Jill Cataldo

Last week, Jewel-Osco hosted their first-ever invitation-only blogger event. It took place at the Jewel-Osco on DesPlaines in Chicago, which truly is the most beautiful Jewel store I’ve ever seen. Nestled in the Fulton River District, this is Jewel’s “green store,” their first to receive LEED certification for a green, energy-conscious building. And it’s unlike any other Jewel-Osco in our area – the décor is very upscale in feel and theme, with warm wood tones and great use of color throughout the building. The building was constructed with many environmentally-friendly features, including a green roof... literally green, as there's grass growing on top!

This Jewel is an impressive shopping destination, to say the least. The theme of the event was “Back to Routine,” and Chicagoland bloggers were taken throughout the store, department by department, to speak with representatives from corporate. Jewel’s on-staff nutritionist and dietitian, the chef for the CK Grill, and many other department heads, sales managers and marketing representatives were also on hand.

As we traveled through the store, there were lots of foods to taste and enjoy. Each department had a sampling station set up for us as we moved through the store – fresh fruit and vegetable trays in produce, cupcakes and white-chocolate popcorn snack mix from bakery, tortilla soup and organic Tex-Mex mac and cheese at the CK Grill (a fresh, while-you-wait kitchen where a chef prepares hot meals on the spot), wines, cheeses and bruschetta in the liquor department, and so on. And, in each area, attendees enjoyed a short presentation and question-and-answer session with staff members who enthusiastically educated us on some lesser-known Jewel facts along the way.

While I spend time every single week in one Jewel-Osco or another, I was surprised to learn a few things that I didn’t already know. Here are a few things you may not know about Jewel:

Produce Department: Focused on Local

Whenever possible, Jewel is trying to offer locally-grown produce. Right now, a large percentage of the fruits and vegetables sold in the produce department are locally-grown in Illinois, with others coming from Michigan, Indiana, and other Midwest states. Less time from the farm to the store equals fresher produce. Look on produce displays too for origin tags showing the country of origin too to determine where your food was grown. And Jewel also offers their “Fresh Free Guarantee” on all of their produce. If you buy it and the quality is not what you expected, bring it back for a full refund.

Another tip from Jewel’s staff nutritionist, Kim Kirchherr: “Eat the rainbow.” She explained that each fruit or vegetable offers different vitamins and nutrients, and eating a variety of colors of produce is an easy way to give your body a balanced diet.

Wild Harvest and a focus on more organics/naturals

Jewel’s own brand of organics and natural foods, Wild Harvest, has long been one of my favorite house brands. The quality and value are both typically very good, and you can even find coupons for these products at times. To legally call themselves “organic,” Jewel’s Wild Harvest products must be made with 95% organic ingredients.

Jewel is also offering more house-branded products featuring 100% whole grains amongst its regular Jewel house brand as well -- look at the packaging for a gold rectangular seal stating, for example, that the whole wheat pasta is 100% whole grain.

The recipes on the box? They’re pretty good.

Any time you pick up a box of store-brand pasta or another similar item, the recipes on the back aren’t just standard “boilerplate” info. Each recipe you find on a house-branded product, whether it’s Jewel, Wild Harvest, or Culinary Circle, was created in Jewel’s test kitchen in Minnesota by a staff chef. The recipes are custom-created, tried, tested and evaluated long before they hit the back of the box. I have to confess that I don’t often put a lot of stock in “on the box” recipes on house brands at any store. But during this event, we ate some organic Tex-Mex Mac and Cheese at the CK Grill, and it was yummy. (The recipe's on the back of the Wild Harvest organic mac and cheese.)

Nutrition and preparation books in Produce and Meat/Seafood departments

I have seen these books many times and never touched one until this event, but every Jewel store features a nutrition and preparation book in both the produce and meat departments. The books are full-color, easy-to-scan guides to every kind of produce and meat or seafood sold in the store, with instructions on how to prepare it, how long to cook it, and so on. What’s the optimal time and cooking temperature for a salmon fillet? Find it in the book. What is a Kiwano melon and how do I eat it? Find that in the book too. (Hint – its flavor is a cross between a kiwi and a cucumber, it looks like a yellow sea urchin, and we ate some during the event!)

