Transcript Youth Sports Concessions That are Healthy And Profitable

Youth Sports Concessions
That Are Healthy And
Profitable
Turning A Healthy Profit While
Turning Out Healthier Kids
Lyle McCoon, Jr.
Athletics Director
Nicholasville/Jessamine County
Parks & Recreation
Obesity Among Our Children
In addition to the 16 percent of children and teens ages 6
to 19 who were overweight in 1999-2002, another 15
percent were considered at risk of becoming overweight (a
BMI-for-age between the 85th and 95th percentiles).
The Situation At Home
The Situation At Home, cont.
The Situation At Home, cont.
“Our daughter is
getting into this
tendency of drinking
large diet cokes. I'm
not sure where she
picked this up from
but it's getting hard to
get her to drink
anything else. For all
of you who don't
realize it (mom) I'm
just kidding—it's a
medium!”
We start them
younger and younger
The Situation At School
Among schools that allow students to
purchase snack foods or beverages from
vending machines or at the school store,
canteen, or snack bar . . .
- 20% have fruits or vegetables available for purchase.
- 67% have 100% fruit juice available for purchase
- 95% have bottled water
available for purchase.
- 2% do not allow students
to purchase candy; high fat
snacks; or soft drinks,
sports drinks, or fruit drinks
that are not 100% juice
during school lunch periods.
The Situation At School, cont.
A nationwide survey of vending machines in
middle schools and high schools found that 75%
of the drinks and 85% of the snacks sold are of
poor nutritional value
Of the drinks sold in the 13,650 vending-machine
slots surveyed, 70% were sugary drinks such as
soda, juice drinks with less than 50% juice, iced
tea, and “sports” drinks. Of the sodas, only 14%
were diet, and only 12% of the drinks available
were water. Just 5% of drink options were milk
but of those, most (57%) were high-fat whole or
2% milk.
Of the snack foods sold in the machines, candy
(42%), chips (25%) and sweet baked goods
(13%) accounted for 80% of the options. Of
9,723 snack slots in all the vending machines
surveyed, only 26 slots contained fruits or
vegetables.
The Situation At Our Concession
Stands!?!
Your Concession Stand?
Your Concession Stand?
We Do A Great Job Fighting
Obesity . . .
. . . While Contributing To It
Someone Needs To
Take A Stand For
Health!
Will It Be Parks &
Recreation?
What Are Our Priorities?
We focus a great deal of time, care, and
concern to getting good coaches (and
rightly so), but ignore getting good food
for our concession stands
Is Profit Our Main Concern?
- Should it be?
- But, to be
realistic,
it definitely is a concern
of great importance
What One Parks Department
Decided To Do About It
Nicholasville/Jessamine County
Parks & Recreation’s Grand
Concession Experiment Of
2005-06
Our Particular History
Up until 2003-04, we had contracted out
our concession stand to private individuals
on a profit percentage basis
– This led to accounting abuses, unreported
profits, and a loss of control over the
concession stand
For the 2004-05 season, we tried to
contract out a “healthy snack concession
stand”
No one would agree to do it without
at least being able to sell soda
– “I can’t make any money with that
menu without selling soda.”
Healthy Snack Ideas for Basketball Concessions
All of the following items are either sold individually or are sold
individually wrapped (thus useful for a concession stand). Also, each
item is sold in individual sizes. Some of the items require
refrigeration, while others would require a microwave or a toaster.
Apples
Applesauce
Snack cheeses
Bananas
Fruit bowls
Raisins
Yogurt
Fruit snacks
String cheese
Bagels
Popcorn
Cheez-its
Sunflower seeds
Mini-cereal boxes
Granola bars
Rice cakes
(w/o shells)
Cereal Bars
Kudos
Cracker sandwiches
Fruit Bars
Peanuts
Goldfish crackers
Juice boxes
Smoothies
Capri-sun
Bottled Water
Gatorade
Hot dogs
Slim Jims
Lunchables
Beef Jerky
Packaged lunch meat (like Carl Budding)
Chef Boyardee mini-meals
Jello Cups
Pudding Cups
Fruit Roll-ups
Pop tarts
Our Particular History, cont.
