For many years, staff at Keystone’s food shelves have worked hard to offer individuals and families as many healthy choices as possible. In 2017 Keystone participated in a research study being conducted by The University of Minnesota to pilot a new model for food shelf services called Super Shelf.
Designed to help participants choose more nutritious foods, the Super Shelf model encourages participants to use a shopping list to make their choices. The shopping list includes lots of healthy options, including meat, grains and frozen and fresh vegetables. Walking down aisles as they would in a regular grocery store, shoppers choose items from the list, which is color-coded to match each shelf and translated into several languages.
Christine Pulver, Keystone’s Basic Needs Director, is proud of the Super Shelf model and Keystone’s participation in the study. It has increased healthy food options at the food shelf and our participants love it. “Our participants often tell me how grateful they are for the healthy options. They also appreciate the new more relaxed shopping method to select food from the food shelf,” Christine said.
The program has been so popular among participants and volunteers that Keystone plans to implement the program at our other food shelf locations in 2018. And we have increased our Healthy Eating Index rating which is another indicator that the new Super Shelf model is working.