Progress 09/01/21 to 08/31/24
Outputs
Target Audience:The Good Food Bucks program reaches three primary audiences in New Jersey: shoppers who use SNAP, farmers and growers, and SNAP-authorized fresh food retailers. According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, in NJ in 2022, there were approximately 857,300 people who used SNAP to supplement their food budgets. In New Jersey, over half of all SNAP households (63%) included children, more than 47% of SNAP participants are in families with members who are older adults or are disabled, and more than 44% of SNAP participants are in working families. Additionally, as the Garden State, New Jersey is home to approximately 10,000 farms, and hundreds of farmers markets and grocery stores. There are approximately 65 SNAP-authorized farmers markets and direct-marketing farmers in NJ. During the Final year of our grant project, our project reached an estimated 10,631 SNAP households. With an average SNAP household size of 2 in New Jersey, this equates to an estimated 21,262 individuals gaining access to affordable fresh fruits and vegetables through the Good Food Bucks program. Though detailed demographic data for GFB program participants has not been collected, we estimate that our program users reflect that of the general population of SNAP users in our state. These households have purchased $265,781 of fresh produce using Good Food Bucks during this grant period. The other target audiences reached by the Good Food Bucks program are farmers and fresh food retailers, which consist of fruit and vegetable producers, market operators, and grocers. Good Food Bucks are available in both farm-direct and brick-and-mortar retailers. The program has grown to include 47 partner firms (29 farm-direct and 18 brick and mortar) that span 81 market locations across 20 counties and 59 urban, suburban, and rural municipalities across New Jersey. In total, over 92 unique farms have benefitted from the Good Food Bucks program across our network of partner firms. Cumulatively in our 3-year project period, $621,859 of Good Food Bucks that were redeemed, which not only brought more fresh food to the tables of low-income New Jerseyeans, but also reflects additional revenue for these fresh produce retailers and the generation of local economic activity. The NTAE's economic impact calculator demonstrates that the Good Food Bucks program has had a total economic impact of $819,829 since the start of this GusNIP project. The economic impact represents the amount of money generated in New Jersey from Good Food Bucks's nutrition incentive project sales. This was calculated with a 1.3 economic multiplier for brick and mortar and 1.4 economic multiplier for farm direct. Since the start of this GusNIP grant (9/1/21), Good Food Buck nutrition incentives have been redeemed by an estimated total of 24,874 households (49,749 individuals). The Good Food Bucks project supports individuals who use SNAP benefits in New Jersey to be able to afford more healthy, fresh produce for themselves and their families, while simultaneously supporting the people who grow and sell our food. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?As in previous project years, City Green's team has continued to provide training to all of our Good Food Buck partner firms, as well as potential firms, on SNAP and nutrition incentive program operations to ensure they have the self-efficacy, knowledge, and skills to offer Good Food Bucks efficiently and with integrity. Farm-direct and small independent grocery partners are trained through one-on-one sessions and online video modules with our Good Food Bucks team, while large supermarket cashiers, managers, and customer service staff are trained through their corporate training systems. City Green provides custom training materials to all partners. All 47 partner firms were trained in Good Food Buck operations, implementation, data collection, and reporting in Year 3. Further, City Green's team members have received training and professional development in nutrition incentive operations at the annual Nutrition Incentive Convening hosted by the NTAE. Two of our team members attended NTAE's EBT Integration Convening in New England, through which we received training and learned best practices about automated and integrated electronic incentive program pilots. Our team also attended 20 community of practice meetings hosted by the NTAE during this project period, and had 8 check-in meetings with our Program Advisor. Participating in these trainings and learning opportunities have equipped our team with knowledge, expertise, and concrete tools for improving and evolving our program. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Annual program results are published in a brief impact report on our program website, goodfoodbucks.com, as well as shared directly with our firm partners, our newsletter subscribers, and partners and supports. The annual report is also shared with each county's Board of Social Services and state agencies (NJ Department of Human Services, Department of Health, Department of Agriculture, and Office of the Food Security Advocate.) Quanitative outcome data as well as testimonials from partner firms and shoppers are included in the annual impact reporting. Impact is shared on City Green's social media accounts as well. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?
Nothing Reported
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
