfection and abundance built into how stores display food.
Why is imperfect produce rejected? It looks “wrong,” even though it tastes the same.
How much food gets wasted this way? Up to 40% of U.S. food goes uneaten.
Does looks affect taste? No — cosmetic flaws don’t change flavor or nutrition.
Is this changing? Slowly, thanks to “ugly food” startups and discount produce lines.
