Limelight Cinema Offering a healthier choice at the movies

Why we wanted to get involved

“I believed that this is the way of the future – I noticed people, especially kids, were choosing water

over soft drinks. I felt this was a good opportunity for

the cinema to participate in a government funded

initiative to test the market”

Mike Kadinski - Limelight Cinema Manager

About Limelight Cinema

Limelight Cinema in Tuggeranong is one of Canberra’s

favourite cinemas and it strives to deliver the best value

cinema experience in town.

Limelight’s philosophy is built on a love of movies, and a

desire to make movie going more fun, more engaging

and more affordable so that customers can see more

movies more often.

The Choose Healthier local business pilot project is a

new and innovative way local businesses are tackling the

challenge of obesity in our community and is part of the

ACT Government’s push towards a target of ‘zero growth’

for obesity under the Healthy Weight Initiative.

Rising levels of overweight and obesity represent one of

the ACT’s biggest health challenges, with almost

two-thirds of adults and one in four children in the

ACT overweight or obese.

The ACT Government has partnered with the Canberra

Business Chamber and the ACT Nutrition Support Service

together with local businesses to increase the availability

and promotion of healthier food and drinks particularly

where targeted at children.

About Choose Healthier

What we did

We met with ACT Nutrition Support Service to discuss options

for supplying healthier choices. They showed us a frozen

yoghurt product called Twisted. We sourced the frozen yoghurt

along with a Twisted branded fridge and installed it in a

prominent location on our snack bar counter.

The frozen yoghurt was rolled up into a combo with a bottle of

water and sold at a competitive price. To market this new offer

the brand strategist developed a campaign slogan: Combo

Twist – It’s cooler than ice cream. A range of marketing

materials were placed in high traffic areas with prime visibility.

What happened

Introducing a healthier option was easy and had no negative

impact on our bottom line. The Twisted frozen yoghurts sold

very well both on their own and as part of a combo with

water during the pilot.

The choc tops remain the best sellers by a long way but

Twisted are now our second best seller ahead of the range of

other ice creams we have on offer.

Lessons learnt

With advice from ACT Nutrition Support Service and a good

quality branding strategy, we found that you can introduce a

competitively priced, healthier option at the movies with no

impact on our core product sales or profit margin.

Many of our health conscious customers asked for the

‘healthier combo’. Even in entertainment venues,

where food and drink is usually indulgent, people

still want a healthier option to be available.

The pilot was able to showcase the important role local

business can play in shaping an environment where

making the healthier choice is the easier choice.

The Choose Healthier Combo Twist has far fewer kilojoules (kJ) than

most ice cream and soft drink

combos – just 452kJ for the

chocolate flavour and 417kJ for

the strawberry flavour.

The Choose Healthier pilot project is part of the ACT Government’s Healthy Weight Initiative, supporting a healthy, active and productive community.

630 Choose Healthier

Twisted Frozen Yoghurts were sold during the pilot period

and became the 2ND most popular

ice cream seller.