GOAL 1: Unify and expand the Garden State Good Food Program throughout New Jersey's underserved and/or economically distressed communities. Objective: 22,000 SNAP participants purchase $575,000 GusNIP-qualifying fresh fruits and vegetables using point of purchase nutrition incentives, growing from 24 to 40 fresh produce retailers reaching 3 new high-need counties in NJ by August 2024. In Year 3 of this project, an estimated 10,631 households (21,262 individuals) have purchased $254,781 of fresh fruits & vegetables using Good Food Buck nutrition incentives at 81 retail locations operated by a network of 47 farm-direct and brick-and-mortar partners. The program was offered in 59 municipalities throughout 20 of New Jersey's 21 counties. While we are unable to track the exact number of unique incentive program users, we know that there have been 53,823 Good Food Buck redemption transactions in the final year of our GusNIP project, and with an average SNAP basket size valued at $25 per trip, we approximate that 21,262 individuals brought fresh produce home through the Good Food Bucks program. This reflects a 60% increase in incentive redemptions since Year 1 ($164,195), and in the number of program participants since Year 1 (13,136). Cumulatively since the start of the project, $621,859 in Good Food Buck incentives have been redeemed by 48,749 individuals on the SNAP program. Our project has exceeded our goal of reaching 22,000 SNAP participants, as well as our 3-year project goal of redeeming $575,000 in Good Food Buck SNAP incentives. The project was expanded into nearly every New Jersey county in the third year of our project, save for Hunterdon County. New Jersey's five counties with the highest food insecurity rates are Atlantic, Cape May, Essex, Cumberland, and Hudson, with Passaic, Salem, and Camden counties next in line, having just slightly more food security. We have had the opportunity to onboard partner firms in all of these high need counties. Additionally, the program is available over 47 diverse retail partners operating at 81 unique locations. Partners include farmers, farmers markets, CSA programs, mobile markets, large supermarkets, corner stores, and mid-size independent grocers. GOAL 2: Engage cross-sector stakeholders in direct-to-consumer sales marketing techniques to connect SNAP participants and low-income consumers to agricultural producers and GSGF retailers. Objective: 60 community stakeholder partner agencies reach 1,050,000 NJ citizens through direct-to-consumer marketing techniques by August 2024. In Year 3, City Green continued partnering with a breadth of community partner agencies to get the word out about the Good Food Bucks program. Nearly 65 partner agencies, non-profits, and firms helped communicate the opportunity to use Good Food Bucks to NJ residents throughout the state. City Green focused on using word-of-mouth, fliers, and leveraging community events and stakeholder conferences to connect with individuals. The number of unique visitors to our program website (goodfoodbucks.com) nearly doubled to 6,798 visitors (up from 3,567 in the last project year), and over 120 people reached out to our team via the inquiry forms on our website. Additionally, we reached a total of 344 Good Food Buck newsletter subscribers who received monthly news and updates, and 475 followers on our Good Food Buck social media accounts. Further, our social media (Instagram and Facebook) content reached 73,300 people, and garnered nearly 850 instances of online engagement with shoppers about the program (interactions, likes, and comments). In Year 3, our we also worked with a media company (NJ Advance Media) to increase exposure and awareness of Good Food Bucks through targeted online advertisements on social media, local news websites, and youtube. This generated 311,850 impressions and a click-through rate of 0.63%, which is significantly higher than the industry average click-through rate of 0.05% for digital ads. Cumulatively over the three project years, our engagement reached a documented 932,066 New Jersey residents. A few partners that have played a key role in disseminating information about the Good Food Bucks program throughout NJ include the NJ Departments of Human Services and Health, NJ Food Democracy Collaborative, SNAP-Ed and its implementing agencies (Community Food Bank of NJ, Zufall Health, and Rutgers University), Sustainable Jersey and its regional chapters in the state, NJ Farm Bureau, NOFA NJ, the Office of the Food Security Advocate, the New Jersey Food Security Initiative, ACME Markets, Wakefern, and our 47 farm-direct and brick-and-mortar partner firms, and more. GOAL 3: CG demonstrates model validity and informs efforts to improve the overall nutrition and health status of New Jerseyans. Objective: Guided by NTAE, CG works with retailers to conduct process and outcome assessment as well as standardized participant-level program assessment to measure core metrics including SNAP use, firm type, dose of NIP, program satisfaction, fruit and vegetable consumption, food security, health status, COVID-19 impact, sociodemographics, and geography. Outcome assessment is conducted on an ongoing basis, and data is reported monthly to City Green by each firm. Data is submitted through the Nutrition Incentive Hub NTAE data portal, and reviewed and approved by both City Green staff and our assigned NTAE research advisor. Core metrics collected for each partner firm include SNAP sales, Good Food Bucks (incentives) distributed and redeemed, number of fruit and vegetable vendors, hours and days of operation and program availability, number of SNAP and incentive transactions, and redemption rate. This outcome data has been collected from each of our 47 partner firms, and was submitted securely to City Green each month using privacy-protected spreadsheets. Data for all firms is reviewed, cleaned, and compiled into a monthly aggregate spreadsheet provided by the NTAE, which is then uploaded into the NTAE data portal for review. At the participant level, City Green collected a total of 159 surveys from program users over the 3-year project period. These surveys have shown that the Good Food Bucks program has a positive impact on the food security status and healthy food consumption behaviors of program users. Results from City Green's GFB Shopper Survey show that Good Food Bucks shoppers who used the program for at least 6 months were 20% more likely to regularly include healthy vegetables like leafy greens and potatoes in their diet compared to shoppers new to the program, and were also more likely to consume at least one vegetable every day. Customers who used Good Food Bucks for at least 6 months also experienced higher rates of food security and found that their food budget stretched farther, compared to customers new to the program: Good Food Bucks shoppers who used the program for at least 6 months were 22% less likely to ever have to cut or skip meals because there wasn't enough money for food; Returning customers were 12% more likely to find that they could afford to eat balanced meals, compared to customers who were new to the program. This firm-level and participant-level data have been aggregated by the NTAE and Nutrition Incentive Hub and integrated with results from GusNIP NI and PPR projects across the country, which are published in annual national impact findings.
