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Bag of groceries. Go shop healthy. Healthy retail for Louisiana.
In this article:
About Geaux Shop Healthy
Why Healthy Retail?
Benefits of Geaux Shop Healthy
Healthy Retail Menu of Strategies
Join Geaux Shop Healthy!

About Geaux Shop Healthy

Geaux Shop Healthy (GSH) is a community-based healthy retail program that aims to increase the supply and demand of healthy foods in Louisiana communities. The LSU AgCenter Healthy Communities program developed GSH by adapting research-based healthy retail programs from other universities to fit our unique state. The purpose of Geaux Shop Healthy is simple: to promote healthy items in local stores and encourage shoppers to purchase these items.

Why Healthy Retail?

When people lack access to healthy food in their community, it can lead them to travel greater distances to shop for food, pay higher prices for low-quality food with poor nutritional value, and experience higher rates of obesity and other diet-related chronic diseases. These issues are especially common in rural areas, limited resource communities, and communities with a greater proportion of racial and ethnic minority populations. Because food retailers are uniquely positioned between communities and the products they consume, they are an ideal environment for encouraging healthy food choices and promoting good health. Engaging with local food retailers and community members through healthy retail efforts is a comprehensive approach to improving healthy food access in communities.

Benefits of Geaux Shop Healthy

For Shoppers For Retailers
  • Easier to identify healthy options in local food stores.
  • Delicious, simple, cost-effective recipes.
  • Opportunities to taste test healthy products and recipes.
  • Loyalty rewards.
  • Free marketing materials to boost sales of healthy products.
  • Positive publicity.
  • Opportunities to host events like taste tests and grocery store tours in partnership with LSU AgCenter Healthy Communities.
  • Technical assistance and support from LSU AgCenter Healthy Communities staff.

GSH website runner

Healthy Retail Menu of Strategies

Below are some examples of healthy retail strategies and activities offered through Geaux Shop Healthy. Food retailers that partner with us start out by choosing a minimum of two (2) strategies to implement in their stores and continue to add more strategies as the partnership grows.

Marketing & Communications

Display & Stocking

Customer Engagement

  • Display GSH signage around the store to promote healthy items.
  • Promote GSH items and activities on store’s social media.
  • Offer recipe cards and other LSU AgCenter materials to customers.
  • Offer prizes, store giveaways, or loyalty rewards to customers that purchase healthy items or complete program activities.
  • Host a poster contest for store artwork promoting healthy foods.
  • Offer promotions or discounts on healthy items.
  • Move healthy items to more prominent locations (eye-level on shelves, endcaps, or by the store entrance).
  • Create more appealing displays for healthy items.
  • Create a “Healthy Food Section” or “Healthy Checkout Line.”
  • Offer meal bundles with recipe cards.
  • Make physical improvements to the store’s interior/exterior to make it more inviting.
  • Offer ready-to-eat foods, such as pre-sliced fruits and vegetables, green salads, or fruit salad.
  • Host food demonstrations and tastings that feature healthy items available in the store.
  • Provide a suggestion box, poster, or other opportunities for customers to offer suggestions for stocking healthy items and store activities.
  • Host grocery store tours and/or a scavenger hunt.
  • Offer nutrition education for staff and/or customers.

Join Geaux Shop Healthy!

To learn more about Geaux Shop Healthy, contact your local LSU AgCenter extension office and ask for the FCS extension agent or contact us directly via email.

Innovate . Educate . Improve Lives

The LSU AgCenter and the LSU College of Agriculture

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