He aha te mea nui o te ao?

What is the most important thing in the world?

He tāngata, he tāngata, he tāngata

It is people, it is people, it is people

From the work our Support Centre teams do behind the scenes through to our trucks driving all night to deliver products picked by our DC (Distribution Centre) teams, there’s always something happening, something moving, something special going on. The logistics of our cooperative (Co-op) are complex, but at the heart of our success and what we do for New Zealanders, is our people.

Empowering our Foodies whānau

We pride ourselves on offering opportunities for our people to thrive, feel rewarded and have meaningful careers within our Co-op. We promote and encourage everyone within our Support Centres, Supply Chain and stores to move around the network or continue their careers.  So, we've set a hefty ongoing goal for ourselves – we want 2/3 of our hiring to be from our own people!

‘There’s always opportunities going around and I put my hand up for anything that was available. I’ve gone from picking orders, to being a Team Leader and then to being an Operations Manger that runs the whole site. I’ve been empowered to move forward, make changes and progress my career and this is what I’ve enjoyed about working at Foodies’ Adele Monga, Operations manager Roberts Line Palmerston North

Living our values

How we go about things is just as important as what we do. Our Foodies values play a key role in helping our teams work together, make courageous decisions, respond, innovate and deliver for customers every day.

Our values are:

“Winning the award was huge for me but honestly the award belongs to our checkout team as they were the ones that voted for me. There is no I in team! To me living the values is about caring, helping and leading. We want to put our best foot forward and provide the best service, best products and best presentation for our customers. It’s also about enabling and encouraging our team members and building their confidence so they can provide the best service.” Parminder Kaur, Overall Values Award winner, NW Metro Queen St

Foodies Learning

Whether you work in our Support Centre, Supply Chain or one of our stores, we make world class learning and development available to our people. We pride ourselves in growing our own across the Co-op with opportunities valuing internal mobility and equal opportunities.

Development available begins in the early career space and continues all the way through to store ownership. Formal development programmes available, amongst many others, include:

• Building your Personal Impact
• Stepping up to Leadership
• Supervisory Excellence (NZQAL3)
• Certificate in Retailing (NZQAL4)
• Leadership Essentials (NZQAL4)
• Women in Retail: Careers by Design
• Department Managers Programme – Retailing Excellence
• Store Managers Programme – Store Mastery
• Trainee Operator Programme

We deliver these through a culture of curiosity in learning, on the job application, connection, networking and peer support mechanisms.

“From the first day I stepped foot in store, it was clear that the opportunity to progress was there. As a produce assistant, I was given the opportunity in my first three months to supervise. Foodies has always had my own growth as a priority, offering bigger shoes to step into at each point.

The shop floor itself gave me the experience and edge to excel at the support centre, understanding how what we do here shows up in store. This paired with the supportive network of foodies has provided me with a clear pathway for progression at every point along the support centre journey as well, with leaders openly recognising a good work ethic and backing me to step up and progress at an extremely fast pace.

At foodies, I’ve never been short of opportunities to grow and fill bigger shoes at each point along the journey. And in such a supportive environment where the value added has directly correlated into the opportunities presented in front of me.“ Oliver Moffitt, Four Square Optimisation Lead