Since no one would agree to do it, we
simply did not offer concessions
– Our participants and families were not really
happy about this, nor were our Parks board
members (due to the loss of revenue)
We decided this past season to offer a
healthy snack concession stand using our
own paid staff (for accountability)
We hoped to break even
or, at best, to make a bit
of a profit
A Little Bit About Our Program
We had just under
300 basketball
participants
We had 35 teams
Our season lasted 11 weekends
– Only 7 of those weekends were full
weekends (both Saturday and Sunday)
involving most of the teams
– 4 of those weekends involved only half
(or fewer) of the teams
Our Particular Assets
- We had a rather captive crowd
– The facility that we use has no gas
stations, convenience stores, or grocery
stores within comfortable walking
distance
- I had a supportive
boss
- Last season (200405) we did not offer
any concessions at
all
Our Particular Liabilities
We do not have our own facility,
but must use a local elementary
school
We had a very small closet out
of which to operate
We had a small stand up refrigeration unit
that had to fit in that closet
We had no toaster, microwave, or oven
The only plug-in device we used at the
concession stand was a popcorn machine
The only youth sport we run is basketball
Our Particular Thinking
Our Underlying Philosophy: Since we
offer basketball as a way of
promoting activity and good health
and as a way of combating obesity,
we should not then turn and
contribute to the problem by offering
unhealthy concession choices
Our Underlying Premise: We
have a captive audience with
money to burn; they will eat
just about whatever we offer them
Our Actual Menu
• Bottled Water ($1.00)
• Gatorade - Large ($1.50) &
Small ($1.00)
• Juice (only 100% juice
varieties) ($1.00)
• Capri Sun (This was
discontinued in favor of 100%
Juicy Juice) ($0.50)
• Juicy Juice ($0.50)
• Apples ($0.50)
• Bananas ($0.50)
• Raisins ($0.50)
• Fruit Snacks (with Vitamin C)
($0.50)
• Fruit Roll-ups ($0.50)
• Fruit Bars ($0.75)
• Granola Bars (most of which
were low-fat) ($0.50)
• Cracker Sandwiches ($0.50)
• Goldfish ($0.75)
• Cheez-Its ($0.75)
• Cheese & Crackers ($0.50)
• String Cheese (low-fat) ($0.50)
• Trail Mix ($0.75)
• Pretzels ($0.50)
• Peanuts ($0.75)
• Beef Jerky ($0.50)
• Popcorn (made with the lowest
fat oil we could find and very
lightly salted) ($0.75)
Stories From The Front
- A number of people
complained (of course) about
the lack of soda and/or
chocolate
A number of people actually thanked
us and complimented us for the
choices
Some that came looking for
chocolate bought granola bars or trail
mix to get a bit of their fix
Stories From The Front, cont.
What we found, with drinks for
example, is that people bought
Gatorade (our biggest single seller,
along with popcorn) first
When that ran out, they bought juice
When that ran out,
they bought water
You can limit the
choices to make
them as healthy as you want
Stories From The Front, cont.
Many who would definitely have eaten
nachos, a Snickers, and a Coke, instead
settled for a cracker sandwich, a fruit bar,
and a bottled water
Some little kids learned that string cheese,
bananas, and apple juice are just as
yummy as chips, suckers, and soda
I felt a whole lot better after a 13
hour day having not eaten nachos
and hot dogs all day while washing
it down with Mt. Dew
End Of The Season Figures
Total Sales
Total Costs
Profit
Labor Costs
Grand Total Profit
$4,222.29
$1,242.61
$2,979.68
$1,982.00
$997.68
Bottom Line
We made approximately $1,000 in
9+ weeks selling healthy choices –
without selling nachos, hot dogs,
candy bars, chips, or soda!
Our labor costs were the
single biggest expense
we had, almost $2,000
With volunteer labor, we would have
made $3,000
A Little Math
That $3,000 came from
approximately 300
participants (and their spectators)
over approximately 10 weeks
That works out to $10 profit per
participant from a healthy snack
menu
It also works out to
about $1 profit per
participant per week
What That Could Mean To You
In a typical little league
scenario, your league has
around 500 participants
Your season lasts 16 weeks
Based on $1 per participant
per week, your league’s profit
would be $8,000
But the best part is that your profit
came entirely from healthy choices
at your concession stand
Ways We Could Have Increased
Our Profit
Raised our prices
Bought in bigger bulk
(from commercial food
distributors)
Cut our worker’s income (currently
$8.00 an hour)
Used volunteer labor
Expanded our menu to include items
that can be microwaved or toasted
Join The Fight
Ronald Reagan, in his 2nd
Inaugural Address said, “If
not us, who? And if not now, when?”
Theodore Roosevelt said, “Do what
you can, with what you have, where
you are.”
The challenge for parks & recreation
is to be a leader in this endeavor
The Leaders And The Best
If we, as a field, do not lead the way,
who else will?
We ought to be the
vanguard; we ought
to be on the cutting
edge on this issue of
childhood obesity – not just talking
about the problem or dragging our
feet, but being part of the solution
Hope For The Future
We hope to start
to affect long term
change
We hope to lead
some little kid to
ask mommy for
something healthy
that they tried and
liked at the concession
stand at parks & rec
My Challenge For You
Try to implement a healthy snack
concession stand
– At a minimum, offer more healthy choices and
fewer unhealthy ones
– Try a completely healthy menu at least at one
event or one concession stand
If you are worried about profit and
possible lost revenue . . .
– Start small
– Look for grants and partners like the health
department
My Challenge For You, cont.
In the words of Nike . . .
Just Do It!
Let parks and recreation be
a good example to other
organizations that work with youth
Don’t wait until the childhood obesity
numbers get even higher before we act
Don’t wait, like the schools, for the
government to come in and mandate
change
Let us be the leaders and show, through
our actions, that we truly do have the best
interest of the kids in mind
Questions?
Comments?