Throughout the event we were introduced to other new promotions and items. The cookware promo was explained in great detail, with a set of pans on hand to check out. Another hit with the bloggers in attendance were the new rainbow roses that will be appearing soon in the floral department at many Jewel stores. There was a bouquet of these on each food-sampling table throughout the store, and, as you can see, they’re real show-stoppers! They’re dyed through the stem as the rose is growing -- they're not painted -- and as the rose opens, each individual petal features different shades of red, orange, yellow, blue, green and purple. This photo doesn't even begin to do them justice -- they're incredible!

We were also open to ask questions or discuss anything and everything related to Jewel. I took this opportunity to express to Jim Seidler, Jewel’s sales manager for specialty, natural/organic and ethic foods, that many of my stores, unfortunately, have reduced inventory on the Wild Harvest products, which is disappointing to me – my kids are big fans of the organic animal crackers and chocolate-chip cookies, while I like the organic black beans and black-bean tortilla chips -- none of which appear to be carried in my local stores any more. (In fact, the Wild Harvest “station” of our bloggers’ tour featured a table filled with items I haven’t been able to find in my stores in months. I was happy, at least, to know these products still existed.) I, and other bloggers, mentioned how much we like it when coupons are available for Wild Harvest products on their website too.

As the event wound down, everyone’s names were put into a bag for a giveaway, and they called the winners up to receive a new piece of cookware or one of the rose bouquets. There were more prizes on hand than attendees, so after everyone had something, all the names went in again for another round! I went home with roses and a roasting pan from the new cookware promotion. (Getting a water-filled vase of flowers home on a 40-minute drive was another story :)

It also wouldn’t be a bloggers’ event without parting gifts – everyone received a Jewel shopping bag filled with grocery and drugstore products, as well as a computer flash drive with all of the recipes we’d been sampling throughout the day, exterior photos of the store, and other PR materials we might want to include when blogging about the event. (As with any bloggers’ event, attendees are free to write [or not to write] about anything they choose. The “bag of goodies” certainly can be considered to be an incentive to bloggers to write something positive, but it’s also a thank-you gift to those who took the time to drive into the city and spend a few hours with Jewel gathering info for their readers.)

I'd love to see future events include coupons or gift cards for bloggers to give away to readers too... I considered breaking this bag up for a giveaway, but I wasn't sure if anyone would really register to win a box of spaghetti or a can of beans... and even if they did, it would cost more to mail them than they're worth! :)

I was pleased to take part in Jewel’s first bloggers’ event though. It was well-organized and schedule-friendly for everyone. Jewel even offered on-premises childcare for parents with young kids, not wanting the lack of childcare to prevent anyone invited from attending. The fact that Jewel realizes that the blogging community is actively influencing purchasing habits at their stores is powerful, both for us and for them. And, as a shopper, it’s refreshing to note that my opinion as a shopper who’s also representing thousands of other shoppers, is valued and heard.

I’m curious too to see if any of our other large Chicagoland retailers plan similar events to this one in the future. Jewel plans to continue holding bloggers’ events, and in doing so, it’s also setting the bar for its competitors: stores can ignore the blogging community or embrace it. Jewel stepped up and let us know that they’re listening, and they value us.

Legalese: As of December 1, 2009, the Federal Trade Commission's Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising states that any bloggers receiving compensation for a blog post, either financial or non-financial, must disclose any "material connections" between a marketer and blogger or potentially face an $11,000 fine. I was not required to write this post, and I was not compensated financially for doing so. At the event described, I received a bag of groceries and a computer flash drive, and I also won a vase of roses and a roasting pan in an in-store giveaway.