Stop & Shop teams up with About Fresh to fight food insecurity
East coast grocery retailer Stop & Shop and Boston-based nonprofit About Fresh have announced a new partnership aimed at providing expanded access to fresh and healthy foods across the region.
Through About Fresh’s “Fresh Connect” program, participants can use pre-paid debit cards ‘prescribed’ by healthcare providers to purchase healthy food. The announcement makes Stop & Shop the first major retailer to make a ‘prescription produce’ program available. After a successful pilot at Stop & Shop’s Grove Hall store in Boston, the program is now available at more than 100 store locations in Eastern Massachusetts and will expand to all 400+ Stop & Shop stores by early spring.
"Especially in the midst of the global pandemic, working with Stop & Shop to ensure communities have access to fresh fruits & vegetables is more important than ever,” said Josh Trautwein, co-founder and CEO of About Fresh. "By combining Stop & Shop’s reach across the Northeast with Fresh Connect’s innovative prescription produce program, thousands of people are gaining access to affordable, healthy food that they love.”
According to the Greater Boston Food Bank, as many as one in seven adults and one in five children in Massachusetts are struggling with food insecurity. With pre-paid debit cards funded by healthcare organizations and a HIPAA-compliant platform, Fresh Connect allows patients who are experiencing food insecurity to purchase fresh fruits and vegetables that can help improve their overall health and wellbeing. By working with Stop & Shop, hundreds of Fresh Connect participants can now easily shop for fresh fruits and vegetables at their local store. Swiping the pre-paid debit card at check out will automatically deduct the cost of the produce from the total purchase price.
Fresh Connect’s debit cards for qualifying individuals and families are primarily funded by major healthcare institutions like Brigham Medicaid ACO and Brigham Women’s Faulkner Hospital and Boston Medical Center.