Oldways is a nonprofit food and nutrition education organization, inspiring good health through cultural food traditions and lifestyles.
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Dear Whole Grains Council members,
As we finish the 9th year of the Whole Grain Stamp program, how fitting that we have now passed the milestone of 9,000 products approved to use this popular packaging symbol.
Have all your qualifying whole grain products been approved and registered? If you've got 'em, flaunt 'em - shoppers want to know if the foods they're considering buying really do qualify. Contact Mallory Cushman (617-896-4832 or [email protected]); she can send you a spreadsheet with all your currently-approved products, so you can make sure you're maximizing your WGC membership.
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| Supermarket Sampling Possibilities | | For Whole Grain Sampling Day on April 2, 2014, the WGC is carrying out a "matchmaking" service between WGC members and supermarkets. If you're interested in the possibility of supplying samples of your products to be given away in supermarkets on or around April 2, contact Mallory Cushman (617-896-4832 or [email protected]).
Through our sister programs at Oldways, the WGC has contact with hundreds of supermarket dietitians. At the same time that we're asking you to join our matchmaking program, we're also reaching out to the dietitians. We'll send them our list of interested companies, then step out of the way and let them contact you, the potential suppliers, directly.
While this matchmaking service can be very successful, we encourage you to have realistic expectations.
- Stores will generally only sample products already in inventory - this is not a way to get into a new chain.
- Stores have widely different policies. Some will sample your products with their staff; some will require you to provide your own personnel; and some will only allow sampling for a per-store fee.
Putting your name on the list will not guarantee you a sampling opportunity - but if you don't sign up, you'll be out of the game for sure. So contact Mallory today and keep your fingers crossed.
Check out the latest updates on Whole Grain Sampling Day here including our fun new promotional video and downloadable PDFs of information for Manufacturers, for Supermarkets, and for Restaurants / Foodservice. We'll tell you more about other options for food companies next month. |
| How Many Servings is YOUR Company Supplying? |
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 Lately we've enjoyed seeing publicity from some of our members detailing the number of servings of whole grains they've provided in the last year.
McDonald's, for instance, served up 420 million servings of whole grain in the 52 weeks ending July 31, 2013, and General Mills sold 15 billion servings of whole grain during 2012. We love the contributions that companies like these are making to the whole grain cause.
We're putting together information for the media on the wonderful momentum of whole grains, and we'd love to include your company's contributions, too. Email Danita Boyce ([email protected]) with your information about aggregate servings sold; if you're not sure how to calculate servings, we can help with that, too. We want to get you the media attention your efforts deserve!
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| Don't Alter Stamp Graphics -- Use "Look For" Stamp | |  What do you do when you want to call attention, on your website or in marketing materials, to several products that qualify to use the Stamp? You have two options: you can display the Whole Grain Stamp with the lowest number of grams of all the featured products - or you can simply use our special "Look for Whole Grains" Stamp. (You can find the LOOK FOR Stamp on our Download Stamp Graphics page when you're logged in as a member on the website.)
What you may NOT do is simply show the regular Stamp with the number of grams removed, as the top graphic here (found on one member's website recently) shows. Altering the graphics of the Stamp - which is a registered Certification Mark -- in any way is not permitted and can jeopardize your membership in the Whole Grains Council.
If you need to review the rules for using the Whole Grain Stamp, click here then download the appropriate Stamp Usage Guide. Remember, it benefits all of us when our members use the Whole Grain Stamp consistently and according to the WGC's guidelines, so that it can continue to be a trusted and useful packaging symbol.
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Public Health Experts Learn about WGC
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Earlier this month, Oldways, the parent organization of the WGC, exhibited at the American Public Health Association (APHA) show in Boston. It was a great opportunity for us to make public health experts from across the country aware of the great low-cost and no-cost nutrition education materials that Oldways offers. Interest was especially strong in our series of "101" trifold brochures, including Welcome to Whole Grains (shown above), Welcome to the Mediterranean Diet, Welcome to the African Heritage Diet, and Welcome to the Vegetarian / Vegan Diet.
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Best regards,
Cynthia Harriman
Director of Food and Nutrition Strategies
Mallory Cushman
Stamp Program Manager
Danita Boyce
Program Manager
... and from all of the Oldways and Whole Grains Council staff
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