This new school year, the Freedom Area School District has been experiencing not only the usual change in classes this year or the new elementary school down the road, but a new drink brand and food service director. Our previous food service director, Dawn Fronius, who retired this year, is gone and to take her place is Riverside’s food service director, Randy Walker. Here at Freedom, we have been using the brand, for our selections of orange juice, apple juice, milks and assorted teas .
Starting this new school year, we will be using Marburger Farm Dairy Inc., located in Evans City, Pa.
“Marburger Dairy is a local company that expressed a great amount of interest in providing us with milk service. We made the decision to allow multiple companies to bid on Freedom School Districts milk service. In the end, we felt [Marburger] could best meet the District’s needs.” food service director Randy Walker said.
Freedom isn’t switching to a different brand because the quality wasn’t up to par, or because the Marburger milk price is lower, because milk prices are set by state. The reason is because Marburger has lower juice prices. This small change in juice pricing will most likely benefit FASD in the end.
“The switch is an excellent move financially for the district. Although the price of the milk will be unchanged, Marburger has given us better pricing on fruit juices. The district will be saving money which can be used towards other needs,” Walker said.
The first concern of the students and faculty will be about the quality of the new product and if Marburger Farm Dairy’s products are the same quality of our former brand, Colteryahn Dairy.
“I believe we received a quality product in the past and Marburger will deliver the same quality as we’re all used to receiving,” Walker said.
Many students and staff are affected by these changes, whether they liked last years drinks, or not. There will be people who liked the quality that Colteryahn offered, and wished we stuck with it, and there will be others who will love the new change to Marburger.
“I like the Lemon flavored tea, it’s the best in my personal opinion. I believe the teas and other drinks have improved significantly from last year. Last years tea either had a bitter taste to it, or no taste at all, overall I think Freedom benefitted from this change big time!” Junior Sydney Stiger said.
“I don’t think the milk has improved too much, although, I do think there’s a little difference in the milk, and it’s a good one. The change in the quality of the teas, however, is a lot more prevalent and they taste so much better this year,” Senior Samantha Schermerhorn said.
At the end of the day, change is a part of life, big or small, bad or good. This small change in our everyday meal routine is benefiting Freedom in a significant way. It saves us money for other needs, without losing the quality we had before.