Participants in a Krasdale Foods hunger-relief effort
Unsurprisingly, “the most prominent and obviously well-aligned cause you see in [food industry corporate social responsibility] campaigns is hunger,” observes Megan Strand, director of communications at Rye, N.Y.-based Engage for Good, which provides best practices, tips and trends for organizations that want to engage consumers and/or employees on social issues. “Savvy retailers understand the importance of making that focus on hunger … a local one, so that donations generated flow directly to the surrounding community.”
Examples of this include an annual program that White Plains, N.Y.-based independent grocery wholesaler Krasdale Foods ran this past May, Shop to Feed the Kids, while a second yearly initiative, Shop to Give, is slated for November, with all proceeds going to City Harvest hunger-relief efforts in the New York metropolitan area served by Krasdale.
“The programs are further supported via our vendor partnerships, with 10 CPG brands coming together to support the cause,” explains Dylana Silver, Krasdale’s director of marketing. “Lastly, our store owners also gave to the cause, making it a truly collaborative effort to give back to the communities we serve.”
Continues Silver: “To bring the initiative to life in stores, we used custom point-of-sale materials and signage, featured the participating items in the weekly circular, provided shelf talkers and encouraged retailers to build end cap displays with participating brands. In addition, we utilized targeted digital marketing programs like Pandora, geo-fenced mobile ads and social media to raise awareness of our partnership with City Harvest. The response from consumers, store owners and our local community partners was nothing short of overwhelming, and the [2017] campaigns generated over 10 million impressions throughout the time [they] ran.”
As far as Silver is concerned, there’s no question that such initiatives are worth doing. “We’ve found success in programs where we can bring together our entire supply chain to support the same causes,” she notes. “Power is in numbers, which is why we will continue to support and grow our CSR programs throughout our entire organization and with our customers, vendors and employees.”
“Another huge cause-focus area for the grocery space” observed by Strand “is childhood health, particularly children’s hospitals – again typically focused locally – but you may also see other health causes [such as] cancer research or breast cancer awareness, veterans or military issues, or other social services causes like homelessness.”