A Rio supermarket swapped its produce shelves for pick-your-own garden beds

Zona Sul, a supermarket chain based in Rio de Janeiro, wanted to highlight its differentiated offering of fresh, sustainable and local products as consumer demand for healthier food grew — not just claim it.

Replace the produce shelf with the produce's roots: planted garden beds in the aisle that customers harvest themselves

WMcCann's Rio office transformed the shelves in the fruit and vegetable section into fresh vegetable gardens of lettuce, basil, peppers and scallion. Customers were invited to pick their vegetables directly from the earth, with small signs among the beds reading: 'When serving it at home you may proudly say: I picked it up', and 'We plant and take care. You only need to pick it up'.

No sales or reach figures were reported; the installation turned the aisle itself into the proof of the freshness claim, with customers completing the story by harvesting their own.

Supermarket chains say their produce is fresh; Zona Sul let shoppers prove it to themselves. In 2016 the Rio de Janeiro chain, working with WMcCann's Rio office, transformed the shelves in its fruit and vegetable section into fresh vegetable gardens, answering growing consumer demand for healthy, sustainable and locally sourced food.

Customers were invited to pick their vegetables directly from the earth — lettuce, basil, peppers and scallion among the choices. Signs among the beds set up the payoff: 'When serving it at home you may proudly say: I picked it up', and 'We plant and take care. You only need to pick it up'.

The campaign came from WMcCann Rio under chief creative officer Washington Olivetto. No sales or campaign-reach figures appear in the source; the work's contribution was turning a supply-chain claim into a five-second experience at the point of sale.

The medium is the message: a fresh-produce claim demonstrated by living plants beats any 'farm fresh' banner.

It gives shoppers a small ceremony — harvesting — that they retell at home, which is where the sign's script lands.

A retail idea with near-zero media cost: the shelf itself is the buy.

When your claim is freshness, stage the claim where it is consumed — an experience in the aisle argues harder than a line of copy.

The source records the installation and its credits but no follow-up: no figures on sales lift, footfall or how long the gardens stayed in store.