The Human Side Of Insights In Action

Has the Prosecco man called for the last time?

Illustration by Jocel Macaraeg

“Mummy, the Prosecco man is here”

 It’s 9am on a Sunday morning and a slightly confused Tesco delivery man is stood at my front door with five bottles of Prosecco lying flat in their blue shopping tray. This is unintentional and totally avoidable, but nonetheless sometimes a welcome perk of the fact that I hate online shopping.

I should explain. I am a busy mum of three. And I have developed some strategies and shortcuts to help me get through. One of which is block booking up my food delivery slots weeks in advance so that I very rarely run out of supplies to keep the Fleming family functioning! So, I add 5 bottles of Prosecco to my basket, just enough to guarantee my delivery – knowing that I have until 11.46 on Saturday evening to make the changes and swap Prosecco out for nourishing food for my family. But because I hate online shopping, there have been several occasions now, where the Tesco delivery man arrives with just my 5 bottles of prosecco. Oh, the shame!

Don’t get me wrong – I love food and cooking. Food offers so many amazing benefits.

It is therapeutic. Having a recipe to focus on can help to calm your mind and wind things down at the end of the day. There is a reason we saw so many banana bread loaves being baked during the lockdowns – it provides a sense of control and accomplishment that can give a buzz of endorphins. 

It is educational. As a family, during lockdown, worried about how much the children were missing out on by being locked up we decided to travel the world every Saturday night from the confines of our kitchen. The kids would choose a country from our map and my husband and I would try to attempt their local cuisines. The kids loved this and we learnt loads in the process.

It is a source of nourishment. As a young competitive swimmer, I had a great grounding in nutrition and using food to fuel performance, heal and repair the body. When the children were much younger, my interest in functional medicine and nutrition returned as I looked to find ways to help them recover quickly from illness or overcome allergies.

And it is brings us together. We sit down as families or get together with friends. With study after study showing the impact of families who eat together being happier and healthier with lower rates of depression and anxiety and higher levels of resilience and self-esteem¹.

All super important.

So, why then is food shopping so challenging for me.  It is the combination of balancing meals that everyone in my family will eat with actually having the time needed to make them between work, school pick-up, homework and clubs. Planning food out for the week can sometimes feel like a military operation – often with the battlefield becoming the table! I need to find things which will suit all likes and dislikes and deliver some nutrition to fuel their growing bodies and minds.

I have looked and tried many techniques for this – apps, planners, getting kids involved, keeping kids at arms-lengths. Nothing was nailing it for me. I have been waiting, and willing Tesco to launch a function where I can meal plan on their app and items get added to my basket automatically. And I search on this regularly. And by pure chance, last week, I stumbled across Tesco’s five meals for £25 meal planner where they have lots of recipes - you simply click on it and it adds the ingredients to your basket. Tesco, I salute you.

The Prosecco delivery man has not been for a while now and my fussy eating children have enjoyed several new meals with my daughter last night proclaiming that your Fish Puttanesca was the best thing she has ever eaten. This was a massive, massive win for me as we have been working through some issues around food recently and I am building a nice repertoire now of things she will not be able to resist.

Why am I sharing this with you today? Well, I have seen a lot of posts recently on social media – Linkedin, Facebook and Instagram all asking the question of how people manage and this is a big source of stress for parents and people who are keen to eat a healthy and balanced diet.

Last week Tash talked about how to write a great insight and so this week I wanted to demonstrate this in action, by using this example which is relatable to many.

I want to make my family healthy and nourishing meals because they aren’t little for long and I want to set them up with healthy habits for life but I have so much to think about in any given week that thinking about, planning for and shopping for food gets relegated to bottom of my priority or completely overlooked.

Solution: Tesco five meals for £25 – your weekly shop is now as easy as adding five bottles of prosecco to your basket!

A brand living its brand promise and showing how every little helps.

Thank you Tesco.

https://realfood.tesco.com/curatedlist/5-easy-family-dinners-for-25-january-week-2.html

1. https://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/20/04/harvard-edcast-benefit-family-mealtime#:~:text=Regular%20family%20dinners%20are%20associated,resilience%20and%20higher%20self%20esteem.