Publications
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Progress 09/01/22 to 08/31/23
Outputs
Target Audience:The Good Food Bucks program reaches three primary audiences in New Jersey: shoppers who use SNAP, farmers and growers, and SNAP-authorized fresh food retailers. According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, in NJ in 2022, there were approximately 857,300 people who used SNAP to supplement their food budgets. In New Jersey, over half of all SNAP households (63%) included children, more than 47% of SNAP participants are in families with members who are older adults or are disabled, and more than 44% of SNAP participants are in working families. Additionally, as the Garden State, New Jersey is home to approximately 10,000 farms, and hundreds of farmers markets and grocery stores. During the Year 2 grant period, our project reached an estimated 7,552 SNAP households. With an average SNAP household size of 2 in New Jersey, this equates to an estimated 15,104 individuals gaining access to affordable fresh fruits and vegetables through the Good Food Bucks program. Though detailed demographic data for GFB program participants has not been collected, we estimate that our program users reflect that of the general population of SNAP users in our state. These households have purchased nearly $189,000 of fresh produce using Good Food Bucks during this grant period, which means that on average, $5.36 of fresh produce was purchased each time a shopper used Good Food Bucks. The other target audiences reached by the Good Food Bucks program arefarmers and fresh food retailers, which consist of fruit and vegetable produers, market operators, and grocers. Good Food Bucks are available in both farm-direct and brick-and-mortar retailers. A majority of our partner firms are farms or farmers markets (26), while a few partners are brick-and-mortar grocery stores (5). In total, over 92 unique farms have benefitted from the Good Food Bucks program across our network of partner firms, which operate at 55 unique locations in 13 NJ counties. An additional 5 grocery retail locations benefit from the Good Food Bucks program. The $189,000 of Good Food Bucks that were redeemed not only brought more fresh food to the tables of low-income New Jerseyeans, but also reflects additional revenuefor these fresh produce retailers and the generation oflocal economic activity. The NTAE's economic impact calculator demonstrates that the Good Food Bucks program has had a total economic impact of $216,238 in Year 1, and of $248,812 in Year 2, for a cumulative economic impact of $465,050 since the start of this GusNIP project. The economic impact represents the amount of money generated in New Jersey from Good Food Bucks's nutrition incentive project sales. This was calculated with a 1.3 economic multiplier for brick and mortar and 1.4 economic multiplier for farm direct. Since the start of this GusNIP grant (9/1/21), a cumulative $353,000 in Good Food Buck nutrition incentives have been redeemed by an estimated 14,120 households (28,240 individuals). The Good Food Bucks project supports individuals who use SNAP benefits in New Jersey to be able to afford more healthy, fresh produce for themselves and their families, while simultaneously supporting the people who grow and sell our food. Changes/Problems:One unexpected outcome faced was the exit of one of our brick-and-mortar grocery partners, Hackensack Market, at the beginning of Year 2. This medium sized independent grocer was offering a 50% Good Food Bucks discount on fresh fruits and vegetables two days per week with a $10 cap, and was well-received and highly utilized by shoppers. Unfortunately, this store location was acquired by a large supermarket chain in October of 2022, resulting in turnover of store ownership, management, as well as the store's POS technology. WIth this, the Good Food Bucks program was dissolved. After much effort to get the incentive program back up and running, our team was met with a lack of action from the new ownership, and thus the Good Food Bucks was discontinued at this location. Having a relatively high-redeeming partner drop from the program unexpectedly affected our rate of expenditure of incentive funds. However, we have since begun building relationships with Albertson's family of Acme grocery stores in New Jersey, as well as growing our relationship with Wakefern Food Co. and their ShopRite locations, and are excited to say that we anticipate 6 additional brick-and-mortar stores to join the Good Food Bucks program in the final year of our project. With these additions, as well as the addition of several more farm-direct partners, we are confident that our rate of expenditure of incentive funds will increase and that we are on track to reach our goals by the end of the project period. An additional unexpected development is that an additional agency in New Jersey has been awarded a GusNIP nutrition incentive grant for a SNAP incentive program at ShopRite store locations throughout New Jersey. Having learned this news, City Green is having to address customer communications so as to not cause confusion amongst program users, as both Good Food Bucks and this new program will be operating at ShopRite locations in overlapping New Jersey geographies. To address this development, City Green plans to lead and convene semi-annual meetings of nutrition incentive providers in New Jersey so that we are able to ensure that all parties can remain apprised of the various programs happening, and so that communications to the end-users (shoppers who use SNAP) about how and where to use nutrition incentives areas clear and effective as possible, ultimately ensuring that as many eligible New Jersey residents as possible are gaining access to affordable healthy food through nutrition incentives. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Training and professional development are an important component of making sure that City Green's team and all of our partners feel that they have the self-efficacy, knowledge, and skills to enhance nutrition incentive programming in New Jersey. City Green offers one-on-one virtual and in-person trainings for farm-direct retailers in how to become a SNAP-authorized farm or market, in how to operate SNAP at your farm or market once authorized, and most importantly, how to implement the Good Food Bucks program. The first two training segments have evolved out of need, as there are a limited number of SNAP-authorized farms (35) and farmers markets (31) out of the hundreds that exist in New Jersey. With 25 active farm-direct partners in the Good Food Bucks program, approximately 40% of the state's SNAP-authorized farm-direct outlet offer GFB incentive programming. This indicates that farm-direct fresh food retailers needed additional support in getting set up to accept SNAP, so that the Good Food Bucks program has space to grow into. In Year 2 of the project, City Green trained over 40 individuals in Good Food Buck program operations at farm-direct partners. An additional 9 individuals from our brick-and-mortar partners were directly trained on the Good Food Bucks program and operations, who subsequently trained all cashiers, store managers, and customer service employees at participating grocery retail locations. These comprehensive training opportunities help to ensure that the Good Food Bucks program is operated with integrity across our network of firms, and that is having as much impact as possible. Further, City Green's team members have received training and professional development in nutrition incentive operations at the annual Nutrition Incentive Convening hosted by the NTAE. Our co-project directors were selected to attended the NTAE's Statewide Scaling Mini-Convening in Philadelphia, through which we received training and workshopped best practices with incentive practitioners from across the country. Our team also attended 15 community of practice meetings hosted by the NTAE during this project period, and had 10 check-in meetings with our Program Advisor. Participating in these trainings and learning opportunities have equipped our team with knowledge, expertise, and concrete tools for improving and evolving our program. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?City Green has published our Year 1 impact and results for the Good Food Bucks program by posting on our website, goodfoodbucks.com, as well as by sharing through social media and the Good Food Bucks newsletter, which reaches over 230 people each month. The impact report was also shared directly with all of our 29 partner firms to distribute to their shoppers and communities. Further, results were mailed to each of NJ's 21 counties' Boards of Social Services and Offices on Aging, to the NJ Department of Health and Human Services, NJ Department of Health, NJ Department of Ag, and Office of the Food Security Advocate. City Green was also excited to share about our work and program through a "Grantee Spotlight" feature on the Nutrition Incentive Hub blog. Both quantitative impact data as well as stories from partner firms and shoppers have been shared through these avenues. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?In Year 3, we are onboarding more farm-direct partners, as well as several additional brick-and-mortar grocery locations in partnership with Albertson's Acme stores, and Wakefern ShopRites, with a goal of having at least one GFB location in every county in New Jersey. City Green has put out an open call for farm-direct partners to join the Good Food Bucks program for the 2024 season, and will be enrolling farm-direct firms throughout the next few months through April 2024. Several new partners will include the Trenton Farmers Market, Sparta Farmers Market, and STEAM Urban Farmers Market. In January 2024, the program is expected to launch at an Acme store in Bergen County and an Acme store in Burlington County. In March 2024, an additional 3 Acme store locations and 1-2 Zallie Family ShopRite (Wakefern) store locations will join Good Food Bucks. We anticipate that these store additions will help us to reach our proposed objectives for incentive redemptions and NJ citizens reached. A top priority in the third and final year of our project will be to continue survey collection. Due to a host of delays in getting our participant level surveys live (such as a delay in the IRB process, technical issues with the BHN Rewards systems, etc.), surveys were not collected until project Year 2. In Year 2 a total of 88 participant level surveys were completed. In the first quarter of Year 3, our survey collection is now on pace to reach our objective of 300. Surveys will be collected through postcard distribution to all Good Food Buck partner firms, as well as in-person survey solicitation at partner firms. In 2024, City Green also intends to apply for a large-scale GusNIP for a minimum of $2M, with a $2M match ($4M project total) to continue growing the reach and utilization of the program for NJ shoppers, as well as to explore EBT integration for the state of New Jersey. City Green has received our first-ever state appropriations of $500,000, as well as $1.5M in philanthropic funds from Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Tepper Foundation, in support of continuing to expand and improve the Good Food Bucks program. The momentum and longstanding, widespread impact of our program has caught the attention of large statewide funders, which bodes well for the future stability and growth of Good Food Bucks in New Jersey. With the support of general operating funds and from Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, City Green is also advocating for state legislation that would establish a SNAP nutrition incentive program fund housed in the NJ Department of Human Services to ensure the future stability of nutrition incentives in our state (Bills A5409 and S3799)
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
GOAL 1: Unify and expand the Garden State Good Food Program throughout New Jersey's underserved and/or economically distressed communities. Objective: 22,000 SNAP participants purchase $575,000 GusNIP-qualifying fresh fruits and vegetables using point of purchase nutrition incentives, growing from 24 to 40 fresh produce retailers reaching 3 new high-need counties in NJ by August 2024. In Year 2 of this project, an estimated 7,552 households (15,104 individuals) have purchased $188,800 of fresh fruits & vegetables using Good Food Buck nutrition incentives at 60 retail sites operated by a network of 29 partners. The program was offered in 35 municipalities throughout 13 of New Jersey's 21 counties. While we are unable to track the exact number of unique incentive program users, we know that there were 35,219 Good Food Buck transactions in Year 2, and with an average SNAP basket size valued at $25 per trip, we approximate that 15,104 individuals brought fresh produce home through the Good Food Bucks program. This reflects a 15% increase in incentive redemptions since Year 1 ($164,195), and more than an 11% increase in number of program participants since Year 1 (13,136). Cumulatively since the start of the project, $353,000 in Good Food Buck incentives have been redeemed by 28,240 individuals. Our project has exceeded our goal of reaching 22,000 SNAP participants, and are over 60% of the way to our goal of redeeming $575,000 in Good Food Buck SNAP incentives. With the addition of several brick-and-mortar stores underway, we are on track to meet our goal by the end of the project period in August 2024. The project was expanded into 3 new counties in Year 2: Burlington, Camden, and Somerset. New Jersey's five counties with the highest food insecurity rates are Atlantic, Cape May, Essex, Cumberland, and Hudson, with Passaic, Salem, and Camden counties next in line, having just slightly more food security. We have had the opportunity to onboard partner firms in all of these high need counties except for Salem, in which we have a partner on deck to be onboarded in project Year 3. Additionally, our network of 29 partner firms offer Good Food Bucks in 60 unique retail locations, as several farm-direct partners operate Good Food Bucks through mobile market programs or as a farm-vendor at several farmers market and roadside farm stand locations. While we have not yet reached our goal of 40 unique retailers, the program has expanded in such a way that the program is available in over 40 distinct retail locations. GOAL 2: Engage cross-sector stakeholders in direct-to-consumer sales marketing techniques to connect SNAP participants and low-income consumers to agricultural producers and GSGF retailers. Objective: 60 community stakeholder partner agencies reach 1,050,000 NJ citizens through direct-to-consumer marketing techniques by August 2024. In Year 2, City Green continued partnering with a breadth of community partner agencies to get the word out about the Good Food Bucks program. Nearly 65 partner agencies, non-profits, and firms helped communicate the opportunity to use Good Food Bucks to NJ residents throughout the state. City Green focused on using word-of-mouth, fliers, and leveraging community events and stakeholder conferences to connect with individuals. We had 3,567 unique visitors to our program website (goodfoodbucks.com), 233 Good Food Buck newsletter subscribers who received monthly news and updates, and 253 followers on our Good Food Buck social media accounts. Further, our social media (Instagram and Facebook) content reached 4,325 people through 671 unique visits. A few partners that have played a key role in disseminating information about the Good Food Bucks program throughout NJ include the NJ Department of Health, NJ Food Democracy Collaborative, SNAP-Ed and its implementing agencies (Community Food Bank of NJ, Zufall Health, and Rutgers University), Sustainable Jersey and its regional chapters in the state, NJ Farm Bureau, NOFA NJ, the Office of the Food Security Advocate, and our 29 farm-direct and brick-and-mortar partner firms, and more. GOAL 3: CG demonstrates model validity and informs efforts to improve the overall nutrition and health status of New Jerseyans. Objective: Guided by NTAE, CG works with retailers to conduct process and outcome assessment as well as standardized participant-level program assessment to measure core metrics including SNAP use, firm type, dose of NIP, program satisfaction, fruit and vegetable consumption, food security, health status, COVID-19 impact, sociodemographics, and geography. Outcome assessment is conducted on an ongoing basis, and data is reported monthly to City Green by each firm. Data is submitted through the Nutrition Incentive Hub NTAE data portal, and reviewed and approved by both City Green staff and our assigned NTAE research advisor. Core metrics collected for each partner firm include SNAP sales, Good Food Bucks (incentives) distributed and redeemed, number of fruit and vegetable vendors, hours and days of operation and program availability, number of SNAP and incentive transactions, and redemption rate. This outcome data has been collected from each of our 29 partner firms, and are submitted securely to City Green each month using privacy-protected spreadsheets. Data for all firms is reviewed, cleaned, and compiled into a monthly aggregate spreadsheet provided by the NTAE, which is then uploaded into the NTAE data portal for review. Our outcome assessment processes have bee As survey collection continues via the secure Qualtrics software and through in-person collection by CITI certified City Green staff members, we will begin to gather data regarding program satisfaction, fruit and vegetable consumption, food security, health status, COVID-19 impact, sociodemographics, and geography. City Green regularly encourages feedback from our partner firms about program operations and implementation and works to incorporate that feedback into our operations. In response to feedback gathered in Year 1, City Green updated our data collection process by developing a custom and secure Google Form and Google Sheet dashboard that houses and displays data for each individual partner firm. Feedback in Year 1 also indicated that partner firms requested additional visits and in-person communication from the City Green team, and we have responded by scheduling a minimum of one site visit to each partner firm. A mid-year partner firm survey in Year 2 showed that 100% of firms who responded (11) thought the program had been well received by both vendors and by customers. All survey respondents indicated that the training provided by City Green was straightforward, clear, and useful. One partner firm shared, "I have found the GFB program immensely helpful to improve both our program's impact on the community and our bottom line at the same time. In all ways, the Good Food Bucks program creates a win-win situation for us." The most common request from farm-direct partner firms was for additional support in getting shoppers who use SNAP to make an initial visit to their sites, as partners feel many shoppers with SNAP don't know they can use SNAP or Good Food Bucks at farm-direct markets.City Green will address this by continuing to conduct statewide program outreach, as well as local outreach, on behalf of our partner firms. We also plan to continue building our relationship with NJ Department of Human Services to improve program awareness among NJ SNAP shoppers.
