CLEVELAND, OH — Marc’s has teamed up with Del Monte Fresh Produce to provide self-serve salad bars to three schools in Mentor, OH as part of the First Lady’s “Let’s Move Salad Bars to Schools” initiative (LMSB2S).
The donations were celebrated on Thursday, Oct. 8 with a ribbon-cutting at Mentor High School, in front of the school’s new salad bar. The event brought together school administrators, students and produce and retail grocery executives to celebrate the donations and observe students as they used the salad bar to fill-up their lunch trays with fresh fruit and vegetables.
“As part of our commitment to the community, we take great pride in promoting healthy eating habits and increasing students’ access to fruits and vegetables in school lunchrooms,” said Marc Glassman, founder of Marc’s. “We’re pleased to come together with our partners at Del Monte Fresh to make this positive, healthy change possible.”
“It’s always great partnering with a customer like Marc’s, which embodies the same values as us,” said Dionysios Christou, VP of Marketing at Del Monte Fresh Produce. “It is our responsibility to give back to the communities we operate in and to make a lasting impact on society. Allowing students to ‘customize’ their healthy lunches with a large variety of fresh produce is the perfect tool to instill healthy eating habits that will last a lifetime.”
According to Jeni Lange, Supervisor of Nutrition Services for the Mentor Public Schools, “We began implementing these new salad bars three weeks ago and they are tremendously popular with our students. They are selecting fresh produce to top their hamburgers and sandwiches as well as making side salads, grabbing a piece of fruit and some are just taking veggies to dip with dressing. We’re seeing our students take, and eat, a lot more fruits and vegetables.”
She also added, “The salad bars are new, so we are still learning the best way to use them with our current meal programs, but it is clear students really like the option to customize their meals.
At Mentor Public Schools we are committed to moving our meal program forward with new innovative ideas that expand upon a typical salad bar approach.”
While there is growing awareness of the benefits that salad bars provide to kids, such as providing a visually appealing array of options that empower students to make their own healthy choices, many school foodservice programs do not have the capital funds available to purchase salad bar equipment on their own. According to Ms. Lange. ““We would not have been able to get salad bars, if not for this opportunity. Now that we have salad bars, it’s a huge attraction and we have more students eating a healthy meal at school.”
The salad bars donated to Mentor Public Schools are the first salad bars implemented by the school district. The district was interested in using salad bars as a way to encourage more students to participate in their meal program, as well as to meet new federal school lunch nutrition standards that require schools to serve an increased amount and variety of fruit and vegetables each day.
Del Monte and Marc’s coordinated the donations with the United Fresh Start Foundation, a founding partner of the national Let’s Move Salad Bars to Schools initiative, which works with the produce industry, non-profit foundations, healthcare partners and allied business to support salad bars for schools, as a strategy to increase children’s consumption of fresh fruit and vegetables every day at school.
Schools receiving salad bars from the Marc’s and Del Monte Fresh Produce partnership:
Mentor High School 6477 Center Street Mentor, Ohio 44060
Shore Middle School 5670 Hopkins Road Mentor, Ohio 44060
Memorial Middle School 8979 Mentor Ave, Mentor, OH 44060
To date, the Let’s Move Salad Bars to Schools initiative has facilitated the donation of salad bars to more than 4,100 schools nationwide, benefitting nearly 3 million children every school day. This includes 150 salad bars for Ohio schools. Let’s Move Salad Bars to Schools supports First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! initiative to end childhood obesity in a generation.
Videos
* Mentor High School nutrition specialist Jeni Lang discusses the districts new salad bars: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRgAoIMq89g
* Mentor Schools Salad Bars – Healthy Eating Initiative: https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=75&v=MS459cXr9BU
About Marc’s
Marc's operates over 60 stores throughout the Cleveland, Akron, Canton, Youngstown and Columbus region in Ohio and part of Connecticut. They are very proud to be locally owned and operated in N. E. Ohio. Marc's targets the value conscious family shopper. Basic inventory represents name brand merchandise in the food, health & beauty, and general merchandise categories. Marc's is proud to accept Discover credit cards, but provides approved customers with check cashing convenience. Each of our stores has a courtesy section which provides many extra services such as postage stamps, money orders and pre-paid phone cards.
About Del Monte Fresh Produce
Del Monte Fresh Produce N.A., Inc. is one of North America’s leading marketers and distributors of high-quality fresh and fresh-cut fruit and vegetables. Del Monte Fresh Produce N.A., Inc. markets its products in North America under the Del Monte® brand (as well as other brands), a symbol of product innovation, quality, freshness and reliability for over 120 years.
Let’s Move Salad Bars to Schools
Let's Move Salad Bars to Schools is a public health campaign to increase salad bars in schools across the country so that every child has the choice of healthy fruits and vegetables every day at school. Let’s Move Salad Bars to Schools supports First Lady Michelle Obama's Let's Move! initiative to end childhood obesity in a generation. Founding partners are: The United Fresh Start Foundation, National Fruit and Vegetable Alliance, Chef Ann Foundation, and Whole Foods Market. More information can be found online at www.saladbars2schools.org
About the United Fresh Start Foundation
The United Fresh Start Foundation is a 501 (c)(3) not-for-profit organization focused exclusively on increasing children’s access to fresh fruits and vegetables. Affiliated with the United Fresh Produce Association, the Foundation is committed to helping today’s kid’s achieve the public health goal to make half their plate fruits and vegetables in order to live longer and healthier lives. We work to create an environment in which kids have easy access to high-quality, great-tasting and affordable fresh fruits and vegetables, whenever and wherever they are choosing snacks or a meal. More information is available at: http://www.unitedfresh.org/nutrition/lets-move-salad-bars-to-schools/
Source: Del Monte Fresh Produce
