As another year begins, new health and wellness initiatives often top the resolution list for many. Giant Food encouraged its associates to get a head start on that this past fall with its #HealthyAtWork challenge. The company-wide initiative, led by the retailer’s in-house team of 11 licensed nutrition professionals, encouraged store and warehouse associates to move more and add healthier options to their plates by prompting them with these simple weekly goals tied to Giant’s key healthy living pillars:
– Movement: Try a new exercise!
– Emotional Health: Reconnect with a friend!
– Physical Health: Check your blood pressure at the pharmacy!
– Nutrition: Swap a sugary beverage for water!
Participants followed the program using a #HealthyAtWork booklet filled with tips and coupons, by viewing brief nutritionist-led weekly videos, and by interacting on the nutrition team’s Facebook group. Activities also directed associates to Giant’s own healthy living programs including the Healthy Living By Giant podcast, blogs and classes as well as in-store shopping tools like Guiding Stars, the nutrition rating system that identifies better-for-you options on the shelves. Associates enrolled in Giant’s Flexible Rewards program also earned 5X Flex points on healthy food purchases throughout the program, which were identified by the Guiding Stars designation. Day-to-day support for associates was provided by the 168 new Healthy Living Ambassadors, made up of Giant department managers across all stores. The four-week program, which ran from September 20 to October 17 and Giant Food, just concluded this month with the announcement of 22 winners of free fruits and vegetables for a year.
“Giant is committed to supporting the health and well-being of our associates,” said Lisa Coleman, MS, RD, and director of Healthy Living at Giant Food. “The pandemic has placed enormous pressure on our associates who have been on the frontlines every day in difficult circumstances supporting our communities. Through programs like these, it is our goal to build a culture of health and support for all associates.”
“Robust associate engagement programs are a great opportunity to show our commitment to being a healthier workplace,” said Irfan Badibanga, SVP of operations at Giant Food. “When our associates are benefiting from programs like Flex Rewards, Guiding Stars and the Healthy Living Team, they can help share those opportunities with customers and help us to build heather communities.”
The program, which was modeled after the Landover, MD-based grocery chain’s #HealthyAtHome virtual initiative that took place in May, was so successful, that not only is Giant going to continue to reward associates for healthy purchases and behaviors through its Flex Rewards program in 2022, but the Giant Healthy Living Team also continues to offer customized #HealthyAtWork programming for any interested local groups and businesses through its Workplace Wellness programming.
With the implementation of this program and by helping local businesses and groups do something similar in their organizations, Giant Food has demonstrated how invested the company is in not only its employees, but the community it serves as well. In my opinion, giving people the incentive and the tools to create healthier lifestyles is a win-win situation for a company. I hope many other organization in the industry follow suit as well.
Global leader in consumer data science and analytics for brands, grocery retail ,retail pharmacy and retailer financial services, dunnhumby, just released its fifth annual U.S. Grocery Retailer Preference Index, which explores the needs of grocery shoppers and reveals the rankings of their favorite retailers. The study surveyed about 10,000 customer households to understand what’s driving customer preference and as a result ranked what it considers the top 57 grocery retailers in the U.S. To do so, the company uses a statistical model that predicts retailer execution based on various customer needs which they call preference drivers – these are price, quality, digital, operations, convenience and discounts, rewards and information speed – and how these factors impact emotional bonds formed with customers and the retailer’s near-term and long-term financial performance. The preference driver score and the emotional connection score is measured with data from the household surveys and the Financial performance data is gathered from publicly available financials from Edge by Ascential. Topping the list of retailers for 2021 are Amazon, H-E-B, Market Basket, Wegmans and Amazon Fresh. This is the second year in a row that Amazon has topped the list and that H-E-B has been in second place. It is the first time that Market Basket has been at number three, due to its continued excellence in the performance drivers of price and operations and its improvements in speed during the COVID-19 pandemic and despite its lack of a digital offering. Rounding out the top 15 are Aldi, Trader Joe’s (which once held the top spot), Sam’s Club, Costco, Walmart Neighborhood Market, Target, Publix, Walmart, BJ’s Wholesale and Fairway. In addition to the retailer rankings, the report also touched upon the impact of COVID, the growth of digital, and digital and shopper behavior. I think he 54-page analysis is a worthwhile read for anyone in the industry, plus it’s free. To download a copy, go to https://www.dunnhumby.com/resources/reports/.
With sustainability initiatives becoming standard for retailers and manufacturers in the industry, it’s great to see a big CPG company putting its money where its mouth is. Starting in March of this year, four of Colgate’s most popular lines of toothpaste will come packaged in recyclable tubes. The redesign has been more than five years in the making and the manufacturer plans to have every tube in its U.S. portfolio be recyclable by 2023 and internationally by 2025. The tubes will be able to be recycled in curbside bins, which is important because then consumers are more likely to recycle them than if they had to take special steps to do so. They key to this was utilizing a single material rather than a composite for ease of recycling. “The secret sauce was mixing and matching different grades of the same material, so it would still be recyclable,” said Greg Corra, worldwide director of global packaging and sustainability for Colgate’s parent company, Colgate-Palmolive. The global organization even made its design open-source so that other manufacturers can follow suit. The company’s ultimate goal is to make recyclable toothpaste packaging the standard, with Corra and his team investigating different sustainable materials and reusable containers. “We’ve got 9 billion tubes around the world to worry about right now, so we had to do something now, but we are looking into next-generation materials. We’ve got several irons in the fire.”
Since we are on the topic of sustainability in the industry, I would like to give a shout out to MOM’s Organic Market, which this past September became the first grocery store in the U.S. to have created an in-store set solely dedicated to upcycled products. The Rockville, MD-based retailer, which operates 21 stores in four states, has always been proactive in taking steps to protect and help the environment. The upcycled items, which include snacks, beverages and HBC offerings, are featured at an end cap that can be easily discerned by shoppers. In an interview with the New Hope Network, Liz Dunn, the regional wellness coordinator for the grocery chain, credits an article that was done by New Hope about the Upcycled Food Association, as being the inspiration for the featured display. “Upcycling seemed like a perfect next step after we had a couple of zero waste concepts. MOM’s purpose is to protect and restore the environment and our customers are really tuned in to that.”
Before I sign off for the month, I would like to give a shout out to Schmidt Baking Company and Chuck Paterakis for helping out stranded motorists on I-95 in Virginia during a snow and ice storm by sharing the contents of one its trucks with them. According to the Washington Post, a couple who had been stuck there for more than 16 hours called into the customer service line of the Baltimore, MD-based commercial-scale bakery after seeing one of their trucks a few cars ahead of them. They left a message about the dire situation in the traffic jam (some motorists being stuck for over 24 hours) and left their number, not really expecting a callback. Instead, Paterakis (a principal owner and senior vice president of transportation and logistics for the parent company, H&S Bakery) personally called them back, telling them to go to the truck. Paterakis had instructed the driver to give one package of rolls and one loaf of bread there to any person who requested. When asked about the generous action, Paterakis stated, “It was an easy decision,” If he had been stuck out there on the road with no food, he added, “I would want someone to offer their products.” Bravo to Paterakis and the company for such an altruistic gesture – the national accolades that they have received over this story are well-deserved.
Until next month…
Karen can be contacted via email at: [email protected]
