Amy’s Kitchen plant opens family health center for employees
Amy’s Kitchen has long been focused on health food, providing customers with organic, vegetarian and gluten-free products for decades. But in recent years, the company has taken a new initiative aimed at the health of its employees. Monday, the Pocatello plant celebrated the opening of its new family health center.
The center is part of a partnership with Vera Whole Health that the company has on each of its three plants.
“So this is a unique benefit Amy’s offers our employees at our manufacturing sites,” Amy’s Vice President of Human Resources, Cindy Gillespie, said. “This is an on-site health center, so our employees can utilize the health center, along with their families to get primary care services.”
The brand new family health center is just hundreds of yards away from the plant itself, making health services walking distance for many of the companies employees.
“And that’s one of the things that’s always a bit of a barrier,” Gillespie said, “and so this makes it very convenient.”
A representative from Vera told me that it’s their approach to health care that makes this service different. Upon a patient’s first visit, they spend an hour with a health care provider, taking part in a four-part “whole health evaluation.”
And this center is able to provide employees with any and all primary care needs. Anything from physicals and episodic care, like a cold or bronchitis, to even minor procedures.
Amy’s President Xavier Unkovic told me that services like this are part of the fabric of the company.
“You know at Amy’s we believe in providing a great place to work, a great working environment for all people. Taking care of each other is part of our core values and this is our way to take good care of our people, this our way to take care of our family, building a health care center for the families and employees of Amy’s Kitchen.”
Today’s addition means that all three of the companies plants now have these centers, that even the company President and his family use.
“I do go to the health care center in Santa Rosa, and my family goes as well,” Unkovic said.
