Fresh to You: An innovative, public-private partnership to increase fruit and vegetable consumption

Eating adequate fruits and vegetables (F&V) has been linked to lower health risks. Barriers for eating more F&V include cost, limited availability and hectic lifestyles. To address these barriers, Fresh to You (FTY), an innovative, public-private partnership between a F&V distribution company, Brown University and the RI Department of Health, has been piloted at worksites and a community-based organization (CBO) serving low-income families. The F&V distributor provides high quality, fresh F&V directly to the sites at discounted prices.

At the CBO, biweekly markets are held with the produce marked up slightly to cover implementation costs. In this pilot, 64% of participants reported that they bought more F&V because of the market; 76% said that they would eat more F&V; and 66% said that other household members would eat more F&V.

In worksites, FTY initially implemented a market model whereby employees came to a biweekly market in the workplace to purchase F&V. A pilot with 233 participating employees found that 73% reported purchasing more F&V because of the market; 73% reported that they ate more F&V and 68% reported that other household members ate more F&V. A preorder model has now also been initiated at worksites whereby employees can order F&V online through the FTY website (www.freshtoyou.com) and individual, pre-packaged orders are delivered to the worksite at predetermined times on a weekly basis.

FTY has been positively received by site managers and consumers and has pilot data demonstrating promise in increasing F&V availability, access and consumption. FTY is now being expanded to 6 CBO, 16 low income housing projects and 24 worksites to see if it is a cost-effective intervention for increasing F&V intake. Research will include studying the F&V delivery system with and without additional educational components.

This presentation will describe the history of FTY; discuss the pilot programs and their results; discuss the diffusion of the FTY program into different community-based locations, and present preliminary results of this process. FTY is a true “win-win” partnership between private industry and public health that can be replicated widely if shown to be effective.