Publications
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Progress 09/01/21 to 08/31/22
Outputs
Target Audience:City Green's Good Food Buck 26 partner firms are serving community members in 12 New Jersey counties, at 33 distinct locations. As of 2012, only 13.4 percent of farmers markets in New Jersey were accepting SNAP as payment, compared to a national level of 20 percent that year. Approximately 50% of farmers markets that are SNAP-authorized in New Jersey participate in City Green's Good Food Bucks program. In 2017, the national number of farmers markets per 100,000 people was 2.7, which was also higher than New Jersey's number 1.7. With the Good Food Bucks network, City Green is adding the availability and opportunities to purchase budget-friendly fruits and vegetables with SNAP benefits across the state. By making it easier for farmers and markets to get SNAP-authorized as part of a well-connected network, farmers and markets have more connection to each other and the customers they most want to reach. As more farmers markets accept SNAP, there is added economic benefit to all parties. When these markets make the time investment to accept SNAP, they are investing in their presence in NJ communities. SNAP distribution has positive economic impacts in NJ, as $953,558,696 distributed through SNAP generated $1,621,049,783 in economic activity. This equates to every dollar spent with SNAP creating approximately $1.70 in economic activity. SNAP is critical to families in NJ who need additional funds to meet the costs of meals. As of June 2022, 423,016 (814,315 individuals) were enrolled in SNAP, with some of the highest enrollment in Essex, Passaic, and Hudson counties. Of 354,000 households receiving SNAP benefits in 2019, 38 percent are families with children, 40.8 percent are families with an elderly person, 22.4 percent are non-elderly households containing someone with a disability, and 5.3 percent are childless adults without disability in their households. In 2020, 54 percent of SNAP participants had income level at or below the poverty line. Gloucester and Atlantic counties, served by GFB, have the highest percentages of people with disabilities under age 65. Good Food Bucks service areas range in a number of community characteristics, including median income and poverty rates. From Atlantic County, with the lowest median income of $63,680, to Morris County, with the highest of $117,298, partners successfully redeem and incentivize SNAP dollars across distinct NJ communities. Passaic County is the Good Food Bucks service area with the highest poverty rate of 16.9 percent, and the service area with the lowest poverty rate is Morris County, at 4.8 percent. The average cost of a meal in New Jersey is $3.60, which is higher than the national average of $3.25. These average meal costs are above $4 in certain Good Food Buck service areas, like Essex, Morris, and Monmouth. With high costs of living and inflationary pressure on food costs, food insecurity rates are still not back to what they were before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. This means that the Good Food Bucks program is making a critical difference in healthy meal affordability for NJ residents. Fruit and vegetable intake and food security rates need improvement in New Jersey, as 12.1 percent of NJ adults in 2015 met daily fruit consumption recommendations, and only 8.3 percent of NJ adults met daily vegetable intake recommendations. In 2020, 657,320 NJ residents were facing hunger, including 175,830 children. New Jersey's child food insecurity rate of 9 percent is lower than the national average of 16.1 percent. However, some counties served by Good Food Bucks partners have child food insecurity rates higher than the national average, including Hudson (18.2 percent), Passaic (19 percent), Essex (22.1 percent), and Atlantic (24.3 percent). Over 245,000 children among the households enrolled in SNAP were located in the 11 Good Food Buck counties in 2020, which points to the significant geographic reach our partners' firms can have. The Good Food Bucks program aims to reach all populations who are especially vulnerable to food insecurity and hunger. According to data categorized by race/ethnicity, Black and Latino NJ residents are 5.5 times more food insecure than White NJ residents. This is consistent with national 2020 findings that Black and Latino people are more affected by food insecurity in 99 percent of counties surveyed. Based on this, it is important that Good Food Bucks reaches NJ counties with significant Black and/or Latino populations, as evident in all 11 counties currently served. Seniors are also at higher risk of food insecurity, as 230,000 NJ seniors face hunger, but less than half of SNAP eligible seniors are enrolled in SNAP benefits. New Jersey ranks poorly for senior food insecurity and hunger, as nearly 14 percent of seniors face hunger each year. While overall enrollment in SNAP has decreased in 2022 after peak pandemic numbers, enrollment of seniors and people with disabilities has increased from June 2021 to 2022, to 156,723 individuals over 60 years of age, and 232,438 people with disabilities. The Good Food Bucks program serves so many demographics of individuals across the state, as well as supports local farmers, farmers markets, and business by bringing additional income and increasing customer bases at our partner firms.? Changes/Problems:Our team has faced several major challenges that have resulted in adjustments to the timeline of completion for our anticipated outcomes. The most significant delay pertains to the collection of program participant surveys. Our team faced challenges with this component of the project right from the start, but are happy to report the issues have now been resolved. First, City Green faced significant delays in receiving our IRB approval and exempt status at the project's offset. This was a result of an initial plan to partner with a local university for our IRB submission, and those did not materialize due to the university's inability to move forward with the partnership. Though this put our survey collection process months behind schedule, we were able to receive our official IRB exempt status on December 16, 2021. With most of our partner firms closed for the winter season and starting their seasonal operations in spring and summer, we anticipated beginning our survey collection in June 2022. Our survey stipend protocol includes the issuance of $15 Amazon gift cards to individuals completing the survey using the Rybbon/BHN Rewards online system recommended by our Program and Research Advisors from the NTAE. We encountered even further delays, as the Rybbon platform was unable to process the payments City Green submitted, which meant we were unable to distribute participation stipends and thus unable to collect surveys. After several months of working with Rybbon's technical support team to resolve the problem, City Green was able to begin collecting surveys in October 2022, but was unable to collect any surveys during the first year's grant period (9/1/21 - 8/31/22). Due to this delay, we will be working diligently to reach our project goal of 300 total surveys collected by 8/31/24 