Juice, food prices put the squeeze on cafeteria budgets

Who knew lentils cost so much?  Who knew schools were being squeezed by juice prices?

While much has been made of the rising costs of fuel, electricity and other essentials of providing a sound education, food prices are not nearly gaining the same amount of attention.

Yet, as school food service directors will report, food prices are skyrocketing.

RCS Food Service Director George Dardani said his food bills for the district’s approximately 2,300 students have jumped 5 to 6 percent in the past year with some individual product prices spiking at a much greater rate.

For example, Dardani said, cooking oil’s cost has increased from $32.02  for six, 1 gallon jugs to $41.61 – a 30 percent increase.

Other examples of product price increases include juice, which has increased 39 percent, from $6.02 for 72 count packages of 4 ounce containers to $8.42; and lentils, which have increased 25 percent, up to $15.10 per 20 pound box.

In addition, the district faces an average delivery surcharge of $5 for each shipment. The surcharges have been imposed by the suppliers to deal with the rising fuel costs, he said.

“Just like a homemaker, I try to shop around and buy the best quality at the lowest price,” he said.

However, unlike a homemaker, Dardani and other school food services directors don’t have flexibility in their budgets because under state regulations, food services is independent of a district’s general fund expenditures. In other words, the food services department is supposed to be self supporting.

Dardani said that at this time, there are no plans to increase the price of student meals – which are $1.25 for breakfast and $1.75 for lunch- or reduce the quality of foods.

“I don’t plan to stop offering fresh foods or healthy foods or reduce the quality of what we offer,” Dardani said. 

Rather, he said, his budget will have to” eat the costs” for now.