Chosen Foods stocks healthy pantries

Have you ever found yourself in the grocery store, staring at the bottles of oil and wondering which one to buy? Which one is the healthiest? Which one has the good fats? Which one is the safest for cooking? It can be tough to know.

Chosen Foods’ mission is to make that decision easier. The certified B-Corp produces avocado oils, sprays, and mayos that are good for both our health and the environment.

The San Diego-based company operates in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, and lives its commitment to B-Corp values in several ways. It reduces food waste by using bruised or damaged avocados that would otherwise be thrown out, it buys carbon offsets for its emissions, and it tries to use eco-friendly packaging.

“Our B-Corp certification shows our commitment to our people and the environment. It really makes our product stand out, showing people that it is truly good for you and for the world, and it is truly good from taste to being socially responsible,” members of the Chosen Foods People and Culture team shared.

Chosen Foods strives to bring the same level of care to its workforce and culture as it does to its products. But as the company has grown, staying on top of employee needs and compliance expectations has been challenging for its small but mighty HR team. Working in spreadsheets and disconnected systems led to errors, inefficiencies, and has kept the team from being able to do the work they’re meant to do – ensuring Chosen Foods is a top choice for employees and customers.

Trying a new recipe

Chosen Foods’ workforce has grown steadily since it was founded in 2011, as more and more consumers have learned about the health benefits of avocado oil. The company is surfing the health-food wave, which is valued at USD $250 billion in 2023, and projected to grow at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 9.4% annually.

But while Chosen Foods has always had a high-quality product, it lacked the high-quality HCM system it needed to support growth and engagement. “We had employees logging their time on spreadsheets and using a payroll system that was very difficult to navigate. The company often had situations where data was not in the right place on the spreadsheet, or the data was transferred incorrectly or uploaded incorrectly, or a file failed in a feed,” members of the People and Culture team reflected.

Chosen Foods began searching for an integrated and intuitive HCM system that could become a single source of truth for employee data and could improve efficiency, compliance, growth, and communication. They chose Dayforce^TM.

“Dayforce has helped us make our department successful,” members of the People and Culture team shared. “The organization has more trust in the information that we keep and the data that they receive. The processes are much smoother when employees need to make changes to their profiles, taxes, and benefits. Because we bought the full Dayforce suite, things have been running so smoothly.”

Chosen Foods implemented Dayforce Payroll, Benefits, Time and Attendance, Analytics, and Dayforce Wallet, and is currently also adding Dayforce Performance Management, Compensation, Engagement, Learning, and Experience Hub.

The company worked with Enforce Consulting, a specialized Dayforce implementation partner, on a phased rollout of the system with a heavy focus on compliance. The state of California has uniquely complex payroll regulations, and the Chosen Foods People and Culture team wanted to ensure the systems could deliver on those requirements.

The Enforce team acted as an extension of the Chosen Foods People and Culture team, implementing modules and features according to project schedules, troubleshooting issues, and providing advice and guidance. They also worked upstream to identify and address potential issues before they happened.

“We did a full system Optimization X-Ray and helped the Chosen Foods team identify all active and potential issues and created a roadmap for how to resolve them in the most effective way,” says Michael McKay, CEO of Enforce Consulting.

In most implementation processes, new considerations emerge when people actually start using the system. Handling those situations hasn’t been a problem for Enforce and Chosen Foods. “There were times where we’ve had to make changes to the system,” members of the People and Culture team explained. “It's time to process payroll and we notice, ‘Oh, no, the accruals aren't showing up on the pay statement.’ When issues happen, it's easy to give Enforce a call. Within 20 minutes, they're on it.”

Bringing the ingredients together

Chosen Foods says Dayforce is by far the most user-friendly, efficient, effective, and complete system they’ve worked in. With Enforce and the Dayforce community’s support, they’ve significantly improved efficiency, accuracy, and compliance, freeing up the People and Culture team’s time to work on projects that make work life better for all Chosen Foods employees.

For example, with payroll and time and attendance in a single system, the People and Culture team have the tools to reduce errors and missing data. Employees can enter data on their phones or on their desktop via an intuitive user interface. Payroll issues and inaccuracies are down, and reporting has become easier.

Dayforce has also helped Chosen Foods stay in compliance with state regulations. The company can now track overtime by day and employee meal periods – all things that used to be tracked manually.

But maybe the most significant improvement is the reduction in the time it takes the People and Culture team to run biweekly payroll. It used to take five days, but now with Dayforce, it takes only one day for the U.S. and one day for Canada.

“Payroll was so cumbersome before that our culture wasn't where it needed to be,” members of the People and Culture team shared. “The way that Dayforce streamlines payroll has given us time back to implement wellness programs that were needed a long time ago and that people are now very grateful for. To be able to do what we're doing now for our employees, we give Dayforce credit for that.”

Cooking up something special

To attract and retain talent in a competitive market, Chosen Foods strives to understand the needs of its workforce and communicate effectively with employees. Dayforce helps on both counts.

Twenty percent of Chosen Foods’ workforce is made up of hourly warehouse workers. The other 80% are salaried workers. When Chosen Foods was searching for a new HCM system, on-demand pay was at the top of its list. It rolled out Dayforce Wallet to employees in the first phase of implementation.

Dayforce Wallet is a flexible pay solution that gives employees real-time access to the wages they’ve earned before payday. The solution is needs-based: If an employee needs early access to funds to cover a car repair emergency, they can pull from their earnings instead of turning to high-interest credit cards or payday loans. The rest of the time, their paychecks stay the same.

Chosen Foods estimates that 90-100% of hourly workers are using Dayforce Wallet. Salaried workers are using it too. The company promotes Dayforce Wallet as a perk when recruiting as well – for employees that are in a state of transition and living on a tight budget, being able to access their pay when they’ve earned it is a compelling offering.

“What's wonderful is that we don't have to do anything. There are no separate calculations. There are no separate reports that we have to run. It all shows up nicely on our pay register and reporting. People understand their pay statements. There are no questions. It's very easy to read,” said members of the People and Culture team.

Investing in quality ingredients: A recipe for success

In its second phase of implementation, Chosen Foods is bringing on Dayforce Performance Management, Compensation, Engagement, Learning, and Experience Hub. It has also integrated LinkedIn Learning^TM1 into Dayforce, which allows managers to assign courses to employees and create personalized development plans.

The company is also developing an AI strategy and looking at Dayforce Co-Pilot as a key supporting technology. “We are already effective and efficient in the way that we use Dayforce, but Co-Pilot is going to be a game-changer. We've already saved so much time, Co-Pilot is going to truly bring us to our future state sooner than we would have imagined,” shared members of the People and Culture team.

As customer interest in healthy and environmentally sustainable foods grows, and workers continue to seek to align their career choices with their values, Chosen Foods is well-positioned for even more growth.

“Having a platform like Dayforce allows us to concentrate on the bottom line. Even in these early stages, it has propelled our team and our organization forward to ensure that the growth we are experiencing is a continued piece of our bottom line,” said members of the People and Culture team. “What this does is it allows us to focus on the mission Chosen Foods set out to have. We are here to ensure that we are producing products that are good for the world, for the people, and to slowly be able to make your pantry across the board healthier.”

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