Business and economics classes market CBA merchandise
From January 13th through January 16th, Mr. Santos’ two business classes and his honors economic class marketed their custom CBA products to members of the student body and the faculty.
With each class being given $1,000 and a goal of making a profit, they had to come up with an idea that would both be inexpensive to manufacture, but still popular amongst the students.
They spent class periods discussing potential products and price points, and even rejecting some of those ideas and starting from scratch. In the end, each class eventually came up with their own product that they thought would both earn a profit and beat out the other two classes.
“In the back of Mr. Santos’ room, there was a shirt from 10 years ago and we wanted to bring that style back, and eventually we decided to combine that style with the Barstool style to design our t-shirt,” said senior Jack Hipschman, who helped design the Colt Crazies t-shirt.
Once the product had come in, the sale price for each product had to be determined, and whether or not the price would decrease after a couple of days had passed. Each class had to figure out what the most expensive price would be, that would still make students want to buy their merchandise without it being too expensive.
“We had reached out to a manufacturer overseas who would make and sell the flags at a reasonable price for our budget. When we got them, they came in the plastic bags all folded and everything,” commented Jack Rosenberg, who produced the CBA flags along with the rest of his business class.
But the process did not just end with thinking of what to sell and how to market it to the CBA students and faculty. After coming up with the idea, each class would have to reach out to a manufacturing company and a shipping company to make their product, and then to export it to CBA.
Then, after everything had been set in stone, it was finally time to start selling. As students walked in on Monday morning, there was a table with the flags right by the library, with a table of the Colt Crazies T-Shirt right behind it. There were salesmen in the cafeteria trying to sell the “I Love Jesus” sweatshirts and wristbands to the large crowd.
Trying to make as many sales as possible, the suppliers went around trying to find another customer before school, after school, and even during lunch periods. It was clear that each class wanted to earn the most money for their products, which would be donated to a charity of their choice.
Each class got to choose where their proceeds would be going to after the final sale had been made. The business class selling the CBA flags is donating their money to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, which is trying to prevent and cure Type 1 Diabetes by decreasing its burdens and complications.
The business class selling the Colt Crazies T-Shirts is giving their money to the Miracle Foundation, an organization helping orphaned children in Third World countries, such as Uganda, Ethiopia, and Sri Lanka. Lastly, the economics class selling the “I Love Jesus” sweatshirts and wristbands are sending their earnings to Michael’s Feat which provides financial aid to seriously ill newborn babies.
Overall, this process is meant to be a learning experience for the business and economics classes. They get experience with designing, producing, and selling products to a specific audience. They learned to create a product that will appeal to their target audience while still being affordable.
“The students learn many aspects of running their own business such as research and development, production and operations, and sales and marketing,” said Mr. Santos, the teacher of the classes selling their CBA merchandise.
Because of this one week in the school year, it gives students some practice with business and economics which they might use in college and in their everyday lives. It gave some underclassmen ideas for products that they might sell when they are seniors. Finally, this also shows the determination of the CBA students while preparing them for their lives after graduation.
