Fischer Farms K-12 School Foodservice Calculator with Video Tutorial

Joseph Fischer and Chef Jeff Fell have created an easy-to-use calculator to show how serving our products can actually help you save money through increased participation rates. Joseph created a video to walk you through the process using an example from a real Central Indiana school. Below we share an easy way you can support our family farm while feeding your school fresh, local foods!

We have heard from schools that when they serve local foods, participation rates increase, and they actually see POSITIVE impacts to their budgets.

This may seem counterintuitive, but some schools have seen that even though local products may cost a little more per serving, increased participation rates mean their schools see more revenue with essentially the same overhead (staff/equipment/etc.) cost. So, the overall impact is good for budgets.

We created a spreadsheet to make it as easy to see what participation rate increase you would need to see to break even serving local!

Simply enter your school's information into the yellow cells to see key metrics for your school including:
- Cost per meal
- Cost per meat / meat alternative
- Sodium per serving
- Additional revenue
- Total budget impact

For a step-by-step walk through, click here. As you'll see in the real-life example in the video, this school only needed an 8% participation rate increase to break even. We have heard participation rates increase by as much as 25-50%+ on days when local is served!
 Read more about the ways Fischer Farms can work with you in the lunchroom here

At Fischer Farms, we are committed to supporting your mission of providing nutritious and delicious meals to students. In light of recent funding changes through the USDA , we are investing our time in learning how we can best serve our customers in the next school year.

We have dedicated ourselves to understanding your unique needs and challenges. Here’s how we’ve been working to assist you:

• Distribution Navigation
• Ordering Assistance
• Cost-Saving Strategies
• Culinary On-Site Training

We provide free resources to support you every step of the way with no-cost resources, support, and guidance.
We look forward to continuing our partnership to nourish and educate our students as we look at ways to continue the farm to school momentum we have all built!

Read more about our strategies here.