Looking to increase your local purchases but not sure where to start? Join Michael Webster, the general manager of dining at the Hotchkiss School in Connecticut, and Rachel Harb, the training coordinator at Massachusetts Farm to School, for a one-hour webinar focusing on velocity reports for campus dining service. Learn how to amplify your purchasing power and streamline the planning process with practical data gathering and velocity report analysis. Mike leads participants step-by-step through the process, using chicken purchasing as an example. Find out how velocity reports and strategic planning powered the Hotchkiss School to source 100% of their chicken locally. Next, Rachel shares how Chicopee Public Schools use velocity reports to buy more local food. You’ll come away with tips to analyze your local food buy and balance the budget after selecting higher priced local products. This webinar is designed specifically for dining service managers, chefs, and purchasing coordinators at institutions in New England and beyond. The Getting Down to Details webinar series is designed to improve the way New England's farm and sea to campus supply chain works and is co-hosted by the New England Farm & Sea to Campus Network and Farm to Institution New England.

1. GETTING DOWN TO DETAILS:
HOW TO USE VELOCITY REPORTS TO UP YOUR
GAME ON SOURCING LOCAL FOOD
NOVEMBER 15, 2017

2. INTERACTIVE FEATURES
Q&ACHAT

3. Michael Webster
General Manager
The Hotchkiss School
mwebster@hotchkiss.org
Rachel Harb
Training & Events Coordinator
Mass. Farm to School
rachel@massfarmtoschool.org
SPEAKERS
Dana Stevens
Event & Project Manager
Farm to Institution New England
dana@farmtoinst.org
Kaitlin Haskins
Communications Manager
Farm to Institution New England
kaitlin@farmtoinst.org

4. I. INTRODUCTION
II. VELOCITY REPORTS 101
III. LESSONS LEARNED
IV. Q&A
V. CONCLUSION
TODAY’S OUTLINE
Photo courtesy of Intervale Food Hub

5. INTRODUCTION
PART 1 OF 5

6. ABOUT FINE
Our mission is to mobilize
the power of institutions to
transform our food system.
www.farmtoinstitution.org

7. ABOUT THE FSCN
The New England Farm & Sea to Campus
Network is a community of higher education and
food systems stakeholders who connect, share,
and collaborate to develop transparent regional
supply chains and educate campus communities
about regional food systems.

8. VELOCITY
REPORTS 101
PART 2 OF 5

9. General Manager,
Hotchkiss School Dining
MICHAEL WEBSTER

10. HOTCHKISS DINING OVERVIEW
● Real Food Challenge Goal of 20% “REAL” food by 2020.
(http://www.realfoodchallenge.org/)
● Hotchkiss achieved a 60% RFC score in FY17
● We purchase 100% of our land-based proteins from farmers within 250 miles
● We have a 280 acre campus farm that supplies 6.5% of our annual produce to the
kitchen and engages the school community in the complexity of agricultural
systems.
● We spend $700,000 of the $1.2 million food budget in our local (100mi) economy
or 60%.
● We have maintained a flat per-student operating budget, meaning that this
model could be adapted and applied by other institutions in New England.
● We hope to encourage others to rethink how much their own dining departments
can accomplish by partnering with local producers and using farms and food as a
way of educating their communities on what a “sustainable” future could be.

11. “The Secret of Getting
Ahead is Getting Started”
- Mark Twain

12. ● FSCM: Proprietary software tools for velocity reporting
● Self-Op: Request broadline vendors to provide excel
spreadsheets showing all purchases, including item
description, quantity, and total $ spent
KNOW THY NUMBERSSTEP
ONE

13. EXAMPLE: THE HOTCHKISS SCHOOL CHICKEN PURCHASES

14. YOU’VE GOT THE DATA!
NOW WHAT?
● Filter items based on volume
● Low volume/high variance items
(i.e. jelly)
● High volume/low variance items
(i.e. chicken)
STEP
TWO

15. CRUNCHING THE NUMBERS:
VOLUME & VARIANCE

16. MAKING THE SWAP
● Identify where you can find savings
in regularly sourced items
● Analyze actual savings from actual
usage
● Ask: “Where are my spend dollars
going?”
STEP
THREE

17. NEGOTIATE DIRECTLY
WITH PRODUCERS
● Identify your buying power when negotiating
directly with farmers and producers
● Develop personal relationships for meaningful
negotiations and fair pricing
● Understand contract opportunities
● Leverage bulk buy opportunities
STEP
FOUR

18. DO A GUT CHECK
● Review variance of projected vs. actual purchased items
● Draw financial conclusions on cost of transition
● Look for other opportunities for transition
STEP
FIVE

19. THE BOTTOM LINE: IT’S A WIN/WIN

20. LESSONS LEARNED
PART 3 OF 5

21. RACHEL DUTTON HARB
Mass. Farm to School
Training & Events Coordinator
&
Chicopee Public Schools
Farm to School Coordinator
Role:
● Go-between with farmers / vendors / distributors /
school food service director & kitchen staff
● Write school lunch menus
● Run local food audits for Chicopee and neighboring
districts - Often tracking data as an outsider

