At a time when schools throughout the nation are grappling with food shortages and in some cases the inability to source staples like chicken and bread, SFA News Daily asked Datassential trendologist, Mike Kostyo, how specialty food brands might fill the dearth in supply. Following is his response.
Q: Does opportunity exist for specialty food makers in school foodservice?
Food shortages have been a pain point throughout the food industry, but the pain can be particularly acute for K-12 operators who don't have all of the options that a restaurant has. K-12 operators are working with extremely tight budgets and can't just pay higher prices and pass those on to the students to ensure they have the products they need. Tight budgets also impact their ability to hire and keep staff, with half of K-12 decision-makers saying they can't find enough workers to hire, according to our data. They are also trying to meet stringent federal nutrition guidelines, though the government has allowed some flexibility more recently.
K-12 operators are looking for any help they can get right now, but specialty food and restaurant suppliers who want to fill that need will have to understand the segment's unique challenges. Purchase discounts and low purchase minimums are the top support options that K-12 operators say they want from suppliers. If you have a higher-priced product, make the case for it. Maybe your option is a speed-scratch product that is easy for a smaller staff to produce, or it means that an operator can drop another product that is expensive or hard to find from their purchase order. Every operator is different when it comes to how they handle shortages, with some dropping items from the menu completely, others looking for alternate suppliers, and some substituting different ingredients for their traditional option, and these tactics can differ from menu item to menu item. In the food industry overall, for instance, operators are much less likely to drop core items like eggs and dairy from the menu, but they may be able to find alternate options for chicken wings. In K-12, it's very hard to completely remove pizza from the menu, because it's just too popular with kids. And at the end of the day kids still have to like the food, and kids' palates can be very different, though if you don't work in this segment you may be surprised by the global flavors and interesting produce options found on K-12 menus."
Related: Schools Get Creative to Feed Kids Amid Shortages; Giant Foods Awards Microgrants.