As hospital food service departments take on healthier initiatives, operators have found that banding together to discuss common challenges can make the transition less daunting.
Donna Van Buren, director of nutritional services for Agnesian HealthCare in Fond Du Lac, Wis., who is in the process of transitioning her department to sugar-free beverages, saw this firsthand while participating in the WI Healthy Hospitals and Clinics Forum, a consortium of hospital FSDs and administrators from across the state, this past summer. “There are certainly other systems that are much further along in that movement. So hearing from them and learning some of their obstacles as they’ve tried to move that forward were some of the biggest takeaways for me,” she says.
Van Buren, who has been gradually implementing healthier initiatives since 2012, shares some of the main challenges the FSDs have addressed as they’ve transitioned to healthier menus.
1. Balancing the costs of going healthy
One of the biggest challenges operators face is covering the usually higher costs of healthier items. When Van Buren’s facility did away with the deep fryers in 2013 and brought in new ovens, she wasn’t sure which overhauled menu items would sell well among guests. To hedge potential sales losses and drive customers to healthier choices, Van Buren increased the price of heartier items, like meatball subs and shrimp scampi, by 10 to 35 cents. Healthier items were priced more affordably. Recalls Van Buren, “If we could control those things in small ways, it helped balance us out.”
2. Handling pushback from customers
As Van Buren’s facility has shifted towards healthier options, there has been pushback from some guests. She helped her frontline staff handle complaints by creating a script that explains the changes, empathizes with the customer’s concerns and provides Van Buren’s contact information. She finds that the method allows cashiers to be responsive without unduly slowing down the line.
3. Getting your GPO on board
Healthier initiatives also can lead to challenges if an operator’s group purchasing organization doesn’t carry the needed ingredients. If an operator purchases an item from a vendor outside their GPO often enough, it could jeopardize purchasing incentives. Van Buren, who sources chicken filets from an outside supplier, makes sure she does not violate her GPO purchasing goals by monitoring the ratio of products she’s permitted to buy from other sources.
Van Buren also says that GPO members can help shape what products are carried by getting involved on any committees or consistently speaking with their GPO representative. “There’s power in numbers when it comes to getting the items that we need to be on contract,” she says.