SACRAMENTO — Coinciding with national Nutrition Month, the California Beef Council (CBC) launched their new highly-anticipated Retail Registered Dietitian (RD) Toolkit. The digital toolkit, which is housed on the CalBeef.org website, aims to guide supermarket RDs regarding in-store and virtual tours, beef cooking lesson tips, and shopper talking points surrounding the topics of how cattle are raised, beef sustainability, reading meat package labels at the beef case, and how lean beef fits into a heart-healthy lifestyle.
“We’re excited to unveil the rich content of this digital toolkit to equip retail registered dietitians with the tools they need to promote heart-healthy beef to their shoppers at the store-level and online,” said Kori Dover, the CBC’s registered dietitian and Director of Food and Nutrition Outreach. “Consumers have so many questions about how beef is raised, whether it’s a sustainable and healthy food to feed themselves and their families, and so much more. We focused on bringing all of that content to one digital toolkit that will not only educate the store dietitians, but inspire them to promote beef with ease to their store customers, and hopefully drive shoppers to the meat case.”
Retail dietitians play a crucial role in promoting a healthy plate to shoppers, and beef not only plays a key role in a healthy lifestyle, but also to a retail store’s bottom line. “Beef brings in more dollars than any other protein at retail, but we also know that escalating prices and health misconceptions can be purchase barriers for shoppers,” said Christie Van Egmond, Director of Retail and Foodservice Marketing at the CBC. “Surprisingly, many cuts that are considered lean are also less expensive cuts, and we hope that this digital toolkit for retail dietitians will help lay that education foundation by being a go-to resource for retail dietitians.”
The average consumer spends $154 per year on beef products, compared to $82 for chicken, $73 for pork, and only $34 for meat alternatives, according to NielsenIQ. Beef in the cart is not only good for consumers’ health, but also for individual basket rings and ultimately total store sales.
To download the Retail RD Digital Toolkit, visit CalBeef.org.  For questions, or to explore retail promotional opportunities with the CBC, contact Christie Van Egmond or Kori Dover.
–California Beef Council