Tag Archives: salad bar

5 Ways to Brighten Up Your Space

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Look around your office, classroom, or cafeteria … do you see drab walls with outdated posters? Or do you see vibrant colors and positive messages? 

It might be time to brighten up your space. We have everything you need, and posters are just the beginning!

  1. Floor decals are a unique way to add some color and nutrition messages where people will be surprised to see them. 
  2. Walloons are balloon-shaped wall decals and they come in sets. 
  3. Salad bar and table top signs are appropriate for school and workplace cafeterias, plus they’re portable so you can take them to health fairs as well.
  4. Bulletin board kits give you a big bang for your buck. Posters, photos, and handouts make beautiful bulletin board displays with little work on your part.
    • With the Four Seasons poster value set, all you have to do is change the display every season and use the accompanying handouts, which include recipes, seasonal shopping lists, and seasonal fitness activities.
    • Or promote MyPlate with kits for adults and kids. Both kits come with beautiful color photos of healthy foods. 
  5. Posters are tried and true. And our posters are NOT boring. A few favorites:

Happy decorating!

Hollis Bass, MEd, RD, LD

 

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Have You Seen Our Salad Mandala?!

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Have you seen our Salad Mandalas? Yes, you read that right – but you have to see it to believe it, so take a look at the bottom of this page and then read on!

We know you’ll love these beautiful works of art as much as we do! Eye-catching and discussion-generating, they will brighten up any area and remind people to eat their fruits and vegetables every day.

Not sure what to do with our Salad Mandalas? Whether you choose the floor or wall decal, they’ll stick to most clean, smooth surfaces and are removable. Here are some ideas on where to put them:

  • In a hospital… A Salad Mandala on the floor or wall is the perfect way to identify dietitians’ offices, the nutrition department, kitchen, or cafeteria – wherever you want people to know that healthy eating is a priority here!
  • In a nursing home… Hang one up the dining area or other common room where residents and visitors can enjoy the beautiful colors.
  • In a school… Students and staff will get a kick out of seeing Salad Mandalas on the wall or floor of the cafeteria or gym, the nurse’s office, food service director’s office, health classrooms, and hallways.
  • In a fitness center… Brighten up the locker rooms or aerobics studio.
  • In a doctor’s office… Patients will appreciate having something unique to look at while they wait, making the Salad Mandala a good choice for exam rooms.
  • In a library… Use one as part of a display for nutrition month in March, salad month in May, or farmer’s market week in August, along with selected cookbooks or children’s books that feature fruits and veggies.
  • At a health fair… Attract a crowd with the Salad Mandala decal – on the floor in front of your booth or on the wall behind it.
  • In a vending machine area… Remind everyone about the healthiest snacks of all!

And here are some activities to go with our Salad Mandala decals:

  • Preschool/early elementary class… Use the Salad Mandala to teach colors, practice counting, or learn the names of fruits and vegetables. Have a special Salad Mandala Snack – everyone can make their own mandala on a paper plate with cut up fruits and veggies.
  • Caught eating healthy… Put the Salad Mandala on a wall in the school cafeteria. Ask parent volunteers to come in during lunchtime once a week to snap pictures of kids who are eating a fruit or vegetable that day. Then post the pictures around the mandala. Watch the circle grow bigger every week!
  • Salad day selfies… Let adults in on the fun in your workplace or hospital cafeteria! Build a salad from the salad bar, then take a selfie in front of the Salad Mandala decal and post it to your social media page.
  • Salad Mandala search… Put the mandala in a different classroom, hallway, office, or other location every week to generate interest.

Be sure to let us know what YOU do with our Salad Mandala decals!

Floor Sticker - Salad Mandala - Removable Floor Decal - Nutrition Education Store

Floor Sticker - Salad Mandala - Removable Floor Decal

$88.00
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Salad Mandala - Removable Wall Decal Vinyl - Nutrition Education Store

Salad Mandala - Removable Wall Decal Vinyl

$88.00 $105.00
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Fall in Love with Salad

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I was recently stuck at the airport on the way home from a trip to New Orleans. It was lunch time and after a weekend of jambalaya, etouffee, gumbo, bananas Foster, and beignets, what I really wanted was a big healthy salad.

