Meijer is partnering with the nutritional scoring program, NuVal, for the first ever “Nu-Me Weight Loss Challenge” that will incent the 60,000 team members across the retailer’s five-state footprint with the opportunity at prize money totaling $15,000 over the three-month contest. The program is the largest health and wellness contest in the retailer’s history and the first-of-its-kind corporate partnership for NuVal.
“Health and wellness is an important cornerstone of what we stand for at Meijer,” says Shari Steinbach, lead dietician and healthy living advisor for Meijer. “NuVal has been a great partner for many years, offering a simple tool that helps shoppers make healthier food choices. We’re excited to offer team members an opportunity to engage with NuVal in a fun and informative way that will help them make healthy changes in their lives.”
Meijer team members from the store level to corporate headquarters signed up, and will compete as teams in one of eight divisions: Northern, Mid-Michigan, Eastern, Western, Central and Southern regions, supply chain and corporate. One team in each division will win a $1,000 grand prize.
To be eligible for the grand prize, all team members were required to get a verified weigh-in either at a Meijer Pharmacy or at Meijer headquarters in Grand Rapids, Mich., before the March 1 contest kick-off and again at the end of the challenge from May 20-31.
The Nu-Me Challenge also features weekly activities through an internal portal that allows team members to win prizes for participating whether they’ve received a verified weigh-in or not. Through that portal, they will have access to weight loss strategies, NuVal tips for healthy eating and a feature that allows them to track their daily eating habits and exercise. Participants also will receive weekly newsletters with health and wellness ideas.
“At Meijer, our goal of providing simple solutions to make healthy living easier has always extended beyond our customers to our team members, but this contest will help us take it to a new level,” says Amanda Senecal, wellness program specialist at Meijer. “We think sparking this healthy competition among co-workers is an opportunity for a lot of fun.”
The NuVal Nutritional Scoring System is a familiar feature to Meijer team members and shoppers since the retailer implemented it in 2009 to eliminate the nutritional mystery of a grocery product. The scoring system calculates and summarizes a grocery product’s nutritional information into a single number. Scores are displayed directly on shelf tags, scale labels and other signage throughout all 199 Meijer store locations, helping shoppers make quick and easy nutritional comparisons between foods. More information about NuVal at Meijer can be found here.
