For the second time in recent months, a rumour has been floating around that Whole Foods Market is coming to Victoria.

And for the second time in recent months, there appears to be nothing to date to substantiate it.

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Victoria City Coun. Shellie Gudgeon recently tweeted: “South Jubilee neighbourhood rumour is that Whole Foods is taking over Fort/Foul Bay Safeway location.” But as Gudgeon points out, it is just a rumour.

According to Whole Foods, there is nothing to talk about. Company spokeswoman Ann Marie Ricard said Wednesday “Whole Foods Market has growth plans for B.C. and is always looking for new store locations. However, the company has not announced a store location for Victoria and does not have news to share at this time.”

The rumour seems to have some weight simply because Whole Foods is in expansion mode and there are currently three Safeway locations for sale in Greater Victoria.

Texas-based Whole Foods, which reported a $551 million profit on $13 billion in sales last year, has plans to open as many as 38 new stores this year and as many as 40 in 2015.

Whole Foods has eight locations in Canada — four in Greater Vancouver and four others in Ontario.

While Whole Foods eyes new locations, Sobeys is selling three of its four Victoria Safeway stores as a part of divesting 23 locations in Western Canada to satisfy the federal Competition Bureau.

The sale of the Safeway stores was required for Sobeys to complete its $5.8-billion purchase of 213 Canada Safeway locations.

The Competition Bureau said it was concerned about the lessening of competition with Sobeys’ purchase of Safeway. Sobeys already owned grocery brands Thrifty Foods, Sobeys, IGA, Foodland, FreshCo and Price Chopper.

Sobeys has put up for sale the Safeways at the corner of Fort Street and Foul Bay Road, University Heights in Saanich and the store on Beacon Avenue in Sidney. The Tillicum store is the only local location not for sale.

Sobeys spokesman Andrew Walker said there is no news to report.

Many Island-based grocers have already said they are unlikely to bid for any of the Safeway locations.

In earlier interviews, Country Grocer noted they were unlikely to be in a position to take on a large new store having recently completed a new Nanaimo location; Quality Foods also said the timing was poor for them as they had just committed to two Victoria locations; and Fairway Markets pointed out they had locations too close to the Safeway stores.