![]() “I’d rather pay $18 for a smoothie that’s going to fuel my body and give me nutrients in lieu of having a $20 drink.” “I think of people who go out and spend $20 on a vodka soda at the clubs every weekend,” she says. But post-diagnosis, her priorities have shifted. Latin, who lives with her parents while she builds her caseload as a therapist, guesses she spends around $125 per week at Erewhon (separate from miscellaneous groceries) and understands why people question the store’s prices. ![]() “I never thought I’d be able to have a dessert that tastes good again,” she says. Shopping at Erewhon is an assurance that she is eating the best foods for her body, while also allowing her to indulge her sweet tooth. Jessie Latin, 25, keeps a dairy-free, gluten-free diet and attempts to restrict sugar, soy, and alcohol to help manage her endometriosis symptoms. “I’m seeing someone else, so I don’t think I can do that. “There’s this boy in San Francisco and he texted me yesterday and said, ‘Can you ship me the peanut butter? I’ll literally pay you,’” she says, gesturing to the wall of $30 nut butters before us. “Every time I go, I make it a point to look really cute because it’s obviously a dream to meet my future husband while at Erewhon.” For her, it’s a love language. “I have friends in their 30s and they like it because it’s a pickup place for young, good-looking, fit people who want to hook up.” Spencer concurs. The store became a fixture on social media, earning a regular place on DeuxMoi’s Sunday Spotted, and has capitalized on the hype, partnering with Hailey Bieber, Bella Hadid, and Kourtney Kardashian to craft signature smoothies priced just under $20 and boasting ingredients like mesquite, chlorella, spirulina, and vanilla collagen.Įrewhon’s pronounced dating culture also lends to its cachet. “It’s like Tinder for groceries,” says Adam Shapiro, 65, who goes there for soup. In 2011, Tony and Josephine Antoci bought Erewhon, kick-starting the once-niche vendor’s transformation from hippie health-food store to a luxury-wellness behemoth. Named for Samuel Butler’s satirical utopia in Erewhon, the store started in Boston, specializing in macrobiotic-rich foods before making its way out west in 1968. That was when I was dating my ex-boyfriend and he would buy salmon for his dog here.”ĭespite its current reputation, Erewhon came from humble beginnings. “Actually, I used to buy cut fruit sometimes. “I would never buy that,” Spencer insists. She leads me to the produce section and points to a 16-ounce container of crimson strawberries, which cost $24. She weaves through the narrow aisles jam-packed with colorful, if not somewhat perplexing, products like $40 Neptune Blue sea-moss gel and $11 pea-flower and turmeric bread. It’s an uncharacteristically light Erewhon trip for Spencer, also an aspiring wellness content creator, who has come to collect her smoothie as a post-yoga reward. Photo-Illustration: by The Cut Photos courtesy the subjects “Well, not technically free since I pay for a membership.” (Spencer, who pays $200 per year for a membership, gets one free monthly smoothie.) “One of my friends said that it was horrible.” At least it’s free, she acknowledges. It’s not the best thing we’ve ever launched.” Spencer nods intently. ![]() “Have you tried it?” she asks the barista. On a recent morning, Spencer leans against the smoothie bar at Erewhon Market and orders the smoothie of the month - Thorne’s Super Greens Coconut Shaker - which retails at $13. ![]() She’s joined by others who shell out thousands of dollars per year on jars of chicken noodle soup and regularly fork over $20 for a single smoothie. She spends most of her disposable income - and then some - on elevated groceries. “I’ve made jokes about how no matter what, it’ll always be in my budget, even though I’m a starving artist,” she says. Her favorite items include French Squirrel’s Bisous, a “nutritious version” of puppy chow ($9) a keto brownie that is “literally five bites” ($10) and a package of three peanut-butter-filled dates ($8) that she acknowledges could probably be DIY’ed for less money. Each week, she spends between $50 and $75 (though sometimes, she admits, as much as $200) at the cult high-end health-food store in Los Angeles, which has also become a social scene attracting TikTok wellness influencers, health nuts, and, on one occasion, a dominatrix. ![]() Spencer, 23, makes roughly $40,000 annually as a freelance voice-over artist, content creator for a hummus company, and college-essay tutor - forcing her to share a carpeted, un-air-conditioned apartment in Brentwood with a roommate - yet she is not willing to give up one luxury: Erewhon. ![]()
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