Being a great place to work makes Wegmans a great place to shop, notes Forbes article

It’s seems like every week, Rochester, N.Y.-based Wegmans Food Markets receives an award or recognition for being a wonderful place to work and shop. Pamela N. Danziger, a market researcher and the author of several books on retailing and consumer behavior, observes in her recent article on Forbes.com that these two traits are inseparably interrelated. 

Danziger interviewed Jo Natale, vice president of media relations at Wegmans, for the article. “It is our employees, and the incredible service they provide our customers, that set us apart,” Natale told Danziger. “We hire the best, and we invest in training and development.”

Emphasizing why it’s important to put employees first, Natale is quoted as saying, “In order to be a great place to shop, we must first be a great place to work.”

With more than 90 stores and a reported $8.3 billion in sales, Wegmans recently ranked No. 2 in Engagement Labs’ list of “Most Beloved Brands of 2017” — second only to Disney World, Danziger reported in her article. Engagement Labs compiles this list of “offline brands” from personal, face-to-face conversations and recommendations. 

“The offline sentiment for Wegmans has always been substantially higher than the supermarket/grocery store category in general,” Ed Keller, CEO of Engagement Labs, stated in the Forbes article.