In Dallas-Fort Worth, Whole Foods lives up to its “Whole Paycheck” reputation for selling pricey groceries.

A study conducted by market research company Strategic Resource Group for Consumer Reports found Austin-based Whole Foods is the most expensive grocery chain in DFW compared with Walmart as a baseline. The study examined prices for a “basket” of comparable packaged goods, produce, and meat.

At DFW Whole Foods stores, groceries were 48 percent more expensive than comparable groceries purchased at Walmart, the study showed. Whole Foods operates 15 stores in DFW.

In a statement, Whole Foods told Consumer Reports that the study didn’t account for other factors that may be important to shoppers, including ingredient standards and product sourcing.

"In the last 18 months, Whole Foods Market has reduced prices on 25 percent of items in our stores, including private-label items, without compromising our industry-leading quality standards,” a Whole Foods spokesperson said. “[Amazon] Prime members who shop at Whole Foods Market have access to a number of benefits year-round, including deep discounts on select popular products each week and an additional 10 percent off hundreds of in-store sale items.”

In DFW, the least expensive grocer was Costco, whose prices were 18 percent below those at Walmart. Prices at San Antonio-based H-E-B were just 0.2 percent below Walmart’s prices.

Costco operates 16 stores in DFW, Walmart operated about 140 in North Texas as of last September, and H-E-B has 11 DFW stores and plans to open at least six more.

Here’s the full list of DFW grocers included in the study, with the percentages indicating a grocer’s prices compared with Walmart’s prices.

• Costco, -18 percent (No. 6 among grocers ranked by the 2026 American Customer Satisfaction Index)
• Aldi, -5 percent
• WinCo Foods, -2.3 percent
• H-E-B, -0.2 percent (ranked No. 3 by the American Customer Satisfaction Index)
• Target, +9 percent
• Kroger, +14.7 percent
• Fiesta, +21.7 percent
• Albertsons, +23.4 percent
• Tom Thumb, +25.4 percent
• El Rancho, +30.1 percent
• Trader Joe’s, +33 percent (ranked No. 1 by the American Customer Satisfaction Index)
• Whole Foods, +48 percent (ranked No. 7 by the American Customer Satisfaction Index)

The study reviewed grocery prices in six U.S. metro areas. In addition to DFW, they were Boston, Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles/Southern California, and Virginia Beach, Virginia.

A few notes about the study:

• It didn’t account for the cost of annual memberships at places like Costco.
• Many of the grocery items that the study compared were national brands, meaning grocers’ private-label goods weren’t given full weight.
• Not all “baskets” contained the same number of items. For example, some Chicago-area baskets had 56 items, while others had only 23.