Ready, Set, Launch – Boost the Roost takes Flight

The procurement, purchasing, and delivery of nearly 1 million pounds of clean label, No Antibiotic Ever chicken proves that there is strength in numbers.

Collectively the member districts of the Urban School Food Alliance purchase nearly one billion dollars of food, and food products, each year to feed children. That number may seem staggering, so let’s break it down:

• 18 Member Districts in 12 States
• 6,480 Individual School Sites
• 4.2 Million Students Enrolled
• 724 Million Meals Served Annually

Nestled in all those numbers we also know that chicken is the #1 protein served in all our districts. 

“Our students are asking for a lunch they could be excited about. The chicken sandwich and chicken tender craze is a country-wide phenomenon and our students wanted to eat a product that is restaurant quality.” Dr. Katie Wilson 

As a result, chicken was the obvious choice for our Alliance to challenge an outdated procurement model on such a high-volume product.

Why did we insist on No Antibiotic Ever (NAE) Chicken?

In short, antibiotics, as a preventive measure, are not necessary in our food supply.

“So, if there is anything that we can do as a society it’s to understand how we are all interconnected and we all have to work together. That includes the appropriate use of antibiotics for animals and especially for those animals that we raise to help feed one another.” Dr. Jason Newland from Nationwide Children’s.

Our data tells us that communities in our member districts are concerned with sustainability, antibiotic resistance, animal welfare, and higher food standards. The Alliance has chosen to join our districts in this commitment to NAE to help move the needle in that direction.

Echoing Districts Everywhere

“USFA now is a credible organization. USDA is looking to us to provide input as to what’s happening at schools. We can speak on behalf of not only the 18 members that are part of USFA, but also about other school districts, which are from other states and regions, because we are echoing the same things as them. We want a better product. We want kids to get better food. This is all part of the initiative.” Manish P. Singh, Los Angeles Unified School District

The ticket to a high-quality final product is the use of high-quality ingredients. However, these ingredients are often outside of a district’s ability to purchase due to the higher cost that is typically associated. But what would happen if we apply the basic principle of purchasing to these items: the more you buy at one time, the less the individual per-item cost will be (ie: the Costco effect). 

But how much volume do we need to be able to make this newly developed product affordable to districts?

Nearly One Million Pounds Later…

For this pilot our Alliance committed to acquiring 955,550 pounds of clean-label NAE chicken to serve as a limited time offer (LTO) to students. This equated to 4,368,231 servings spread across 16 districts. Over four million students benefited from this pilot. This means that four million students were served a higher-quality, cleaner-label product at no additional cost to the student or district.

“The Alliance really wanted to make a significant sustainable change, and so we decided to take this project on – and go big or go home! We knew that there had to be a change in our food system.” Dr. Katie Wilson

So why isn’t this the norm?

Arriving at the product launch phase of the project was no small feat. By staying committed to the task, and the three years of behind-the-scenes work, we were able to overcome several challenges we encountered along the way.

Here are just a few:

• We collectively chose to develop our own chicken specification that would meet the members requirements.
• We still had to stay within all the federal, state, and local procurement rules.
• We had to find a co-op that was large enough to do the purchasing and would be willing to work with inter-state purchasing.
• We overcame the unexpected challenge of “one-off” procurement bid concerns within districts.
• We confronted fear and concerns from industry around the RFP and how this would impact their companies in the future.
• We had to adapt to the misunderstandings and miscommunication with industry by writing over 11 amendments to the RFP in order to improve our responses.
• We learned that this type of bid is intimidating to many companies and watched our interested companies dwindle from over a dozen to only two responding to the final bid.

As you can see, this effort was an extraordinary move to disrupt the marketplace and change the way schools procure food. The bold steps that the Alliance made in this process now serve as stepping stones for future initiatives. Despite its challenges this pilot proved that a new approach to procurement was possible.

“The advice I would give to anyone that’s thinking of taking on a project of such magnitude is to understand that you must have patience. It’s going to take time. You’ll need to first show some successes – so even small bites of the apple – getting four or five districts to cooperate is better than none. Once you have proven success, others will join on board because they want to be a part   of the success.” Rick Garcia, Frontier  Food Group

Ready to join the cause?

The Urban School Food Alliance is committed to NAE and we are not looking back. The future of higher quality, clean-label ingredients in schools depends on the entire industry working together. Don’t just take it from us, be encouraged by two of our member districts on your path to incorporating more values-based procurement standards.

“Just do it. Just stick with it and don’t let large food manufacturers and industry tell us what we can serve our kids. We need to stay strong to our values, make changes to our menus, be creative, and send the message that we’re strong on our science-based decisions around what we’re serving our kids.” Anneliese Tanner, Boston Public Schools

 

“There’s strength in numbers – join other school districts, join other organizations, and utilize Urban School Food Alliance. But then also get your parents, your students, and your community involved too.” Florence Simpson, Los Angeles Unified School District

Read more on this topic in the full digital publication HERE.

Access FREE Boost The Roost downloadable resources on our website HERE.