Providing Food for All:
Making Sure All Your Employees are Catered For
Our jobs are one of the most demanding aspects of our lives. With so many pressures to deliver work, often to challenging deadlines, more and more people are eating one or two meals a day at their desks.
Many employees in companies across the world will eat their breakfast and lunch, or lunch and dinner, at their workplace and often while sat at their desk with one hand on the keyboard and one eye on a screen. Even employees that have the luxury of a staff lunchroom or cafeteria will often be working on a cellphone, tablet or laptop while sitting at a lunch table with a soup and a sandwich.
If you provide food for employees, even if only in vending machines or basic foods in a kitchenette, you should be considering the dietary requirements of your staff when replenishing stocks of food and drink to make sure everyone has equal access to refreshments.
Have Healthy Choice Vending Machines, As Well As Traditional Options
If you dare remove the unhealthy snack machines from your vending line-up, you may well have a riot on your hands, or at least some industrial action. This may seem hyperbolic but having access to a guilty pleasure of a sugary snack can often be just what an employee needs at a stressful time when the pressure is on them.
It’s a good idea to complement traditional vending machines that sell sugary snacks and sodas with healthier options and a water fountain. There are vending machines available that can dispense fresh fruit and vegetables, healthy snack options like noodles and soups, as well as healthier drink options like flavored, low-calorie water and smoothies.
Providing Employees with the Most Important Meal of the Day
An increasing number of workers are going to work early for a number of reasons. Some have a flexible hour policy at work, that helps them avoid the worst of the traffic in the morning and again in the afternoon, some start early so they can pick children up from school or tend to elderly family members. These factors and more are leading more people to eat breakfast at work.
Providing a breakfast bar or cereal buffet at work is a great way to give your employees a small perk at work that is both low cost and cost-effective. A healthy breakfast of Bob’s Red Mill steel cut oats can give any employee the energy they need to make it through to lunchtime without being distracted by hunger. Many studies have shown that a healthy cereal for breakfast helps people to be more productive and able to concentrate on complex tasks, so providing a healthy breakfast cereal to employees can pay for itself in productivity.
Make Sure You Provide for all Employees Dietary Demands
There are many people today who suffer from a number of ailments that prevent them from consuming certain foods. Some may be allergic reactions, so you should be careful to source products that do not pose a threat to members of your team.
Over 1% of the world’s population is gluten intolerant and have to avoid a number of different foods in order to eat in comfort. It is likely that people who have a gluten-free diet, like Celiac sufferers, compose around 1% of your workforce and should also be catered for.
Many people are now turning to vegetarianism or veganism for health or ethical reasons. If you want to provide adequately for all your employees, you need to make sure you have vegan-friendly foods and a selection of vegetarian options.
Providing your employees with healthy food and drink choices, and choices that reflect diverse diets and dietary health demands is a great way to show your employees that you understand their demands and care for their welfare.
Every day, millions of people are eating meals at work, often at their desks, and this can lead to unhealthy food choices that can cause long-term health problems for workers. This eventually puts excess strains on employee health management plans and the cost to business of unplanned employee absence due to poor health.
If you already provide food and refreshments to your employees or are thinking of doing so, you should definitely consider healthy food options and a breakfast service to your employee’s food choices. Healthy food and the right start to the day can increase your company’s productivity and the overall health of your staff and make the refreshments you provide investment in your business and not new expenditure.
