Prescription For Health
At its 13 in-store pharmacies, Piggly Wiggly Carolina Co. is promoting the health benefits of select foods.
How many times has your pharmacist told you to drink your red wine and eat your chocolate, too? Customers at Piggly Wiggly Carolina Co.'s pharmacies have received just such advice, and they continue to receive a different healthy-eating tip each month.
The program — which uses the pharmacy to promote healthy eating — is the brainchild of Scott Wink, director of pharmacy at Charleston, S.C.-based Piggly Wiggly Carolina Co.
“In South Carolina, metabolic or dietary causes are at the root of a lot of the diseases being treated with prescription medications,” Wink says. “By giving people just medicine, historically, we're just treating the disease.”
In addition to having one of the highest rates of diabetes in the United States, South Carolina ranks fifth in the country for obesity, with 30.6 percent of the state's population tipping the scales at 30 or more pounds overweight, according to a nationwide Gallup poll conducted earlier this year.
One of the program's goals, Wink says, is to help customers make better food choices, and part of that is educating them about the healthy options that are plentiful in the supermarket. “It's not necessary to eat rice cakes and drink only water,” he says. “We decided to highlight healthier foods with specific medicinal benefits. And we picked stuff that tastes good.”
Get with the program
In the pharmacy department next to the register, a sign highlights the food of the month along with a small display of the featured item; another sign is placed in the food aisle where the item is merchandised.
In September, canned red and black beans, which have fiber and protein, as well as being filling and affordable, were in the limelight. The sign read: “Beans, beans, they're good for your heart... Do you want to know why? Ask a pharmacist.”
Wink admits that the health benefits are complicated messages to get across, so the program encourages a one-on-one dialogue between the pharmacy staff and the customer.
“You really need to figure out who that person is, what their needs are and what they're currently doing,” says Wink. “There's a fine line between too little info and too much information. We get around that by having a conversation.“
The program kicked off in January with Progresso Low-Sodium Chicken Soup paired with a low-sodium, high-fiber cracker. And in February, red wine and dark chocolate with almonds were featured. In other months, apples, canned tuna in water, fiber snack bars, whole wheat pasta and extra-virgin olive oil have been on display.
In September, the Piggly Wiggly program joined forces with the “Healthy Monday” campaign, an initiative of The Monday Campaigns with the goal of getting individuals and organizations to commit to healthy behaviors. The New York Yorkbased organization's president, Peggy Neu, explains that Monday is the day that people set weekly healthy intentions, such as beginning diets and exercising, and are in turn looking for help to jump-start their plans with ideas and inspiration.
“This great thing about Monday is that there are 52 of them,” says Neu. “We like to call it the Jan. 1 of the week.”
Not surprisingly, adds Wink, Mondays are the busiest day in the pharmacies, providing an ideal time for the pharmacy staff to redouble their outreach efforts to promote healthy lifestyle changes.
Seven days a week, Piggly Wiggly pharmacists, pharmacy technicians and store managers are all essential to the program's success.
Back in January, when the program launched, Wink admits it was “a little tricky the first month. We're not used to requiring the pharmacy to have food displays.”
To make sure the Piggly Wiggly pharmacies are all on the same page, Wink sends signage to the pharmacy, and he also forwards the pharmacy team links to medical literature so they can “explore it themselves.”
Impressed with Piggly Wiggly's healthy foods initiative, The Monday Campaigns reached out to the supermarket chain about integrating the nonprofit group's Healthy Monday campaign into its existing efforts. “
Piggly Wiggly is taking a leadership role in how they're using the pharmacy. It's a gateway to other areas of the supermarket,” Neu says. “With the health care crisis in this country, it's a great idea to look at food in the store that can help prevent disease.”
Future Plans
While the supermarket operator has more than 100 stores in South Carolina and coastal Georgia, the program is being piloted at the 13 Piggly Wiggly supermarkets with in-store pharmacies. Depending on the impact and the feedback, Piggly Wiggly could expand the program to its other stores, says Wink, who was working on his 2012 plans at press time.
‘There's a fine line between too little info and too much information. We get around that by having a conversation.
‘ —Scott Wink, Piggly Wiggly Carolina Co.
'With the health care crisis in this country, it's a great idea to look at food in the store that can help prevent disease.'
—Peggy Neu, The Monday Campaigns
The idea — that pharmacies can help people get more information on how to eat healthier — has a lot of potential, adds Neu. “People visit some supermarkets two times a week,” she points out. “And more and more pharmacies are being integrated into supermarkets, and pharmacists are on the front line of providing health information.”
Wink would like to see the program expand not only to other Piggly Wiggly stores, but also for other grocery stores to “pick up and run with this idea.”
“Our goal is to make people healthy,” Wink adds. “If what we do can spread to other grocery stores, it would be wonderful.”