Completed Projects
Since 2015, our team has had the opportunity to work on many different projects, many of which have ended. You can read more about them below by clicking on a title on the right >>>

SNAP-Ed Toolkit Website
The One-Stop SNAP-Ed Clearinghouse
​
The SNAP-Ed Toolkit website was a dynamic online resource center for State and local SNAP-Ed providers that offers evidence-based interventions, an interactive Evaluation Framework and Interpretive Guide for collectively tracking and sharing SNAP-Ed program results, a clearinghouse of peer-reviewed literature on outcome- and process-related articles from SNAP-Ed funded projects, as well as an extensive library of other helpful resources. The end of 2023 marked our last year managing this project and supported the migration of all these materials into the USDA SNAP-Ed Connection website.

Healthy Retail and Social Marketing
Together We Shop!
Behavioral economics and social marketing are key components to making healthy food choices. We collaborate with business owners and marketing professionals to find ways to make shopping for healthy food easy and affordable. This Healthy Retail project partnered with several community convenience stores to investigate the impact of in-store signage in promoting sparkling water sales.
The Healthy Retail project worked to encourage healthier food purchases in food retail establishments like grocery stores and convenience stores, and to promote healthier eating habits within communities. We focused on communities with high SNAP-eligible populations, addressing the specific nutritional needs of these individuals and families. Aims of the Healthy Retail program were to:
-
Alter the food retail environment to promote the purchase of healthier foods, such as fruits, nuts, and water.
-
Partner with a variety of retailers to implement strategies aimed at achieving our goal.
-
Utilize behavioral economics strategies to influence customer choices.
​
We believe that promoting healthier food choices contributes to improved overall wellness. This program hoped to improve the financial and nutritional well-being of individuals and communities. We attempted to do this by:
-
Collaborating with retailers such as Lowe’s, JustSave, Family Fare, as well as independent stores like IGAs and corner stores to implement changes in the retail environment.
-
Incorporating behavioral economics strategies to influence customer decision-making.
​​
Read the published article HERE: Evaluation of a Sparkling Water Promotion Intervention on Sales at Convenience Stores in the Southeastern US
Our Partners
What is
Behavioral Economics?





WAGE$ Study
The WAGE$ Study was a five-year study that evaluated the effects of a minimum wage increase in Minneapolis on the health of low-wage workers.
Study Team: The study was led by researchers at the University of Minnesota (UMN), Dr. Molly De Marco at the University of North Caroline (UNC), and the FFORC team to enroll participants in Raleigh, N.C. to serve as a comparison. The WAGE$ Study was funded by The National Institutes of Health and the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health at the University of Minnesota.
Participants: In 2018, 475 people who earn low wages ($11.50/hr or less) in Raleigh, N.C. enrolled in the WAGE$ Study. Each year for the next four years they will complete a survey and verify their current wages, and we will measure their height and weight. Every other year they collected and returned two weeks worth of food receipts. The same happened in Minneapolis.
​
Partners: Over 35 organizations serving families living in Raleigh, N.C. partnered with FFORC to conduct outreach to potential participants. These organizations include PRIME Collective LLC, Passage Home, Dress for Success, Alliance Medical Ministry, and more!
​
Study Principles for Community Engagement: We were committed to: 1) ensuring a positive experience for and fairly compensating participants and 2) sharing the results of this study to support organizations that provide services to and advocate for low-wage workers.
​
In Conclusion: On February 15th, 2023, our Minnesota and Raleigh teams completed our final interview for our final year (year 5) of our WAGE$ Study exploring the impact of a living wage ordinance in Minneapolis. Ultimately, we were able to get 58% of our original participants from Year 1 back in year 5 (that’s 63% in Raleigh and 53% in Minneapolis)!
We have also conducted two rounds of interviews with a smaller set of our participants in both Minneapolis and Raleigh. The main reasons for these interviews were to learn about our participants’ lived experiences of changes in wages, changes in benefits (like SNAP benefit levels), and the pandemic.
​
CLICK HERE to watch a short, five-minute, video that summarizes some of what we learned from our first round of interviews.
Here’s some things we have learned so far from our WAGE$ study:
​
-
SNAP benefit receipt decreased from the first year we collected data to the second year in both sites (2019 to 2020), but by the fourth year (2022), SNAP benefit receipt had increased at both sites.
-
By year 4, 29.8% of participants were unemployed, and 61.5% received SNAP benefits.
-
Only about 50% of our participants who have children reported receiving child tax credit payments, given during the height of the COVID pandemic.
-
Having a bank account was associated with the receipt of a pandemic-related stimulus check, suggesting that people without bank accounts had difficulty receiving the benefits they were entitled to.
​
​

Orange County Food Council
In 2021, the Orange County Board of County Commissioners requested a more data-informed policy to address food insecurity in the area, leading to a collaborative report between the FFORC team and the Orange County Food Council. The report involved consulting with community experts, those with lived experience of food insecurity, and it provides policy recommendations such as improved language translation services, more options for food delivery, and deeper economic investments to end hunger in the local community. The Orange County Community Food Access Assessment was completed in September 2022 and presented to the Board of County Commissioners. It included a compilation of community recommendations for addressing food and nutrition security in the county.
​
Unfortunately, after presenting the report, The Orange County Board of Commissioners defunded the Food Council in Orange County in December 2022. The full report can also be found on our Products, Publications, and Presentations page.

Community Circles
Community circles are a restorative justice practice, based on the Talking Circle method used by indigenous people of North America, that can be used in classrooms to build community, relationships, and shared values.
This project was an effort to meaningfully engage SNAP-eligible residents who were experiencing or had previously experienced food insecurity in a facilitated, strengths-based dialogue to identify policy, systems, and environmental solutions to community-level food insecurity. Community Circles allowed participants to guide the conversation to understand how food insecurity manifests in their community and develop community-approved solutions to address food insecurity
.
The Community Circles were held in six rural communities with community partners.
​
-
The discussions covered WHY people experience poverty, which led to the development of action plans to build on community assets to address food insecurity.
-
These dialogues ultimately led to the beginning of three community-based projects to increase access to culturally-appropriate nutrition education and strategies to be physically active, namely 1/Communities on the Move, 2/Women on the Move, and 3/Golden Journeys.

Warren County Community Circle, led by community leader Jane Ball-Groom.