Lucky for me, I found a pretty nice pre-made salad at an airport shop. That’s the great thing about salad – you can get one just about anywhere. The catch? When it comes to nutrition, not all salads are created equal. Teach your clients to build a healthy salad wherever they are with our beautiful Salad Themed materials.

Start with our Fall In Love With Salad poster. It’s a bestseller and the content is aligned with the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, MyPlate, and the Offer Versus Serve Program. And it comes with handouts, including salad fact sheets, fun puzzles, and recipes.

Use the poster’s key healthy salad messages for individual counseling or group sessions:

  • 6 Salad Lover Tips, like choosing darker greens, piling on colorful veggies and fruits, watching out for high fat toppings, adding protein, and using a healthy but tasty dressing.
  • 3 Reasons to Love Salad: it’s a great way to fit more veggies into your day, eat fewer calories, and get more nutrients and fiber.
  • How to spice up your salad with different ingredients, like Mandarin oranges, water chestnuts, or arugula.
  • Play “what should it be?”. Create a virtual salad using the audience’s favorite vegetables and writing these down on a dry erase board. Calculate the calories quickly by googling “calories for x” with x being the vegetable and let everyone in the audience help. Add them up. Most salads are less than 100 calories. Then go to the fast food websites and check out the calories for popular salads and check out those calories, which often go above the sandwiches and burgers. Why is there a greater difference? See if the audience can guess. By putting the dressing on the side and making smarter choices they can ensure that their salad is a low-calorie choice! Check out a visual comparison here.

To remind people to eat a healthy salad every day, give them one of our I Love Salad wristbands. What’s not to love about salad?

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It’s Time to Change It Up!

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We’re constantly bombarded with images of fast food, junk food, and processed food. Marketers know what they’re doing by getting these pictures into our subconscious minds. Well, let’s fight back! It’s time to Change It Up!

Our Change It Up theme features a gorgeous butterfly made up of real photos of fruit. Now, this is an image we want in our clients’ minds! The message is simple but impactful – transform your life with healthy food and regular physical activity. Go from a fast-food caterpillar to a healthy butterfly.

Our poster and banners come with the free Change It Up printable handout. One side provides general tips on changing up your diet (MyPlate, portion sizes, and fruits and vegetables) and every day activity. The other side offers more detailed suggestions for transforming your meals, snacks, and exercise routine.

How can you use the Change It Up materials in different settings? Glad you asked!

  • Display the banner or poster in the cafeteria, a hallway, or waiting room. (We also have a salad bar sign!) When people see the beautiful, colorful, fruit-filled butterfly every day, they’re bound to think more about healthy food.
  • Give out the stickers and bookmarks so people can take the picture and the message with them.
  • Set up a Change It Up table in the cafeteria or at a health fair. Engage visitors with questions: Are you more like the butterfly or the caterpillar? What changes can you make to transform yourself into the butterfly? Give away the Change It Up handout, stickers, and bookmarks.
  • Teach a Change It Up class. Depending on your audience, here are two lessons:
    • Focus on how small shifts in eating and activity will make everyone feel transformed.
    • Go with the caterpillar to butterfly theme. How does the image of the butterfly make you feel? How about the caterpillar? When you eat healthy food and are active, which one do you feel like? How can a healthy diet and regular exercise make you feel transformed?

Here is a handout called, 9 ways to make easy and healthy switches for a better diet and exercise plan: 9 Easy Healthy Switches Handout

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Make Your Salad a Rainbow!

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Did you know that four final rules for implementing the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act (HHFKA) were just announced?

In a nutshell, the USDA finalized its rules for nutrition standards for all foods sold in schools, including breakfast, lunch, and snacks.

According to a press release sent out by the USDA, “As a key component of First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! initiative to raise a healthier generation, the rules will ensure that children have access to healthy snacks and that nutrition standards for the foods marketed and served in schools are consistent. The rules will also promote integrity across the school meals programs.”