by ramping up our survey collection efforts at Good Food Buck partner firms in Years 2 and 3 (2023 and 2024). A further delay we have encountered is in the rate at which we are able to onboard new partner firms into the Good Food Bucks program, specifically in regards to Brick and Mortar stores. One reason for this is that we have learned that onboarding a grocery store can take several months, as it involves ongoing conversations between the store manager, store owner, and POS provider. Those conversations are often delayed, as these individuals have busy, fast-paced jobs and a program such as this is not necessarily their top priority. To address this, City Green has adjusted our expectations, as well as learned that frequent and consistent follow-ups are required for there to be movement with instituting the Good Food Bucks program at any location. This relationship-building is an important piece of making sure the program is operated effectively and with integrity. An additional barrier we have encountered is program growth restricted by the funding available for the Good Food Bucks program. As a result of operating in a densely populated state and targeting our program in communities with high rates of SNAP utilization, current and potential brick-and-mortar partner firms process hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars in SNAP transactions each month. Our program budget requires that a cap of $5 per day be instituted, or that 50% fresh produce incentive discounts are only applied on certain days of the week (ex. Tuesdays and Thursdays only). In addition to not being able to fully meet the volume of demand from NJ SNAP shoppers, much of our program's match funding from foundations is geographically restricted. In other words, large portions of our matching funding can only be expended in Bergen County, in the City of Newark, in Essex County, or in other strictly defined municipalities and regions within New Jersey. Because of these restrictions, program expansion is confined to good-fit brick-and-mortar firms in those geographic areas, and potential partners are limited. For example, several of our program funders only provide funding for the City of Newark, where we are operating the Good Food Bucks program at the ShopRite of Newark. SNAP and incentive volumes at this site are so high, that this single location soaks up the majority of our Newark and Essex County funding, limiting the number of retailers that we can expand to in that region. For context, recent months have shown an average of $15,000 in nutrition incentives redeemed each month at the ShopRite of Newark alone with a $5 incentive cap in place per SNAP transaction, and monthly SNAP redemptions average to approximately $2.9 million. Conversely, in other geographic regions that are not specifically funded, such as Atlantic County, there is not sufficient funding from the GusNIP award alone to be fully operational at most brick-and-mortar locations. The limitations around our plans for brick-and-mortar expansion are compounded by increasing redemption volumes due to an increase in food prices and in the number of New Jerseyans who utilize SNAP. At the start of 2021,average monthly incentive redemptions hovered around $10,000 per month. Beginning in August of 2022, average monthly incentive redemptions have increased to an average of $14,000 per month. This increase in usage will affect how we budget program growth in 2023 and 2024 so that we are able to maintain the program at current partners without pulling the rug out from under those communitie by scaling down the program. Despite these limitations and challenges, these are good problems to have. The challenges we are facing result from the Good Food BUcks program being successful and eliciting high demand from our community members. It is clear that nutrition incentives are playing an important role in helping NJ residents to afford fresh, healthy food for their families, and we are working diligently to keep up with the resources demanded by the program's growth. We look forward to attending the Statewide Scale Mini-Convening in April 2023 hosted by the Nutrition Incentive Hub and NTAE to help us address some of these challenges that have arisen due to the rapid growth of our statewide Good Food Bucks program. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Training and professional development are an important component of making sure that City Green's team and all of our partners feel that they have the self-efficacy, knowledge, and skills to enhance nutrition incentive programming in New Jersey. There are two levels of training and professional development: 1) training for our network of Good Food Buck partners, and 2) training and professional development for City Green staff administering the Good Food Bucks program. City Green offers trainings to our Good Food Buck partners in three tiers, which help position potential farm-direct incentive partners to become effective incentive providers. The first tier of training is "How to Become a SNAP Authorized Farm or Farmers Market," which in this current project period was completed with 20 farm and farmers market partners. The training included the development of a brand-new SNAP-authorized workbook available for free download from City Green's online resource hub. The second tier of training is "How to Accept SNAP at Your Farmers Market," which is offered to farmers and farmers markets that have received their SNAP authorization, but need support in establishing and implementing a token or scrip system, reimbursement procedures for their vendors, and tools for collecting and tracking SNAP sales and customer data. City Green provided this training to 24 of farmers and farmers markets during this grant period. The third tier of training is for farms and farmers markets who have their SNAP program up and running, and are enrolling into the Good Food Bucks nutrition incentive program. This is the mandatory "Good Food Bucks Partner Training" session, which is required of all new and returning incentive partners in April and May of each year. City Green is in a unique position to provide this training, as we serve as both the statewide administrator of Good Food Bucks in New Jersey, and as a farm-direct firm providing nutrition incentives to our own customers. This training includes an in-depth review of all program requirements for Good Food Bucks partners such as on-the-ground program operations, how to work with tokens and alternative currencies, how to train farmers and vendors at your market on the program, data collection and reporting requirements, survey administration, incentive fund disbursements, as well as how to promote the program and more effectively reach a SNAP audience. The outreach and promotions component of these trainings walks partners through the step-by-step process of how to create and disseminate program promotions through flyers, digital media ads, networks of community organizations, direct mailings, and more. These group training sessions also offer an opportunity for partners to interact with and learn from one another's experiences, challenges, and best practices. Brick-and-mortar partners receive individualized