Dietary Guidelines + Grocery Stores = Wellness Destinations

By: Sue Borra, RD, Senior Vice President, Communications and Strategic Planning, Food Marketing Institute

The 2015 Dietary Guidelines for Americans offer a road map for shoppers to improve their overall eating patterns. According to the FMI U.S. Grocery Shopper Trends report, 80 percent of shoppers assume personal responsibility for the nutrition of the food they buy. However, shoppers report they still rely on food retailers (33 percent) as a partner to ensure their food is nutritious.

The nation’s food retailers play an integral role in helping customers lead healthy lives by offering a wide variety of nutritious foods and providing health and wellness information throughout the store. With in-store dietitians, nutritionists, pharmacists, classes and health screenings, the grocery industry is poised to help shopper reach their health and wellness goals.  

This new dietary guidance is in opportunity for food retailers to remind consumers of their health and wellness offerings as a way of supporting shopper’s dietary efforts. FMI has a number of resources and research reports on how grocery stores can be health and wellness destinations for shoppers. Here are a few:

Facts Up Front - Food retailers can offer front-of-pack labeling systems, such as Facts Up Front, to help offer customers a convenient way to make selections based on nutrients of concern.

RD Toolkit - This interactive toolkit brought to you by FMI, the FMI Foundation and the Retail Dietitians Business Alliance is designed to help retail CEOs, Store Managers, Human Resources and of course Retail Dietitians maximize the opportunity to meet the ever-growing needs of your shoppers.

Retail Contributions to Health and Wellness - This report demonstrates how food retailers are contributing to the health of their customers and shares best practices and innovative ideas.

Shopping for Health - FMI's 22nd survey with Prevention explores how consumers’ health and nutrition attitudes influence the way they grocery shop and offers shopper insights regarding the growing trend at retail to provide patient-centered care.

U.S. Grocery Shopper Trends – See how shoppers view health and wellness in the aisles and how family meals and changing shopper types impact grocery shopper trends.

The Food Retail Industry Speaks – This report provides the industry with important operational and financial benchmarks ranging from sales and profits to shrink, turns and differentiation tactics. See are food retailers are responding to shopper’s health and wellness needs with business solutions.

For more health and wellness resources for food retailers, visit our section online at www.fmi.org/HealthandWellness.