On Thursday, June 12th, a section of the dairy products shelf at New Seasons in Woodstock was still somewhat bare due to the cyberattack the previous weekend on a national wholesale grocery distributor’s IT systems, which severely impacted the supply chain. (Photo by Elizabeth Ussher Groff)

Over the weekend of June 7th and 8th, UNFI (“United Natural Foods Inc.”) the largest wholesale distributor of natural, organic, and specialty food products in North America, suffered a cyberattack on its IT systems.

By Wednesday June 11th, shelves in some grocery stores in Inner Southeast Portland still had large gaps, due to missing products.  New Seasons Markets in Sellwood and Woodstock, as well as Natural Grocers on Powell Boulevard near S.E. Chavez Blvd. (formerly 39th) were among the local affected stores.

In addition to serving some local and regional stores, UNFI is a primary distributor for many large retailers across the country – including Kroger/Fred Meyer/QFC, Whole Foods Market, Target, Costco, and Walmart. In all, 30,000 stores nationwide suffered the cyberattack.

The problem was discovered on the weekend of the 7th when some stores tried to order but found the bar-code scanning gun was giving them trouble.

As of the middle of the following week, UNFI was not able to describe the nature of the cyberattack, nor reveal how much they spend on cybersecurity to protect their online assets.

In response to questions about UNFI’s operations, TechCrunch, an American global online newspaper focusing on topics regarding high-tech and startup companies, reported on June 10th that “much of UNFI’s external-facing systems are offline, including web systems used by suppliers and customers, as well as the company’s VPN (Virtual Private Network) products.”

Recent history has shown that cyberattacks can affect entities, including major companies, in spite of protections.

On Thursday June 12th, an employee at Natural Grocers on Powell Boulevard told THE BEE that their main product distributor was keeping them updated, and some affected products had begun trickling in.  Most local stores were expecting to have their supply chain restored by the following weekend.