CASE STUDY: Greater Berks and Hillshire Brands
One doesn’t normally think of work boots and safety vests when thinking of pro bono, but at Hillshire Brands, safety engineers made recommendations that will have a lasting impact for the volunteers and employees at Greater Berks Food Bank (GBFB) in Pennsylvania.
GBFB wanted to improve their safety initiatives and instill a culture of safety at their organization in anticipation of their move to a new facility in the fall of 2014. They needed to develop an approach to make a safety culture come alive because they were doubling the size of their facility.
Hillshire Brands selected GBFB to participate in a Diagnostic Session at the Hillshire Mixing Center Facility in Pottsville. Hillshire, with their local supply chain management partner Ryder, worked to fully understand GBFB safety needs. During that session, Executive Director Peg Bianca and her team sat down with Trevor Smith, Senior Manager of Logistics and Supply Chain, and his team to develop a framework for establishing a culture of safety at GBFB. They worked together to identify short, medium, and longer term steps that GBFB could take to establish a stronger safety program.
“This was the first time that we’ve had organized skills-based volunteering here at Greater Berks Food Bank. The communication with Taproot, Hillshire, and the Feeding America network has been great, and we knew we were in a room of experts. I felt like I was paying for these services,” said Bianca.
