Sprouts Farmers Market has a strange business.
It puts produce in the middle of the store.
It gives it about 20% of the selling floor.
Then there is the funny part.
Produce was about 25% of Sprouts’ sales when the company went public in 2013.
In 2025?
About 17%.
Yet produce still gets a huge chunk of the store.
So Sprouts is giving more space to produce than the category generates in sales.
That sounds like bad retail math. It isn't.
It may actually be the smartest part of the whole business, because the vegetables are not really the product.
They are the reason you walk through the door.
And once you're inside? Sprouts makes its money elsewhere.
That sounds like a small distinction, but it explains almost everything about the company. Sprouts has spent years making its stores look like giant produce markets while quietly changing what actually drives the economics.
The fruit gets your attention. The rest of the cart gets your money.