Courtesy / WellSpace Maine
Lindy Graham of WellSpace Maine and its new division, wellspace@work.
Updated: December 1, 2020
Maine’s largest brewer adds mental health benefit for employees
Courtesy / Allagash Brewing
Allgash Brewing, headquartered in Portland, employs around 145 people. HR director Celine Frueh told Mainebiz the company's partnership with wellness@work is going well so far.
To help employees cope with stress during COVID and beyond, Portland's Allagash Brewing Co. has signed on with a local mental health therapy provider to add free counseling to its workplace benefits package.
The provider is a new division of WellSpace Maine, a Portland-based mental health counseling practice, called wellspace@work. WellSpace Maine was founded in 2017 by Lindy Graham, a licensed clinical social worker who leads a team of 12 practitioners.
After landing Allagash as the first wellspace@work client, WellSpace Maine has its sights set on working with employers throughout the state in the coming year.
"It can be really challenging to find a therapist at this time, and many employers are keenly aware of the struggle the pandemic has created for their workforce," Graham told Mainebiz in a phone interview. She said her firm began working with Allagash on Oct. 1.
"The way that it works," she said, "is that the employer contracts directly with wellspace@work, so the cost of that is not on the employee at all, and the employer pays on a fee-for-service basis."
Besides the therapeutic benefit to those who use the services, Graham said there are also financial benefits to the employer. They include helping reduce absenteeism and reducing workers' compensation claims because "we end up being a cost-effective tool that mitigates those kinds of risks.”
Allagash, Maine's largest brewer in terms of annual production, employs around 145 people. Its arrangement with wellspace@work means that the brewer picks up the entire cost of care that employees need, including virtual appointments during the pandemic.
The move comes as higher stress levels during COVID nationwide spark greater demand for counseling and other mental health services, as shown in various studies.
In addition to providing therapy services, wellness@work offers educational support including webinars on topics including seasonal affective disorder and juggling work and remote learning for children at home.
Anticipating demand
Celine Frueh, human resources director at Allagash, told Mainebiz the partnership is going well so far and that the webinars have gotten positive feedback.
"It is such a huge comfort to me knowing that our employees can be ‘seen’ [virtually] within a week if they need support," she said. "WellSpace has been so accommodating and flexible, offering everything from weekly therapy sessions to one- time consults on a particular issue."
Frueh also said that while Allagash already has a great benefits package, it decided to expand its offering in anticipation of increased demand during COVIID.
"Anticipating increased demand for services," she said, "we wanted to be sure that if anyone on the Allagash team wanted support for stress-related issues, they would be able to access it readily."
As for plans to expand wellsapce@work to other employers, Graham told Mainebiz that the focus would be primarily on smaller and medium-sized employers but it would also be open to larger ones as well.
"Our overarching goal is to provide employers of Maine with behavioral health care services that are specialized and cost-effective," she said. "The most crucial piece of this is they're readily accessible to employees."
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Anonymous
December 1, 2020
Bravo to Allagash and wellspace@work for this important and step in supporting employees and their families!
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