what’s working
Embracing a Culture of Wellness
Helping workers become healthy is good business.
Brian Mittge
Learning as you go is one key to success for AWB member companies that are
breaking new ground in employee wellness. The benefits are happier, healthier
workers and lower costs for the company in health care and injury claims.
Inside a cold storage seafood warehouse on a
Seattle wharf, two dozen men in bib overalls
and knit caps lift their arms, pull their
elbows behind their heads and bend at the
waist in a group stretching exercise before
their shift begins. It’s a simple daily routine
to limber up tight muscles before going to
work in sub-zero refrigerated rooms.
Looking on, Wes Himes, director of
North American distribution for Trident
Seafoods, remembers a time before this
five-minute ritual, back when his workers
might hurt their backs simply by leaning
over to pick up a 10-pound box.
The entire warehouse crew stretches before their shift begins at Trident Seafoods in Seattle.
Those days are now firmly in the past.
Trident has integrated wellness programs
into its corporate culture, creating benefits both for the
new running machine, he could only keep up the pace for a
company and for workers. New routines have cut repetitive
minute. His workouts improved that to an hour.
motion injuries. Employees can take part in core fitness
“I lost 45 pounds,” he said. “I had some asthma, too. Now
classes in shipping and receiving, for example, along with
it’s never coming back.”
self-directed exercise in new company weight rooms.
Avila’s supervisor has also seen changes, from fewer sick
“We’re promoting safety, but quality as well,” Himes said,
days to more consistent and harder work. His use of the
standing near neatly stacked boxes of frozen Alaska pollock
company’s wellness offerings just earned him a “Lifestyle
fillets on pallets.
Transformation Award,” with a trophy and a Fitbit digital
Since Trident began an ever-expanding wellness program,
health tracking device.
ranging from free bowls of fruit and packets of oatmeal in the
Avila has always done physical work — warehouse jobs with
cafeteria to the construclots of lifting and walking. It wasn’t enough activity to keep
tion of weight rooms in each
him healthy, though.
plant, there have been some
“This is different,” he said. “This is my whole body health.”
at a glance
noticeable changes.
Nearby, Jose “Tiny” Millan is finishing 50 minutes on the
Anthony Avila, a six-year
stair machine. Before he had started regular exercise in the
Businesses see healthier
Trident employee, started
new Trident weight room three months prior, one of his legs
workers, health care savings
using his company’s new
was numb. That wasn’t just a personal health issue — it could
after offering wellness programs
weight-lifting machines and
have affected his job as a driver in the Trident warehouse.
that measure progress, give
cardio equipment each day
“I feel my legs,” Millan said. “More oxygen in my body, less
incentives and provide support.
before his shift began. When
tiredness. Suddenly I quit drinking coffee. I feel better right now.”
he started on the company’s
He also shed 25 pounds.
22 association of washington business