Want to help communicate the key nutrition lessons that are central to these new rules?

Check out this fantastic new salad bar sign!

After all, making healthful food available is only half the battle. We need to make it appealing to kids too.

 

This new salad bar sign is a better design and at a lower price than the previous version, and the video above offers some great inspiration on how to use it.

And that’s just the beginning. Here are some other “eat from the rainbow” resources that can help make healthful foods appealing to kids of all ages…

Eat From the Rainbow Poster 18x24 - Nutrition Education Store

Eat From the Rainbow Poster 18x24

$22.75 $25.50
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Make Your Salad A Rainbow Buttons 3" - Pack of 10 - Nutrition Education Store

Make Your Salad A Rainbow Buttons 3" - Pack of 10

$28.00 $32.00
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Eat From the Rainbow Banner 36" X 24" Vinyl - Nutrition Education Store

Eat From the Rainbow Banner 36" X 24" Vinyl

$65.00 $110.00
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Rainbow Salad Floor Sticker - Nutrition Education Store

Rainbow Salad Floor Sticker

$49.00
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Rainbow Salad Stickers 2" - Pack of 100 - Nutrition Education Store

Rainbow Salad Stickers 2" - Pack of 100

$12.99 $12.99
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And here’s a free printable handout about eating a variety of healthful foods…

Rainbow Salad Handout

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The Story Behind the Rainbow Poster

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We were delighted to get a product request from Sharon Baird, RD, MEd, MBA, Food Service Director for the Goleta Union School District. Sharon was troubled by the school salad bars, which looked woefully plain. We immediately set to work creating a giant salad bar tabletop sign, called eat from the rainbow, that promotes healthful eating. It took a while to pick out and arrange the perfect fruits and vegetables, but we did it! Now we couldn’t be more pleased with the result.

Salad Bar Tabletop Sign

The sign was a hit at the school district as well. In fact, it was such a hit that we crafted a matching banner and poster too. That way, the rainbow of health could be displayed above or below any serving table. The eat from the rainbow oster lends itself especially well to displays in employee break rooms and the offices of RDNs. What a bonus!

Here’s a picture of the salad bar sign as it’s being used in the school district that had asked for it in the first place. Don’t you love the pop of color and encouraging message? The photo of the rainbow salad is actually almost three feet long. It is digitally stitched from six high resolution photos of a real salad that was 3 feet long.

Salad Bar, Hard at Work

Sharon wanted a salad bar sign that could safely sit on top of the salad bar, and since the salad bar needed to be moved daily, the sign had to be easily portable as well. We managed it, and the sign has been working perfectly. After all, the finished table topper’s design is very practical. It assembles easily, and its lightweight construction makes it great to transport anywhere, anytime.

So, what’s so awesome about eating from the rainbow? Basically, eating a variety of fruits and vegetables will get you a wider range of nutrients than eating the same few fruits or veggies every week. Colorful fruits and vegetables are also wonderful sources of substances called phytochemicals.

Phytochemicals contain protective compounds that may help prevent diseases. “Phyto” comes from the Greek word for plant. These chemicals are in all plants, but most people use this word specifically in regards to plants that are food sources. By eating a variety of fruits and vegetables, you will consume plenty of phytochemicals. Here’s just a sampling of colorful foods that are packed with phytochemicals. We’ve even outlined the health benefits of these phytochemicals…

  • Lycopene (found in foods like tomatoes and watermelon).
    Lycopene may help prevent heart disease and prostate cancer
  • Lutein (found in leafy greens like spinach, kale, and romaine).
    Lutein may help prevent cancer, heart disease, and macular degeneration.
  • Quercetin (found in onions, kale, broccoli, red grapes, cherries, apples, and red wine).
    Quercetin may help prevent cancer, heart disease, and seasonal allergies.
  • Resveratrol (found in red grapes, red wine, and peanuts).
    Resveratrol may help prevent cancer and heart disease.

So what are you waiting for? Order your very own tabletop sign today!

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