Cooking Matters at the Store (CMATS) is an informative, engaging, and effective program that provides ready-to-use nutrition and finance info to low-income individuals. But suppose they do not have the childcare, time, or transportation they need to join us for an in-store tour? Well, we’ve managed to figure out how to bring the store to them!
CMATS Pop-up Tours are full grocery store tours in a box. Literally. Our Nutrition Education division has created a system of light-weight plastic bins that contain everything needed to simulate a full grocery store tour. Food cans & boxes, posters, guides, and activities are all in there. Students get hands-on training in practical skills such as sodium and sugar comparisons, unit price comparisons, whole-grain identification, and reading nutrition panels. Each student goes home with a reusable shopping bag, and a participant booklet that is packed full of tips, tools and recipes to help them continue to shop wisely for their family.
Our Pop-up bins are so popular that there is a list of satellite partners just waiting for one. Here is some feedback we got from our NCSU satellite—“I LOVE the pop-up tour bins. They are so organized, and the facilitator guide is excellent. Great work!” We heartily agree … more great work indeed from our Nutrition Education division!