Smoothie King Comes to East

As of March 15, SM East’s cafeteria and the other four SMSD high schools now offer 12-ounce Smoothie King smoothies on Thursday lunches for $2.50.

“We are the leading school,” said Jan Buckley, SM East’s Cafeteria Manager. “Last Thursday, we sold 507.”

One of those 507 non-dairy smoothies was bought by junior Anna Colby. Colby, who usually packs her lunch but will buy water or milk from the cafeteria, is enthusiastic about one of her favorite smoothie shops becoming available for its relatively low price at East.

“It’s a really good price because they’re more than that at the store,” Colby said.

The smoothies are prepared with double-filtered water and ice, are gluten-free, and use 100 percent Natural Fruit, Fruit Juice and Condensed Fruit Purees. Each smoothie is delivered with a red straw in a Styrofoam cup which lists its ingredients.

This spring, Smoothie King approached the SMSD to launch a school lunch program. After sampling with the other cafeteria managers, Buckley agreed that the program would do well within the SMSD.

“We just thought, well, the kids might like that, so let’s try it and see,” Buckley said.

Smoothie King offers its lunch services across the SMSD, visiting one of the five high schools each weekday. Jill Funk, the SMSD’s Food Service Department’s Nutritionist, acknowledges the students’ enthusiasm for Smoothie King’s pilot semester.

“What we’re doing right now is a trial but we’ll evaluate it and continue on for next year if the interest is there,” Funk said.

Profits from items sold goes toward the food service’s operation costs: purchasing new equipment for the kitchens or paying salaries. Funk encourages students to make suggestions on what items they may want to purchase.

“We always encourage student input with new ideas and suggestions for food items and we take that into account when vendors come to us,” Funk said. “If we like those items, then we’ll put them on the menu if the students like them as well.”