training, as their POS systems and reporting methods vary by location. City Green provided training to 2 brick-and-mortar partners during this grant period (ShopRite of Newark and Hackensack Market), which included 2 store managers and 1 store owner. These trainings included how to implement the program through their POS or coupon system, how to report SNAP and incentive data to City Green, and how to effectively communicate the program to their customers. In addition to providing training to current and potential Good Food Bucks partners, City Green's own team has participated in a host of training sessions, webinars, and professional development opportunities to improve our ability to implement this GusNIP project. These include, the Nutrition Incentive Hub Annual Convening, CITI (Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative) training in accordance with our Institutional Review Board (IRB) requirements, State Funding Community of Practice and Brick-and-Mortar Community of Practices sessions hosted by the Nutrition Incentive Hub, a Farmers Market Coalition webinar on Electronic Incentives and more. City Green has also participated in bi-monthly one-on-one training and check-in sessions with our NTAE assigned Program and Research Advisors on program operations, data and survey collection, IRB matters, and troubleshooting. These check-ins have been informative and useful in supporting our team in operating a successful Good Food Bucks program. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?After obtaining final data and feedback from our partner firms, we will publish our Year 1 impact and results for the Good Food Bucks program in early 2023 through social media and a written impact report, which will be available on the goodfoodbucks.com website. Results will be shared publicly online, and will be shared directly will all of our partner firms to distribute to their shoppers and communities. Results will also be mailed to each NJ county's Board of Social Services and Office on Aging, to the NJ Department of Health and Human Services, NJ Department of Health, and NJ Department of Ag. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?The Good Food Bucks program will continue operating and onboarding new partners in the next 12 months. Partner applications will open in February 2023, and approved by early April 2023. Mandatory introductory training sessions will be held for all partner farms and farmers markets in the spring, which will include instruction on program implementation, data collection and reporting requirements, as well as training on tried and true marketing and promotion techniques. Data on program uptake and firm participation will be collected on a monthly basis. City Green will also be diligently collecting participant-level surveys in this next reporting period on an ongoing basis, with a focus on collecting surveys during the farmers market season (June - November). This survey collection is currently underway, and we anticipate that we will still be able to meet our survey collection goal of 300 respondents despite the delays faced in Year 1. Surveys will be collected in-person and online via Qualtrics, and distributed to Good Food Bucks shoppers via postcards with QR codes. Ongoing technical assistance, site visits, and support will be provided throughout the duration of the project. City Green will continue conducting statewide marketing on behalf of our network of Good Food Buck partners. This will include utilizing an online campaign through NJ Advance Media, distributing flyers, posters, and information packets to each of the 21 county's Social Service offices across the state, and highlighting the impact of nutrition incentives through speaking engagements and impact reports. Further, we will continue working to prepare farmers and markets to participate in Good Food Bucks by encouraging partners to become SNAP-authorized and provide technical assistance in the process of becoming authorized and obtaining card-reader equipment. This GusNIP project has allowed City Green to leverage additional funding from the USDA FMPP (Farmers Market Promotion Program) and the NJ YMCA State Alliance in support of helping New Jersey based farmers and farmers markets to become SNAP-authorized and more effectively connect with SNAP shoppers and low-income community members. Further, City Green will be onboarding our third brick-and-mortar partner firm into the Good Food Bucks program in early 2023. This store is the ShopRite of East Orange, and will be supported by GusNIP funds and a newly acquired grant from the Healthcare Foundation of NJ. City Green and the ShopRite of East Orange are currently negotiating a program contract, and working with Catalina Coupon to install the incentive program in the store's POS and coupon system. We anticipate the program to be up and running by Spring 2023. Good Food Bucks will be offered 7 days per week at this location, with a daily transaction cap of $5 in fruit and vegetable incentives. City Green plans to conduct a survey with our Good Food Buck partner firms in January 2023 as part of our process evaluation, and incorporate feedback into our 2023 operations. After obtaining final data and feedback from our partner firms, we will publish our Year 1 impact and results for the Good Food Bucks program in early 2023 through social media and a written impact report, which will be available on the goodfoodbucks.com website. Continuing to fundraise for the Good Food Bucks program is always a high priority for our project. With our current budget, the number of partner firms we are able to onboard is limited. While we will aim to bring on as many farm-direct partners into the program as we are able to, our brick-and-mortar partner stores have extremely high SNAP and incentive redemptions each month. Onboarding an additional one or two brick-and-mortar stores in NJ will quickly max out our program budget. This shows that the program is in high demand and is extremely impactful. Using our match funding, City Green is focusing our fundraising efforts not only on grant opportunities, but also on advocating for the state of New Jersey to enact nutrition incentive legislation that will result in budget appropriations through the NJ Department of Health and Human Services. We have been consulting with Senator Teresa Ruiz's office to draft a bill, and have connected with several other legislators who have expressed support of this legislation. The drafted bill is currently undergoing revisions, and we hope to see it signed into law in 2023.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
