These were all of our initial steps in the creation of the stand. My first set up, my first donation idea, and our first receipt of all of our products from which Mrs. Schmidt bought with her own money.
This was the setup for the magnet fair. At the fair, we made coffee for the first time, which was a bit of a challenge. But, we watched a youtube tutorial and were able to make it pretty well. All of the prices were bumped up per Mrs. Schmidt since there were going to be a lot of people there.
One problem I faced was the fact that our table was stuck in the athletic trainer's car, so instead of losing a day of selling, I chose to use the circle table that was already in Mrs. Schmidt's office. The other one was this woman who is buying from Jhymari and I. She made some comments about how a hot dog cost $3 and asked, "Is it because you are a fancy magnet school?" I told her that they were the price, it didn't matter the school. Only if she knew how much our school's athletic department was struggling.
These were a few of the emails that Mrs. Nguyen, the old Marketing teacher that taught here at SMSA. I asked her if she could send out a link for my GoFundMe page to the alumni since she had practically all of the older student's emails.
I tried to start a GoFundMe page to raise money for the All-State banner. In the "My Story" section of the page, I talked about this project and how I wanted these athletes to have their names remembered after defying the odds. I sent the link to SMSA Athletics to try and get the word out, along with various emails to both Mrs. Nguyen and Mrs. Boutelier. I didn't set the account up right, so I ended up losing $185. After being devastated, a mother of a past student had emailed me and told me that I could always talk to her if I needed anything.
This is the first rough draft of what the banner would look like once finished. I am planning on making several changes, one of the first being to get rid of the yellow color and make it black.
Taking inventory and counting money is a big part of running the concession stands. I have sit in Mrs. Schmidt's office counting money and rolling quarters for hours. Especially on half days when there is a home game. I have been Mrs. Schmidt's personal assistant practically all year, but when it was finals week of the first semester, she needed me more than ever. I took care of everything: the drinks, the food, the money for the gate, the money for the stand. The drinks are sometimes a challenge for me because the sodas are usually in a cooler that doesn't have wheels, and it can get pretty heavy.
I was able to sit down with Mrs. Schmidt and go through all of the archives for the All-State athletes in Connecticut over the years to try and find candidates for the banner. We were, however, missing several years for a lot of the sports that we needed. So, I have to find the remaining names in order to save as much money as possible.
This is the final draft of the banner.