2024 - Your Commission at Work

Foodservice Marketing

IFPA School Foodservice Partner X-Change

This past February, the International Fresh Produce Association (IFPA) coordinated a series of “speed dating” meetings to connect produce companies with menu planners and procurement officials from several major city U.S. school districts. NCSPC participated in half a dozen meetings over two days. The program was developed to enhance the produce industry’s understanding of this unique, large-volume foodservice customer and to create opportunities to increase children’s access to and consumption of fresh fruits and vegetables at school. The program connected us with schools during 15-minute “speed dating” meetings, all coordinated over Zoom. School administrators get to ask us questions and share information about a range of topics including menu planning, procurement, packaging needs, and their interest in nutrition education and other materials that provide greater insight into where and how certain produce is grown. We shared our knowledge of the sweetpotato industry, while also highlighting our capabilities and delicious and nutritious state vegetable. Increasing the variety of fresh produce that students are exposed to at school is a shared priority with IFPA, and this ‘speed dating’ program was a great instrument in jump-starting these types of conversations, innovative ideas, and new partnerships. Kids are next-generation consumers, but they are also today’s consumers and the Commission feels they are an important target in which to keep investing.

Participating schools with whom we met included Baltimore City Public Schools (MD), Boston Public Schools (MA), Cleveland Metro Schools (OH), Fairfax County Public Schools (VA), Florida POWER Buying Group (FL), and St. Louis Public Schools (MO).

International Foodservice Editors Conference (IFEC)

For the third consecutive year, we attended the IFEC annual conference and met with foodservice editors to talk about recipes and ideas for their upcoming issues. This year’s conference was held in Louisville, Kentucky which proved to be an ideal setting to meet chefs and foodies and help educate them on the versatility of sweetpotatoes in the foodservice space. We were able to supercharge our impact as an item sponsor in the attendee goodie bag, as well as teach eventgoers that “sweetpotato is one word” through our attendee Wi-Fi sponsorship, which, you guessed it – had “sweetpotatoisoneword” as the password. As we said, if you want Wi-Fi, you are going to have to spell it right!

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