Everybody needs groceries, but not everybody needs Whole Foods. So when the economy falters, some of that pricey grocery chain’s customers are going to opt for less expensive fare.

That sobering (to Whole Foods) fact was made glaringly clear in the company’s quarterly results, issued late on Tuesday. Marketwatch called it a “reality check” and “an extension of the Starbucks syndrome.”

“Everyone who has ever indulged their inner foodie at Whole Foods knows that when it comes to putting bread on the table, they can do it for far less at Safeway or Kroger stores,” wrote that site’s Jim Jelter.

For CEO John Mackey, this is just another example of the media’s poisoning consumers’ minds by informing them that his stores are expensive. During a conference call with analysts on Wednesday, he grew a bit reflective:

In my 30 years in this business I have never seen an economy quite as weird as this one. So there could be economic factors going on. We definitely know competitors are definitely tougher. There’s a lot of competition and it’s gotten more intense in the last year. That’s a factor. There are possibly media impacts from the media continuing to report … stories about people switching over from Whole Foods and maybe that influences people, I don’t really know.

Despite the media’s best efforts, sales rose from $1.5 billion to $1.9 billion a year ago. And even same-store sales – which don’t count the stores from Whole Foods’ acquisition of the Wild Oats chain and all others not open at least a year — rose by 6.7 percent. But last year, that figure was 12 percent, and in the first four weeks of the quarter, it was 8.9 percent, according to Mackey.

That indicates a swift slowdown in business. Much of the quarter’s loss came from costs associated with the Wild Oats acquisition. Another big chunk came from higher purchasing costs – an affliction shared by all grocers. But unlike Whole Foods, the Safeways and Krogers of the world can rely at least somewhat on the fact that everybody needs to buy food to make up for some of their higher expenses.

Not so Whole Foods. When your nickname is “Whole Paycheck,” it’s hard to convince cash-strapped customers — even many of those of the upper middle class variety – that they need premium organic French cheese. And they know this without needing to see a news account. All they have to do is go shopping.