22. PRESENTATION OVERVIEW:
1. Lessons Learned
2. Requesting Data
3. Reading the Velocity Report
4. Interpreting the Data
5. Projecting Out

23. LESSONS LEARNED
1) Define “local” (or “regional” or “sustainable”) before you start.
2) Milk is a special case.
• Fluid milk in New England gets from “farm to you” within 48 hours - is local/regional by nature.
• You can generally count fluid milk as local, but consider separating it out from local food to place the
emphasis on food/bev shifts where volume is within your control. In Chicopee Schools we generally
say annually we’re sourcing 16% local food, and 29% total local including fluid milk.
3) Baseline audits tend to show we’re buying less local than we think.
• Most districts I’ve encountered are sourcing 1% local at the beginning (excluding milk). No shame in
that, but good to know so we can do something about that!

24. DEFINITION OF LOCAL
Ex: for Chicopee Schools, local = grown and processed within
New England and/or within 250-miles of Chicopee

25. DEFINITION OF LOCAL
FSNE’s “50 by 60” campaign
Supported by the Henry P. Kendall Foundation
Download a copy at www.foodsolutionsne.org

26. REQUESTING DATA
Get a list of all vendors/distributors and a contact for each one.
• It’s helpful if the Food Service Director or school contact is CCed on email correspondences.
Call or email the vendor contacts and ask for a velocity report covering
the last full fiscal year.
• In it, request a detailed report that has item descriptions, total dollars spent for each item, and
dates to run (I use July 1-June 30 for a full fiscal year).

27. SAMPLE EMAIL TO VENDORS
Hi __[Sale Rep]__,
My name is ____ and I’m ___[your role / affiliation with the school]. I was hired to conduct a local food
audit for ____[Food Service Director’s name / school].
Essentially this means taking a “snapshot” of ___[school]’s current purchasing from __[vendor] and
other vendors to determine total dollars spent (overall) and total dollars spent on local/regionally
produced foods (defined as ___[your definition]).
What I’m looking for from you is a detailed velocity report that has item descriptions and total dollars
spent for each item. The dates to run are ___[ fiscal year dates or whatever range you need].
My deadline is ___. Would it be possible for you to send me the document within the next few days?
Thanks, and all the best,
[You]

28. READING THE VELOCITY REPORT
Scan through the food/bev products and pick out the local ones.
• Most prepared products are not local or are unverifiable.
• Whole ingredients (produce, eggs, meat) and dairy products are easier to trace back to origin.
Expect to do some research - especially at the beginning.
Subtract any non-food items from your total food budget.
• Do not count them as local or not local. Just omit them entirely.

29. SAMPLE VELOCITY REPORT

30. SAMPLE VELOCITY REPORT

31. INTERPRETING THE DATA
Velocity Report → Local Food Audit
• Take the data you receive from the vendors and put it into a pretty excel chart. The point is to
know how much $ was spent on ALL food and then how much of that was spent on local foods.
Then calculate the % local at the end.
• Pro Tip: Ask the Food Service Director what they know off the top of their heads is local so you
can keep an eye out for them in the velocity reports. Distributors may be able to identify local, but
their definition of local may not align with yours.

34. DETAILED LOCAL FOOD AUDIT

35. PROJECTING OUT

36. PROJECTING OUT
Ex. Local Applesauce
• Minimum Delivery (1 Pallet): 36 Cases
• Case Specs: 8 64-oz pouches (shelf stable)
• Case Price: $38.40/case, $0.075/ounce
• Avg. Monthly Chicopee Order: 40 Cases
• $38.40 X 40 Cases = $1,536.00 per month
• $1,536.00 X 10 months = $15,360.00 per year

37. YOU CAN DO THIS!
And I’m here to help.
You can reach me at:
rachel@massfarmtoschool.org

38. Q & A
PART 4 OF 5

39. CONCLUSION
PART 5 OF 5

40. GET INVOLVED!
Photo courtesy of Intervale Food Hub
1. Join a Farm & Sea to Campus Network
working group:
www.farmtoinstitution.org/farm-campus
2. Tell us what other webinar topics you
want to see covered! Email:
campus@farmtoinst.org
3. Sign up for the FINE and FSCN
newsletters:
www.farmtoinstitution.org/farm-campus

41. STAY IN TOUCH!
campus@farmtoinst.org
VISIT OUR WEBSITE:
www.farmtoinstitution.org
FOLLOW UP
Photo courtesy of Intervale Food Hub
CONNECT WITH US
Facebook:
www.facebook.com/FarmtoInstitutionNewEngland
www.facebook.com/groups/NEFSCN
Twitter: @Farm2Inst

42. THANKS FOR
JOINING US
TODAY!
Photo: Hampshire College