Today we welcome guest blogger Rikke Iben Neess, who is head of Denmark’s Wholegrain Campaign. I had the pleasure of meeting Rikke in Copenhagen last year, when she and Morten Strunge Meyer invited me to speak to the industrial partners of the Danish equivalent of the Whole Grains Council. When Rikke wrote and told me about their latest promotion event, I asked her to share this great story with all our readers!

On Thursday May 5, from 7am to 5pm, wholegrain products were hanging on trees at Copenhagen Grand Central Station in Denmark. We “planted” three trees, and on them we put wholegrain samples from the Danish Wholegrain Partners.

Nearly 100,000 travelers pass through our Grand Central Station per day. Before the event we were very excited, wondering how people would react to the wholegrain trees. Starting from the early morning people just went by and picked the products down with a smile and a laugh. It was quite fun and we had to put new products on the trees seven times during the day – they were very popular. Thanks to vaulable help from our wholegrain volunteers, we sampled about 7000 whole grain products and passed out flyers, too.

The reason for this event was that The Danish Wholegrain Campaign was celebrating that nearly 400 products with the Danish orange wholegrain stamp are now available in retail banners, at gas stations, in canteens and at craft bakeries. That’s a lot in our little market! The Danish Campaign started in January 2009. Behind the Campaign is The Danish Wholegrains Partnership which is a co-operation between the Danish Food Administration (government), health organizations, producers and retailers.The Danish Wholegrain Partnership encourages Danes to eat more wholegrain in order to improve public health and just decided to continue the campaign for at least three more years.  

By the way – we have also created a short video showing people’s reactions to the Wholegrain Trees, which you can see on YouTube.

Rikke Iben Neess, Kampagneleder

While I was on YouTube I also found a video about a guy who’s selling organic hotdogs, in whole grain buns, throughout downtown Copenhagen – proof enough for me that Rikke, Morten, Nina and their team are doing a good job of convincing Danes that whole grains are the way to go!  (Cindy)