Ramen Sales

Equipment

 * (2)Hot plates. One is a ceramic top from Mary’s classroom and the other is a coil type that  Mary has in her storage/lab prep room,
 * (2) big aluminum stock pots,
 * 2 coffee carafes- Mary’s
 * 1 or 2 Pyrex (glass) 3-5 cup measures. The glass Pyrex cups were Pam's. Useful for moving Hot 	water
 * 3 Coffee percolator urns - 1 is owned by Pam. The other 2 coffee urns were found in the 	concession stand. (Check the week before to see if they are still there.)   Mary also has 	one in her storage room. [Did not use  Mary’s in 2016]
 * 1 or 2 - 50 foot extension cords -in the Robotics equipment storage
 * 1 multi plug for outlet – in the Robotics equipment storage
 * 2 oven gloves for handling hot lids – Pam brought her own
 * 1 wash cloth to clean up counters and table. Some dish soap.
 * 2 cash boxes
 * Kristen Glaser let us borrow her electric tea kettle. [Did not need in Sept 2016]. It heats up very quickly but is small.
 * Mary has a big media cart to store and transport all the Ramen and equipment to the concession stand. The cart can stay in the concession storage room and keep our supplies on it. The concession stand will get used for other events throughout the week at night.

Set up

 * Lead person Arrive by 9:15. (Rest of Adult Crew arrive at 10:00AM) Go directly to concession stand and start all the water heating, get big pots going first. Takes about 45 minutes to get it boiling. Coffee urns take about 25 min to get boiling hot. If there are smaller Mr. Coffee makers present, you can use them to quickly heat water and add that hot water to the water in the big pots to hurry things up.
 * THEN Go get any supplies you need in Mrs. Rutland’s room and the cash boxes. After getting supplies down to the concession stand, Adult crew will start arriving about 10:00. They can start setting up Ramen varieties, unwrapping plastic wrapped cups ahead of time. Set out Fortune cookies, chopsticks, forks, hot sauces. Place a still wrapped sample of each available Ramen flavor on the counter for the customers to see.


 * Be careful not to leave the cash boxes unattended.


 * NOTE: Could not sell anything but Ramen in Sept 2016. No Drinks, no cookie cake pieces.


 * February 2016--Small cart with 3 – 4 gallons of pre-made, cold beverage. Lemonade 2, Tea 2 gallons. We sold about 3 gallons each day. If you had a big plastic/glass dispenser with spigot, with real lemon slices floating in it, you would probably sell more if they thought it was fresh. You can make with Real Lemon juice and sugar or Just use Country Time powder (yellow) though.  Mary makes tea in her little Hot Pot. I don’t know the recipe but make it during Robotics dinnertime. It will probably be during build weeks when parents are providing dinner.

Supplies
September 2016
 * Sold all the cups at $1.00 Cost .26 cents at Walmart. Might be able to find at a wholesaler also.

Ramen

 * about 300 cups per day. Could only sell 3 days, on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.

Favorites

 * 1st- Hot & Spicy Chicken, 20 flats--240
 * 2nd-Hot & Spicy Beef,        16 flats - 192
 * 3rd-Chicken, 		   15 flats -180
 * 4th-Hot & Spicy Shrimp,   10 flats -120
 * 5th- Beef		    10 flats -120
 * 6th- Shrimp		      4 flats – 48
 * Maybe one or two Lime Chicken flats sold but really only because we ran out of the favorites.
 * Tortilla Chicken did not sell well at all.
 * Don’t Get Mac n Cheese. It is disgusting and several were returned at February 2016 sale.
 * The only other flavor you might purchase to sell is Shin. It is a favorite but not offered in the Maruchan Brand or in cups. I’ve only seen Shin Bowls during September, 2016 at stores. It cost more so you would need to charge more.
 * Bowls are not a good seller because of higher price.

Related Supplies

 * Also need a super large box of Forks –from Sams or Costco
 * About 4-5 packages of chopsticks (80-100 per package) found at HMart
 * Fortune cookies. I found 25 for .99 cents at HMart.  Get about 200 per day. NOT REQUIRED but fun.
 * AND a variety of hot sauces. Sriracha, (big bottle) Texas Pete, etc.  We usually have a collection in the Robotics room.
 * The cafeteria manager doesn’t like the students taking his forks and hot sauce packs when they didn’t buy a lunch from him.

