Fate of a food nudging intervention during the Corona-pandemic: unexpected shopping ban on a small clinic bistro

Abstract

In a pilot study, we wanted to influence the food selection of employees in a pediatric clinic bistro aiming to increase the sale of “healthy” grain buns (number and proportion of all sold buns). During basic assessment, the mean weekly sale of grain buns was 98 (52.3%) and in the second week of highlighting them on a green napkin under a transparent hood (intervention 1) reached 124 (54.6%). However, just when starting intervention 2 (position in front of the display), the bistro was closed due to the Coronavirus pandemic. Thus, necessary public health measures stopped our interventional public health experiment.