Dive Brief:
- Natural Grocers is hiring more than 30 nutritional health coaches to offer guidance to shoppers in all of its stores.
- The company will host a virtual hiring event on April 1 and will connect attendees directly with its recruiting team, according to a Thursday press release.
- These on-site coaches build on Natural Grocers’ focus on health, as they provide free nutrition education and personalized coaching through guided shopping trips, nutrition classes and recipe demos, and more.
Dive Insight:
With 138 nutritional health coaches currently employed by the specialty grocer, which has over 169 stores, this hiring event aims to help Natural Grocers achieve its goal of having a nutritional health coach on-site at each location, Katie Macarelli, a spokesperson for Natural Grocers, wrote in an email to Grocery Dive.
“Having full‑time [nutritional health coaches] embedded in our stores allows us to offer free, personalized nutrition education and real‑time support at the point of purchase. This is something that continues to set us apart in the retail space,” Macarelli wrote.
While the hiring event is virtual to make participation easier, Natural Grocers said that its nutritional health coaches’ work happens on-site and is “rooted in personal connection.”
“Being present in the store allows nutrition education to move beyond information and into everyday action, which is core to the impact of this program,” Macarelli wrote.
As of Friday, Natural Grocers’ careers page has 32 job listings for a nutritional health coach, with 15 open roles based in Colorado; three in Oregon; two each in Iowa, Nevada, Utah and Wyoming; and one each in Arkansas, Washington state, North Dakota, Idaho and New Mexico, as well as the grocer’s soon-to-open debut Wisconsin store.
Natural Grocers stores have staffed nutritional health coaches since 1995, Macarelli said. All the grocer’s health coaches are required to hold a degree or certification in nutrition or a related field such as dietetics, biology or naturopathy. Once hired, all nutritional health coaches must complete training from Natural Grocers’ Nutrition Education Department as well as complete over 160 hours of continuing education each year, according to the press release.