Previous Sale February 2016: Notes
(two order lines/2 cash boxes work great. 4-5 Students each lunch shift (4 lunches, A < B > C > D)
 * Hot & Spicy Chicken cups
 * Shin cups
 * Chicken cups
 * Spicy Beef cups
 * Shrimp cups
 * 2 x either 8 or 12  bowls cases Spicy Chicken bowls
 * 1 case Hot and Spicy bowls
 * H Mart was a good source. Try to avoid the Cup of Noodles (Walmart and Kroger/Publix); require unwrapping.
 * Bowls are not a good seller.
 * You will get some different flavors also from donations brought in.
 * Bought 9 cookie cakes from Sam’s Club. Cut it into 42 pieces (6x7) Sold $1.00 each,  Sold 2 each day and only bought one for Friday so we would sell out.  *Order ahead of time and pick up maybe 4 at a time unless parent will pick up and pay for them. $20 each (incls tax) I had parents “adopt” a cookie cake, or two and either pick up themselves or I would pick them up if they sent a check into Mary (payable to PRSH Robotics Booster Club)
 * Pam Karlins also offered to pick up Ramen for people if they would send a check in. This could work nicely so that you don’t get anything that won’t sell. (Mac n Cheese Raman…is gross)
 * You can start having people send in Ramen in December. It will last until February sale date. We can store it in Mary’s lab storage room.
 * We had a lot of bowls leftover by Thursday so we marked them down to $1.50 and then on Friday if they ordered a cup flavor we didn’t have but we had in a bowl size, we gave them a bowl for $1.00 instead of $1.50 or the original price $2.
 * Need napkins for cookie slices and cups (16 oz) for drinks. Cut the cookie cakes the night or morning before you get to school. Saves time. It seems to be a challenge for some people to get them even, me included, so I take my time at home.
 * Cash Box $100 in One’s, if only selling $1.00 cups. If selling something for $1.25 or $1.50, add 3 rolls of quarters to the starting till. Mrs Rutland has a cash box. Split that till between the two cash boxes.  Note exactly how much you start with in your till. Subtract till amount from your end of day cash box total for total sales that day.
 * Running: Need 2-3 adults per day. 2 at the counter taking orders and payment and one making hot water. You can run this with 2 adults – One Adult and one experienced Student taking orders and payment, And 1 Adult making hot water.

Student Helpers

 * Have one Student be the Expeditor: Cashier calls out the order. Expeditor pulls the cup and hands it to a student/filler to fill with hot water. That student who filled the cup places the cup on the counter to the customer.
 * 2016 we had 5 students scheduled for each lunch shift. Sometimes one would not show up. All lunch periods were equally busy. 6 students are toooo many and make it too crowded in concession stand.


 * Feb. 2015 we only had 2 students for “D” lunch but it also wasn’t a busy lunch. “A” lunch was the busiest.
 * 2016 we had 5 students scheduled. Sometimes one would not show up. All lunch periods were equally busy.

Regulating hot water
Staffing with Students -One of the student officers gets the students to sign up for shifts and makes a schedule sheet and then posts it and sends in a message to team students. Have that person provide you a schedule arranged so you can see who is coming for each shift. When the students show up for their shift, check off who showed up. Give a copy to Mrs Rutland at the end of sale and keep a copy for yourself in case she loses it. Students work their shift first and then as it slows down, they can go eat their own lunch if they want while the adults take care of rest of customers.
 * Making enough hot water. One adult keeps making hot water. (This is not a Student Job) The hot plates with big stock pots and all but one coffee urn is placed on back counter.
 * Place 1 urn and the permanently installed hot water dispenser near the front of concession stand for the students to fill up the ramen cups. [2 Coffee urns near the front if the permanently installed hot water dispenser has been removed.] Also place 2 coffee maker carafes (6-8 cup size) on the back edge of the table for 2 other students to fill raman cups with.
 * The adult making water keeps moving hot water up to the front into the coffee urn and the carafes on the table.
 * The adult making water needs to manage the making and moving of hot water. When a stock pot or urn at the back of the concession stand gets to boiling, move it out of that pot/urn and fill the pot/urn back up with tap water so it will be boiling by the next lunches. The urns will boil sooner because of lesser volume. You might move boiling water out of an urn and add part of it to a stock pot to get the stock pot boiling faster. It might take some practice to keep from running out of hot water.
 * ALSO; if the permanently installed hot water dispenser is still in the concession stand, be aware that it runs out of hot water and will need to cycle to make more. It will Dispense Luke Warm water that is not hot enough for the Ramen so make sure the students are paying attention to that. Put a cup or sign/paper over the handle if you know it is no longer hot, so the students know not to use it. I think it takes about 15 minutes to get hot again.
 * Bring blank paper, Sharpie marker, ink pen and latest, printed student schedule and masking tape.
 * When you clean up each day, you may leave the equipment that belongs to the Robotics team on the cart inside the storage closet in the concession stand and also leave extra Ramen on the cart. Make a sign that says Robotics and tape it to the cart.


 * Count the money in Mrs. Rutland’s back room. Let her know the total each day. Don’t forget to subtract the starting till from the total. She will keep the money in her desk. Set up your cash box with the starting till again ($100.00 one dollar bills) so you are ready for the next morning.
 * You will split that till between the two cash boxes.
 * Have a GREAT Ramen Sale!