Groceries teach about healthy eating

September 27, 2010 – Detroit Free Press by Susan Selasky – If you're trying to learn more about health issues related to food, such as hypertension, allergies or cancer, two area grocery stores can help.

Hillers Market in Commerce Township and Whole Foods Market in Rochester Hills have become proactive in teaching shoppers about healthy eating.

Jim Hiller, owner of the seven-store grocery chain Hillers, says it's not "an academic exercise," but rather something he believes the company must do.

"I recognize that food can either kill you or make you healthy," says Hiller, who was diagnosed last year with hypertension and needed to cut the salt from his diet.

But it wasn't the salt in the shaker that was his biggest problem; it was the sodium in prepared products.

So Hiller set out to make it easier to identify low-sodium products on store shelves by tagging them as such.

At 7 p.m. Tuesday, Hiller's Market at 39950 W. Fourteen Mile in Commerce Township is hosting a free health-related store tour, which will focus on high blood pressure. (To register call 248-798-5442.)

Another tour aimed at cancer patients is planned for Oct. 26. Among others things, it will help customers identify immunity-boosting foods.

It's "gratifying knowing that a local grocery store is on the forefront of this," says Stacia Lyon, 44, of Ann Arbor, who went on a Hillers nut-allergy tour in July. Her 3-year-old daughter, Celia, has a peanut and tree-nut allergy.

At Whole Foods Market in Rochester Hills, health-related tours are scheduled each month as part of a global initiative to educate customers and employees about healthy lifestyles.

"We've been morphing them into what customers are looking for," says Michael Hack, community relations specialist for the Rochester Hills store. "It's all education, and our biggest push is to inform everybody and let them make their choices."

The next session is set for 4 p.m. Oct. 20 or by appointment at the Rochester Hills Whole Foods store, 2918 Walton Blvd., and will focus on the health benefits of eating a plant-based diet. (To register, call 248-371-1400.)

"It's all education, and our biggest push is to inform everybody and let them make their choices," says Hack.

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