Selah Neal

Seniors Jake Wyatt and Gabe Johns sell shaved ice from their business Arctic Labs, March 20.

The Economics fair, a tradition and right of passage of a senior year is a beloved, communal annual event. The smell of pulled pork and barbecue sauce fills the cafeteria. Friends meet up, share frozen sour lemonades, and save spots for each other in line. The sound of conversation is spread throughout the room. Seniors compete to see which booth will sell the most product in the short 45-minute period, March 20.

Civics and Economics teacher Robert Foshee supervised and helped prepare students for their busy day. The Econ Fair is a project created to teach about entrepreneurship and how to create, market, and sell a product. 

 

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This year’s 17th Econ Fair featured dozens of booths, selling items from ice cream sandwiches to iced cold brews to grilled cheese sandwiches, and even tie-dyed T-shirts.

Students from grades 6-12 and school staff participated in buying goods from the booths. For 45 minutes, the cafeteria overflowed with lines of buyers. The goal for the entrepreneurs was to sell as much of their product as possible. To do this, seniors designed flyers, advertised on Instagram, and handed out free samples to attract customers.

A key component of marketing is aesthetic appeal. Bright colors, bold letters, and humor help build the customer pool.

“My favorite part about the econ fair is the beautiful drinks that were made,” Junior Lyla Hinton said. “I also liked the Scoopies booth with ice cream sandwiches, they were very visually appealing.”

Not only were students allowed to participate in the event, but teachers could too. Buying their current and past student’s goods, teachers were able to contribute to the success of the senior’s businesses. First-year Bible and English teacher Brian Butler shares his experience at his first Fresno Christian Econ Fair.

“It was busy, but there was a good variety of food. It met my expectations,” Butler said. “The food and entertainment were also good.”

Students were graded based on their presentation, advertisement, budgeting, prototypes, and reflection paper. This gave students a chance to prepare for real-world scenarios. Economics teacher Robert Foshee gives a little more depth of what went into the preparation for this econ fair.

“The main part of our entrepreneurship is having a partnership and within that the students take many weeks or even months to prepare their product,” Foshee said. “During the preparation, students figure out what market they want to market to, budgeting for their product, and they participate in focus groups to see what kind of changes they need to make to their product.”

Out of all the booths, Squealin’ Sandwiches gained the most revenue from their product. The combo meal consisted of pulled pork sandwiches, rice and iced tea for only $8. Although the meals were inexpensive, they were the highest revenue grossing $408 from their sales. 

“It felt great to bring in the most revenue out of all the booths because our rival booth, Philly Street Booth only made a couple of dollars in revenue.” said Senior Luke Portale.

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Selah Neal

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