Covid-19Preparing For A Safe Return To The Office And Employees’ Nutritional Needs

When planning our safe return to the office, it’s important to consider how the needs of your employees have changed — as well as society’s approach to health and wellness in general. Will mask wearing persist? Will meal and grocery delivery remain the norm? It’s hard to anticipate what a post-COVID-19 world will look like but optimistically, with the vaccine rollout, it’s one we should be starting to think about. A part of this is anticipating the needs of your employees as you consider returning to an office setting and incentivizing them to do so.

Many companies are looking to level up health and safety plans for their teams and providing safe and healthy food options for your employees is one consideration. Enter UpMeals, a refrigerated vending machine solution for retail business and offices that provides healthy, fresh and sustainably packaged meals. Each individually packaged meal is stored in a refrigerated unit, with these meals available for purchase 24/7. This makes the SmartVending option ideal for an office, factory, or any location that hosts employees or customers around the clock. Fresh meals are delivered to the machines at a regular cadence and employees can purchase meals that were custom developed for them by a holistic nutritionist according to their preferences.

It’s anticipated that, after working from home for a year, many employees are looking for a hybrid work arrangement between an office and home and that 3 out of 4 employees do want to return to the office. Employers will need to ensure that in addition to considering flexible work arrangements, they’ll also want to incentivize employees with better workplace amenities.

UpMeals menu items are created by chefs and nutritionists that focus on incorporating local, seasonal ingredients, and all meals are sustainably packaged in compostable or recyclable containers. Any meals that are not sold within their freshness time frame can be donated to local charities that distribute meals to the homeless or sold at a discount. Each meal is good for three to four days and the food is replaced by the UpMeals team as it gets close to its expiry date.

Considering all aspects of your employees health and wellness upon the return to the office can have compounding positive effects. Knowing that you’ve thought out all aspects of your health and wellness plans will ensure all employees feel heard and their needs considered. In addition, adding to your workplace amenities will help motivate employees to work in the office.

UpMeals is available all over Canada with plans to expand to the US later in 2021. To learn more about how you can feed your employees healthy and nutritious meals through a refrigerated vending option, reach us at info@upmeals.ca.