In 2022, City Green onboarded 26 partner firms in 12 NJ counties into the Good Food Bucks program and provided them with nutrition incentives ("Good Food Bucks") to distribute to SNAP shoppers for the purchase of more fresh fruits and vegetables. Nearly $165,000 in Good Food Buck SNAP nutrition incentives have been redeemed throughover 57,000 incentive transactions by SNAP households at our Good Food Bucks firms. Two 90-minute training sessions were offered to partners, of which 15 individuals from Good Food Bucks firms attended. City Green has distributed 6 newsletters, which had 266 instances of engagement from readers. City Green provides an average of 5 instances of Good Food Bucks technical assistance to Good Food Buck partners per week, amounting to 120 instances of technical assistance in Year 1, and an additional 23 site visits to Good Food Bucks partners have been conducted. City Green has undertaken substantial efforts to secure sustained funding for the Good Food Bucks program through fundraising, and through advocacy efforts supported by our match funders. We have worked hard to enlist commitments from private foundation partners, including the Victoria Foundation, Russell Berrie Foundation, the Schumann Fund of NJ, Partners For Health Foundation, and have now secured USDA Farmers Market Promotion Program (FMPP) funding for marketing efforts at Good Food Bucks farmers markets. Recent GusNIP findings reported by the NTAE show that people who participate in nutrition incentive programs have sustained behavior change, and not only consume more fruits and vegetables than the average SNAP user, they consume more fruits and vegetables than the average American. Nutrition incentives result in a clinically significant increase of fruit and vegetable consumption by ΒΌ Cup per day and contribute to a reduction of diet-related diseases, ultimately having the potential to reduce healthcare costs by the billions. Good Food Bucks will sustain the capacity of low-income consumers to consistently access participating retailers for local, healthy food, to eat more local produce, and to use federal food benefits to purchase local produce. GOAL 1: Unify and expand the Garden State Good Food Program throughout New Jersey's underserved and/or economically distressed communities. Objective: 22,000 SNAP participants purchase $575,000 GusNIP-qualifying fresh fruits and vegetables using point of purchase nutrition incentives, growing from 24 to 40 fresh produce retailers reaching 3 new high-need counties in NJ by August 2024. City Green's Good Food Bucks program resulted in the redemption of $164,195 in SNAP nutrition incentives through 57,000 separate transactions at 26 total fresh produce retailers in 12 different counties. We expanded the program into one (1) new county by onboarding a retailer in Gloucester County, NJ. We also welcomed our second brick-and-mortar retailer into the program with the addition of Hackensack Market grocery store, which has allowed us to expand the program's availability into a new retailer type with frequent and year-round program hours. GOAL 2: Engage cross-sector stakeholders in direct-to-consumer sales marketing techniques to connect SNAP participants and low-income consumers to agricultural producers and GSGF retailers. Objective: 60 community stakeholder partner agencies reach 1,050,000 NJ citizens through direct-to-consumer marketing techniques by August 2024. City Green partners with a breadth of community partner agencies to get the word out about the Good Food Bucks program, as well as utilize a targeted media campaign by contracting with NJ Advance Media. Our media campaign exposed the program to hundreds of thousands of New Jerseyans and resulted in 482,685 total impressions in Year 1. This includes 190,305 impressions through digital ads on the high-traffic local website NJ.com; 290,328 social media impressions; 1,844 unique visitors to GoodFoodBucks.com; 118 Good Food Buck newsletter subscribers; and 90 Good Food Buck social media followers. City Green communicated with 55 partner agencies throughout New Jersey to help spread word of the Good Food Bucks program through fliers, word-of-mouth, presentations, collaborative marketing to cross-promote Good Food Bucks alongside other nutrition and ag programs, and online and social media advertising. A few partners that have played a key role in disseminating information about the Good Food Bucks program throughout NJ include the NJ Department of Health, NJ Food Democracy Collaborative, SNAP-Ed and its implementing agencies (Community Food Bank of NJ, Zufall Health, and Rutgers University), Sustainable Jersey and its regional chapters in the state, NJ Farm Bureau, NOFA NJ, Foodshed Alliance, Bergen County Food Security Task Force, our 26 farm-direct and brick-and-mortar partner firms, and more. GOAL 3: CG demonstrates model validity and informs efforts to improve the overall nutrition and health status of New Jerseyans. Objective: Guided by NTAE, CG works with retailers to conduct process and outcome assessment as well as standardized participant-level program assessment to measure core metrics including SNAP use, firm type, dose of NIP, program satisfaction, fruit and vegetable consumption, food security, health status, COVID-19 impact, sociodemographics, and geography. Outcome assessment is conducted on an ongoing basis, and data is reported monthly to City Green by each firm. Data is submitted through the Nutrition Incentive Hub NTAE data portal, and reviewed and approved by both City Green staff and our assigned NTAE research advisor. Core metrics collected for each partner firm include SNAP sales, Good Food Bucks (incentives) distributed and redeemed, number of fruit and vegetable vendors, hours and days of operation and program availability, number of SNAP and incentive transactions, and redemption rate. This outcome data has been collected from each of our 26 partner firms, and are submitted securely to City Green each month using privacy-protected spreadsheets. Data for all firms wasreviewed, cleaned, and compiled into a monthly aggregate spreadsheet provided by the NTAE, which is then uploaded into the NTAE data portal for review. Participant level data was not collected in Year 1 due to several delays in getting participant level surveys ready for use, including a delay in IRB approval and technical difficulties in getting the online survey and participant reward ($15 Amazon gift cards) system up and running. Those obstacles have now been resolved and survey collection is underway, though no surveys were collected during the Year 1 time frame of this grant period. City Green regularly encourages feedback from our partner firms about program operations and implementation and works to incorporate that feedback into our operations. We will be conducting a process analysis survey with all partner firms in January 2023 to garner information about how the program is operating for each of our partners, areas where we are doing well, and areas that could use improvement. As part of our process evaluation, City Green also has conducted an annual internal program assessment for the Good Food Bucks program, analyzing successes, challenges, resource and capacity status, needs for the upcoming year, internal and external supports, partnership building opportunities, and budgets. Some highlights from this internal program assessment were that: this program has many supports and resources for successful operation, such as provided by the NTAE, but the capacity to expand the program is capped by current funding levels; data collection process with partner firms requires some adjustments to improve ease of use; and collaboration with community partners has been essential to the program's success.
Publications
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