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Campaign Evaluation 165

was thought to be extensive, even if only a few believe this information could be a
relevant strategy to change individual nutritional styles. Higher brand knowledge,
awareness, loyalty, and a clearer product identity probably fostered a more tradi-
tional approach to product selection through vending machines.
The project could be considered successful because the results exceeded the
initial goal (that at least 25% of the products that target audiences purchased
through the campaign’s vending machines were healthy). The project has been
able to develop a great interest in its goal and its activities. In fact, interest has
been lasting and continuous, even after the six-month trial period: the number
of participating vending machines increased from the initial 13 to approxi-
mately 175 by the end of 2007, upon citizens’ requests.
In 2007, a similar project was developed in some secondary schools in the city
of Modena. In this case, vending machines offered children aged 11 to 13 only
healthy products, together with information on healthy habits and health educa-
tion activities in the classrooms. Health education and communication interven-
tions have been studied according to the characteristics of the young targets.
Based on this experience, a proposal of healthy public procurement for
vending machines has been realized by a national network composed of repre-
sentatives of the Social Marketing National Work Group, Health Plan–Modena
Local Health Unit, FARE (an association of public purchasers), the Institute of
Nutritional Science–University of Rome “La Sapienza,” Confida, the Italian
Association of Local Agenda 21, and Federconsumatori (a national consumer
association). The objective of the proposal was to spread health promotion val-
ues through public procurement for vending machines. In particular, the pro-
posal supported the following activities:

• Increase the availability (and therefore the access) of fresh, local,
biological, and fair trade products.
• Enhance local, typical, and traditional foods and beverages (fruits,
vegetables, and water).
• Introduce guarantees for environmental protection among the selection
criteria—for example, a short supply chain (to reduce distances from
place of production to point of purchase).
By law, public administrations in Italy must develop public procurement if
they want to purchase goods or services, and usually a point system is used to
compare the different offers. One of the main strengths of the proposal was that
it recommended paying more attention to the characteristics of the products. In
fact, it recommended giving 50 points to the economic offer and 50 to the qual-
itative offer. Among these, 40 points should be attributed to the choice of the
products. Table 7-1 summarizes the proposed score attribution.