Safeway created FoodFlex®, a free online nutritional tool, with a focus on improving the lives of our customers. FoodFlex allows Safeway shoppers to receive a nutritional snapshot of their grocery purchases, benchmark their nutritional performance against USDA guidelines, identify food alternatives and create a personalized shopping list to achieve their nutritional goals. We are the first company to offer a resource like FoodFlex. Now, shoppers can locate information from a single source, allowing them to easily understand the nutritional impact of their food purchases.
FoodFlex can be customized to provide personalized health and nutrition information along with healthy product alternatives. In the development of this program, we partnered with nutrition-science experts from the Tufts University Friedman School of Nutrition.
Additional FoodFlex features include:
• Purchase History – FoodFlex tracks purchase history from in-store and online purchases and provides aggregated nutrition content for each food item. FoodFlex shows a household’s purchase history by most recent shopping trips, or all purchases as far back as six months.
• Customized Food Alternatives – FoodFlex can also serve as a search tool to assist users in identifying alternate products based on their desired nutritional goals. Food alternatives are determined based on user-defined nutrients of concern. By using the “My Healthy Picks” feature, users can see the before-and-after effects of their food alternative choices.
Healthy Measures is a voluntary program designed to help employees identify and understand their major health risks and engage in healthy behaviors to lower their chances of suffering from heart disease, diabetes, cancer or other health conditions. Employees who choose to participate in the Healthy Measures program can qualify to receive substantial discounts to their healthcare contributions.
In addition to lowering their overall health care costs, participating employees are offered a variety of wellness programs and incentives, such as discounts at fitness centers and access to lifestyle coaches and medical advisors/physicians. Many people struggle with the common causes of diseases, including high blood pressure, high cholesterol and tobacco use. Safeway believes it is very important to know the risks and then take action to reduce them.
In 2008, our corporate headquarters in Northern California and subsequent corporate and division campuses across North America went smoke-free as part of our comprehensive healthy workplace program. To assist the efforts of those employees who consume tobacco products, Safeway offers a 12-week cessation program free of charge.
The health and wellness of our employees is paramount at Safeway. We have taken steps to improve their quality of life.
Some examples at our corporate headquarters include:
• Cafeteria transitioned to a healthier menu, with company-subsidized, better-for-you options and calorie counts listed on each option.
• The company opened a 17,000-square-foot fitness center with state-of-the-art equipment, daily fitness classes including yoga, spin cycling and aerobics, as well as personal fitness instructors.
Many Safeway employees also have access to an on-campus nurse, Weight Watchers discounts, a 24-hour nurse hotline provided by MedExpert and educational, lunchtime sessions on a broad range of health topics.
Safeway provides several training programs for employees in the environmental arena. These include environmental modules in our New Employee Orientation, Retail Leadership Development and Safety Champions programs. There are also specific programs for Clean Water Compliance training on source reduction, recycling and environmental compliance. In addition, our Environmental Affairs Department maintains a website on our intranet that features numerous resource materials for our employees’ access.
In 2008, we launched CareConnect in conjunction with the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) Medical Center for all Safeway employees and their immediate family members who have been diagnosed with breast or prostate cancer. As a direct result of our employee fundraising efforts, cancer researchers are making remarkable breakthroughs in clinical trials that show promising results. CareConnect is a ground-breaking service provided by North America’s premier cancer research centers, many of which are located in our operating areas and benefit from our fundraising efforts.
This service includes access to the CareConnect website, clinical trials, screenings and treatment options. The program also connects employees to coordinators at MedExpert, an independent, nationally recognized medical information company.
Safeway is a leading voice in the national discussion on healthcare reform, based on market principles. We pursue this objective both on our own as a major employer and working through the Coalition to Advance Healthcare Reform (CAHR) – a group of over 60 companies and employers committed to solving the nation’s healthcare crisis. CAHR calls for a market-based healthcare system, universal coverage for all Americans coupled with increased individual responsibility for healthy behavior, financial assistance that enables low-income individuals to obtain health insurance, incentives to encourage healthy behavior, and equal tax treatment for all who purchase healthcare – whether through their employer or individually. Safeway CEO and CAHR Chairman Steve Burd founded this coalition and is one of its most vocal leaders.
At Safeway, we are leading the nation in thinking about a whole new approach to healthcare. We focus our corporate healthcare plan to emphasize prevention, wellness, and personal responsibility, and to motivate healthy behavior through personal incentives. We take a holistic approach, offering broad support to motivate and help our staff adopt healthier behavior – for example: a state-of-the-art fitness center (corporate headquarters) available at no cost to employees and spouses or domestic partner, gym membership discounts around the country, healthy offerings in our company cafeterias with discounts on healthier meals, a non-smoking campus, and preventive healthcare services with zero co-pay for employees and family members. These successful programs stand as a model for our nation to improve access to healthcare coverage and improve the health status of Americans, while driving down costs.
At Safeway, integrating our values with our work is good corporate citizenship and good business. To reinforce our commitment to conducting business with the highest ethical and legal standards, we maintain and demand strict adherence to a Code of Business Conduct and Ethics available on our website at www.safeway.com/IFL/Grocery/Investors. The code sets forth guidelines to be followed at all levels of the company by our directors, officers and employees.
We also provide mechanisms to report unethical conduct and to foster a culture of honesty and accountability. If employees believe a co-worker, supervisor or executive may be violating our standards, they may contact their immediate supervisor or, if necessary, escalate their concerns to senior management. In addition, we maintain a confidential, toll-free hotline available 24 hours a day, through which employees, vendors and others can report apparent violations anonymously and without fear of reprisal.
We believe that excellence in corporate governance supports superior financial performance.
All but one member of Safeway’s board of directors are independent under standards established by the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and our own independence standards, which go beyond the NYSE’s standards. The sole employee member of the board is our Chief Executive Officer, who serves as Chairman of the Board. In addition, we have established the position of Lead Independent Director.
Among its numerous responsibilities in supervising and directing Safeway management, the board and its committees review and approve the company’s major financial objectives, plans and actions.
The board has adopted a set of corporate governance guidelines to assist in the exercise of its responsibilities to serve the best interests of the company and its stockholders. The guidelines are available online at www.safeway.com/IFL/Grocery/Investors.