Whole Foods' Stock Price Has Me Dancing in the Aisles

What the Critics Say

Food and gas prices are soaring, consumer wallets are getting wacked and all the while the organic super-grocer's stock is in the dumps -- currently trading near its 52-week low at around $26 per share. Its year-long high was reached back in October 2007, hitting $53.65 per share. Since then the stock's lost about half its value on a drop in consumer spending, growing competition from lower-priced rivals like Wal-Mart (WMT Quote) and Safeway (SWY Quote), massive spending on expansion efforts, and the high costs to integrate the more than 100 Wild Oats chains it acquired back in 2007. Goldman Sachs (GS Quote) analyst Simeon Gutman cut his price target from $45 to $39 per share, describing the business as "in transition."

But if there's anything I've learned from working at TheStreet.com and listening to our co-founder Jim Cramer give advice on TheStreet.com TV's "Wall Street Confidential," it's that you want to buy a stock that you believe has growth potential, when it seems everyone is bearish on it. So for all the reasons I've stated (and more), I think buying 35 shares of Whole Foods is a good long term investment of just-under a grand.

Call me a value-orientated gal, but I want a stock that, in the next 10 or 15 years might help pay for a brand, new car - a hybrid, of course. Analysts argue that Whole Foods, despite being beaten down over the past year, is not a cheap stock. "We say the stock is trading at 21 times our 2008 numbers and still 16 times our '09 numbers," says Lehman Brothers (LEH Quote) analyst Meredith Adler. "Yes, it's growth. But how long will it last?" Adler says if she were really shopping for growth, she would rather pick growth companies CVS Caremark (CVS Quote) and Dollar Tree (DLR Quote).