The challenge encourages every Illinois household to dedicate $10 of
their weekly grocery budget to the purchase of Illinois products. If
every household made this pledge, it would generate more than $2.4
billion a year for the Illinois economy. Residents can go online at
www.buyillinoischallenge.com to take the pledge.
The newly designed Illinois Product logo is now available from
the Illinois Department of Agriculture. Any Illinois food or
agribusiness company that processes, produces, packages, distributes
or is headquartered in the state qualifies to use the logo. Retail
establishments that carry Illinois products may use point-of-sale
material.
"The logo is an easy way for consumers to identify Illinois
companies and allow them to support locally owned businesses,"
Flider said. "We currently have over 2,500 food processing
establishments in Illinois. Our goal is to get every one of them
involved in the logo program, so no matter where consumers shop in
Illinois, they will be able to find and identify Illinois products."
Today's event is the first of five media events happening around
the state to promote the Buy Illinois challenge and newly designed
Illinois Product logo. Future events are scheduled:
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July 19 -- Pheasant
Hollow Winery, Whittington
-
July 25 -- The
Firefly Grill, Effingham
-
July 26 -- Prince
Agri-Products, Quincy
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Aug. 2 -- Eli's Cheescake, Chicago
"By working with our partners at the Illinois Chamber of
Commerce, FFA, family and consumer science students, the Illinois
Retail Merchants Association, and the Illinois Food Retailers
Association, we selected locations throughout the state that
represent the food and agribusiness industry," Flider said. "With
the Illinois State Fair beginning Aug. 9, this is a great time to
pose this challenge and encourage everyone to visit the fair, the
ultimate showcase of Illinois products."
In conjunction with today's event, Illinois companies offered
samples of their products to customers at Schnucks.
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The companies involved included:
For more information about the Illinois Product logo, visit
www.illinoisproductlogo.com.
A few stats about the economic importance of the Illinois food
processing industry:
-
Illinois ranks
first among all states with $162 billion in food processing
sales
Source: Dunn & Bradstreet Market Insight, April 2012
-
Illinois ranks
third among all states with 82,540 food processing employees and
77,500 food manufacturing employees
Source: Dunn & Bradstreet Market Insight and CES, April 2012
-
Illinois ranks sixth among all states
with 2,514 food processing establishments Source: Dunn & Bradstreet Market Insight, April 2012
[Text from file received from the
Illinois
Department of Agriculture]
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