Two of the most prominent food buying missions for consumers today are - to make healthier choices and to spend less money.
Two of the most prominent food buying missions for consumers today are - to make healthier choices and to spend less money. And in this regard Walmart is doing it best to make these both possible. The nation’s biggest grocer has a year-old icon, the Great For You label. This label was placed on select packages of Walmarts' Great Value and Marketside store brands, plus produce and low-fat dairy products that passed nutritional criteria, as a way to help shoppers instantly identify healthy options. Walmart took this one step further in October 2012, by offering 5% savings on Great For You-labeled products. This purchase incentive was the first of its kind—it went to more than 1 million members of HumanaVitality who shop at the chain. A joint statement from both parties explained the program’s concept: 1 in 4 families report skipping healthy purchases, often or always due to price. (“It’s Dinnertime: A Report on Low-Income Families’ Efforts to Plan, Shop for and Cook Health Meals,” Share Our Strength’s Cooking Matters: No Kid Hungry, December 2011.)84% of HumanaVitality members said a savings program would motivate them to purchase healthier foods. The Lempert Report expects to see increasing connections ahead between food retailers and insurers because, according to a National Public Radio report, “two-thirds of healthcare spending is linked to lifestyle diseases such as obesity.”