Before working as a retail dietitian, Andrew Akhaphong, MS, RD, LD, CPT, CSCS, worked as a clinical dietitian for six years for skilled nursing facilities in transitional care units. However, it didn’t satisfy his interest as a registered dietitian.

During his time there, he found he enjoys giving patients dietary recommendations prior to discharge, and assisting the social workers in identifying community resources, including food shelves.

“When a patient returned to the transitional care unit, I thought to myself, ‘Did I do enough?’” he said. In 2016, he took a risk to leave the full-time position for a part-time opportunity as a retail dietitian. He held a part-time clinical dietitian position to sustain himself financially. In 2019, there was a full-time opportunity at a competitor, which is where he is now.

Working at Mackenthun’s Fine Foods, a family-owned grocery chain in Minnesota, Akhaphong plays a multifaceted role, combining business operations with community health and wellness initiatives. His journey into dietetics was shaped by his parents’ experiences as refugees during the Vietnam War, where food scarcity and survival defined much of their early lives. Inspired by these stories and a college course covering malnutrition, Akhaphong found his calling in dietetics, and now integrates nutrition education with the retail environment. Below is the full exclusive interview.

Describe your role.

As the sole registered dietitian for Mackenthun’s Fine Foods, I’m involved in all aspects of the business operations. This includes brand and vendor relations, marketing and communications, purchasing decisions and consumer engagement. In addition to the business operations, I also coordinate the employee wellness program, collaborate with community partners to support health and wellness and conduct consultations in partnership with area providers.

Why did you want to work in dietetics?

I was born to parents who were raised for much of their childhood (and adolescence) in refugee camps during the Vietnam War. There are photos from their childhood where one image depicts my father and uncles in their street attire with thick hair and adequate muscle mass for their stature. Another captured them in their refugee camp uniform, protruding bones from their clavicle and chest, thinning hair. With the bits and pieces they have shared from this traumatic time, it was a constant fight for survival. My father mentioned how he and my uncles would venture out to the jungle for coconuts as a clean source of water while being cautious of Viet Cong hiding in the environment. My mother and her sister would go to nearby farm fields to seek out water buffalo dung and salvage undigested food to clean and eat.

I do not know the origins of how my father and his family immigrated to the United States. Throughout my life it was lunch or dinner at my maternal grandparents’ home every Sunday. It was not just our family joining in for meals, but they invited neighbors and friends. I always wondered who these strangers were. Sometimes there were so many people joining in for meals that extra seating had to be set up in their garage. During winter my family would offer the mailman a hot cup of Thai tea and a fresh batch of egg rolls as he walked door-to-door delivering parcels.

It was not until I took Intro to Nutrition during my freshman year in college for a health credit. When we approached malnutrition and public policy in the course, the discussions brought me back to the stories and experiences from my childhood. The photos presented my father and uncles’ journeys of health to malnutrition. The need to invite friends and neighbors to our family meals fulfilled the value of relationships and human life. Before junior year started, I transferred to a four-year university and declared my major in dietetics.

How did you come to work at Mackenthun’s Fine Foods?

My friend who graduated from my same dietetics program started the dietitian program at Mackenthun’s in 2016. The company was looking for an opportunity to stand out and meet the demands of the evolving consumer as our competitors started launching dietitian programs in our market area. Additionally, the general manager at the time had personal experiences with a registered dietitian for health needs; thus, the manager advocated to include a registered dietitian to join Mackenthun’s. As the dietitian program grew, my friend (and other dietitians before me) pursued other career goals. The position opened in 2019, I submitted my application and here I am!

What do you like about it?

The retail landscape allows me to understand how our consumers shop and interact with the environment. Observing their behavior allows me to develop nutrition messages to encourage beneficial health behavior changes and individualize recommendations. The entire grocery store is an educational tool. It is wonderful to see how excited the consumers get in applying recommendations in the aisles such as using the Nutrition Facts Label to reduce added sugar.

What has been the biggest challenge for you as a dietitian working in the retail industry?

How to get buy-in for programming and events to encourage positive health behavior changes and improve health outcomes. To achieve these goals, I depend on support from food boards, brands and store and department managers. I must be able to show metrics to these stakeholders that my interventions have made an impact on consumers through analytics such as item movement and basket dollars. Additionally, some programming or events may not be possible to implement consistently each year as the stakeholders may have other obligations. This is where I need to do my due diligence with planning and communicating months ahead.

What is one thing you wish you had known before starting your career in retail?

Ethics of brand and product communications and marketing. There are many rules involved one may not think about when providing education on how a brand or product may fit the health and wellness needs of a consumer. Quite often I will review guidelines established by the Federal Trade Commission or study the approved health claims by the Food and Drug Administration to reassure me that I’m practicing in compliance.

Has there been anything specific that helped you move forward in your role?

It’s hard to know everything, because the retail landscape, like nutrition, is always evolving. I learn a lot from my consumers. Oftentimes they are first to learn of a new brand or product and will ask me for information about its benefits or if I have heard of it before. Many brands or commodity boards will also provide education through webinars, toolkits or newsletters which allows me to stay up to date. Q. Is there a program or initiative that you are most proud of? A. In collaboration with the University of Minnesota masters of public health nutrition coordinated dietetics program, I created a course to help students develop cultural humility and how to bring it into practice. Part of this course includes case studies to apply the Nutrition Care Process while taking into consideration the patient’s cultural values, identity and food practices including ingredients unique to their culture. To apply this further, I coordinate tours at ethnic grocery stores for students to get introduced to ingredients, brands and products unique to these cultures and how to respectfully recommend modifications or alternatives to improve nutritional quality of their cultural foods.

Have any “hot topics” in the dietetics/nutrition industry impacted the way you do things?

Since the pandemic, there has been an interest in integrative nutrition. Consumers would often ask me about the uses and benefits of supplements like ashwagandha, turmeric and valerian root, among many others. Minnesota also recently legalized marijuana, and I get questions from consumers about how it may support health and wellness. Because consumer interest is changing, I need to educate myself on supplements and marijuana to answer those questions confidently; additionally, know what resources and providers with greater knowledge than I to refer them to.

Bio: Andrew Akhaphong, MS, RD, LD, CPT, CSCS, is the corporate registered dietitian for Mackenthun’s Fine Foods. Akhaphong is passionate about educating consumers how to develop nutrient-dense meals with familiar or new brands and products without needing to stray from familiarity. Akhaphong is currently pursuing his doctorate in clinical nutrition through Kansas University Medical Center. He holds a master’s in health promotion from the University of Central Arkansas and a bachelor’s in family consumer science from Minnesota State University – Mankato. Additional certifications and training held include culinary arts from Escoffier International Culinary Academy, personal training and strength and conditioning specialist through the International Sports Sciences Association, low-FODMAP from MONASH University and precision nutrition level 1 from Precision Nutrition. Akhaphong has been featured in media including Men’s Health, The Today Show and the Food Network. Akhaphong resides in the southern Minneapolis area with his husband Martin, son Emilio, two dogs and two cats.