PLANSPONSOR - June - July 2022 - 20

BEST PRACTICES | 2022 PLAN SPONSOR OF THE YEAR WINNERS
Corporate DC >$70mm-$150mm
International Dairy Queen Inc.
Bloomington, Minnesota
I
nternational Dairy Queen Inc., headquartered
in Bloomington, Minnesota,
is the parent
of American Dairy Queen Corp. and Dairy
Queen Canada, Inc., and now a subsidiary of
Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Through its subsidiaries,
IDQ develops, licenses and services a franchise
system of more than 7,000 locations in
the U.S., Canada and over 20 other countries.
Although IDQ covers only 526 participants
in its 401(k) plan, the company has incorporated
multiple features that typically appear only in
large plans. These include, for instance, parttime
employee eligibility; immediate vesting of
the company match; both automatic enrollment
and deferral escalation; and periodic automatic
enrollment sweeps.
Ideas for plan benefits and features come
from multiple sources, says Danielle DuBois,
director, global rewards and human resource
systems for the company. The company has
an organization-wide " listening strategy " that
actively solicits participants' feedback on their
experience with the plan and its benefits.
Benchmarking the plan also provides ideas.
" We do a benchmarking analysis every
other year for our benefits, where we compare
our plan with the market, " says DuBois. " Sometimes
we'll notice trends that are changing or
evolving. "
The plan's recordkeeper, Empower Retirement,
is another source of suggestions, she says.
Jim Noble,
the Empower
relationship
manager who serves IDQ, explains that DuBois
and the company's leadership keep looking for
ways to improve the plan.
Several years ago, Noble was tasked with
re-examining the plan's design-which, he
says, was " good " at the time-with the stated
goal of making it excellent. Every feature was up
for debate, Noble says.
The benchmarking and review process
has resulted in multiple changes over the past
24 months. These include: increasing the autoenrollment
default savings rate from 3% to 6%,
20 PLANSPONSOR.COM June - July 2022
then re-enrolling all those deferring less than
6%; periodically re-enrolling non-savers and
under-savers-i.e., anyone saving 5% or less-
so they can maximize the company match;
increasing the automatic escalation cap from
6% to 10% for all new and previously autoenrolled
employees; and reducing new participants'
entry and match eligibility date from the
first of the quarter after one year of service to
the first of the month after 30 days of service.
These changes have worked, DuBois says.
The participation rate grew, average deferral
rates increased, and more employees receive
the full company match. A review determined
that 86% of the individuals included in the
sweep accepted the higher, 6%, rate, which
told DuBois that the change was successful.
But the measurement was not a " oneand-done, "
Noble stresses. " Naturally, we
can capture the employees who were swept
in and went
through the process right after
it happened, " he says. " But, [we thought] in
another six months, let's see if those employees
dropped out or they just stayed with the same
percentage. So, we measured six months out,
as well. "
IDQ's emphasis on continuous improvement
also applies to the plan's administration
and governance. Noble cites the example of
how the plan addressed the uncashed check
problem for small-balance distributions to
terminated participants. Previously, participants
with balances under $1,000 were cashed
out and received a check.
The small-balance cash-outs became an
administrative headache, says Noble. " So,
we reduced that threshold. Anybody with a
balance from a penny to $5,000 now gets rolled
over into an individual retirement account. It
eliminates the uncashed check problem, and it
also preserves those employees' assets in a taxdeferred
account where they can decide if they
want to keep it in that IRA or move it. "
-Ed McCarthy
Danielle DuBois, Director,
Global Rewards and Human
Resource Systems
" We do a
benchmarking
analysis
every other
year for our
benefits,
where we
compare our
plan with
the market. "
Finalists
Holt of California
Pleasant Grove, California
IMT Insurance
West Des Moines, Iowa
Universal Group, Inc.
Guaynabo, Puerto Rico
More on PLANSPONSOR.com/
awards/2022-plan-sponsor-year
http://www.PLANSPONSOR.com/awards/2022-plan-sponsor-year http://www.PLANSPONSOR.com/awards/2022-plan-sponsor-year http://www.PLANSPONSOR.COM
PLANSPONSOR - June - July 2022

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