Waitrose and John Lewis offer online health workshops

Waitrose and John Lewis are offering loyalty programme members a series of free virtual workshops on health and well-being, to combat the effects of the Covid-19 lockdown, on the back of its partnership with health and life insurer Vitality signed late last year.

Exclusively available to myWaitrose and my John Lewis members, the online sessions are specifically designed to combat the effects of the coronavirus pandemic on both mental and physical health.

Customers are being invited to book onto the classes, which will take place every Wednesday throughout June. They include talks by in-house Waitrose nutritionists, family fitness classes with Olympic swimmer Lizzie Simmonds and Olympic Modern Pentathlete Samantha Murra, as well as cardio sessions run by Vitality’s clinicians and coaches.

Even Olympian Lord Seb Coe has been drafted in to run a session on posture principles alongside a Vitality physiotherapist.

John Lewis and Waitrose customer experience director Peter Cross said: “Lockdown will have taken its toll on us all in different ways, whether it’s long hours working on an unsuitable chair in our bedrooms, unhealthy snacking, disturbed sleep or lack of proper exercise, as well as the impact on our mental health.

“We have created a broad range of content with some of the nation’s superstars as well as our own in-house experts to look at well-being from a variety of angles – we hope that there’s something here for everyone however small.”

Waitrose was just one of a number of new partners – which also included Virgin Atlantic and Expedia – that Vitality brought on board in November as part of plans increase rewards for its customers.

The supermarket now offers Vitality members discounts of up 40% on healthy foods, as well as 25% cashback. The amount of cashback available directly correlates with the level of physical activity a member has done the previous month.