Case study: Automotive group helps employees better manage type 2 diabetes
To help employees better control their type 2 diabetes, Gurley Leep started offering Level2® from UnitedHealthcare.
At Gurley Leep’s 20+ dealerships across the Midwest, 1,300+ employees work as salespeople, service technicians, general managers, service advisors, painters, body shop technicians and more.
“Gurley Leep started as a family business, and even though it’s grown from one dealership to 20-plus, the owners still consider it a family business,” says Bobbi Imel, human resources director for Gurley Leep.
That family feel extends to the company’s benefit offerings. Whether it’s the “Make a Memory” matching vacation fund or dependent college scholarship support, Gurley Leep offers its workforce a competitive suite of benefits that also includes an HDHP and HSA to which Gurley Leep contributes up to $600 per quarter for eligible employees.
So when it noticed that some employees were dealing with type 2 diabetes, Gurley Leep recognized the opportunity to provide better support.
Building healthier workforces together with Gurley Leep Automotive Family
Providing specialized diabetes support
Through annual wellness screenings, Gurley Leep discovered that a number of employees were dealing with type 2 diabetes, which affects 1 in 10 Americans1 and accounts for 1 in 4 health care dollars.2 For many employers like Gurley Leep, continuing at that cost trend is unsustainable.
Gurley Leep initially contracted with a vendor to help its employees manage their type 2 diabetes. Unfortunately, “we just didn’t have a lot of traction with the program,” Imel says.
As a result, the company decided to switch course and offer employees Level2® as a health plan in 2023, which provided members with tailored type 2 diabetes coverage and care. This included access to a continuous glucose monitor (CGM) to help members understand how specific foods and activities impact their glucose levels as well as no-cost access to Level2 Specialty Care teams who focus on improving type 2 diabetes treatment with wearable technology, personalized insights and expert care.
Increasing engagement
In its first 6 months of offering Level2, Gurley Leep saw higher employee engagement compared to its previous diabetes management program. In fact, 97% of verified type 2 diabetes members activated the Level2 Specialty Care program in year 1.
Part of that engagement can be attributed to the resources and materials provided by Level2, which Imel says were easy to slot into their email communications and employee intranet forum. These efforts have continued to drive engagement in Level2.
For instance, in 2024, 91% of employees enrolled in Level2 Specialty Care connected their CGM, and 74.5% engaged their care team on a monthly basis. As a result, the number of members with a high-risk type 2 diabetes diagnosis decreased by 12.5 percentage points between 2023 and 2024.
And while those enrolled in Level2 had a 34.1% higher medication adherence than members with type 2 diabetes not enrolled in Level2, Gurley Leep also experienced an 8.3% reduction in its per member, per month pharmacy spend — largely due to members not needing to take as many drugs to help manage their type 2 diabetes diagnosis. In fact, Gurley Leep saw a 51% decrease in insulin usage from 2023 to 2024.
Gurley Leep Benefits Manager Teresa Grace sees Level2 as a small but powerful picture of how the company cares for its workforce.
“This company really does care about their employees,” Grace says. “They want the best for them. When employees don’t have to worry about their benefits, they can really focus on the work they need to do for the company.”
For 2026, Gurley Leep will be considering a migration over to the Level2 Assured Value Program. This transition would allow Gurley Leep to continue offering specialized type 2 diabetes support and the assurance that 100% of its program fees will be reconciled against clinical outcomes and actual medical and pharmacy claims.
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