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D. J. Co-Ops Great Lakes Co-op Lansing, MI November 18, 2004. Advantages of a Commodity Co-op. Every food item you buy, except commodities, you order what you want, when you want it, delivered where you want it, from whom you want.
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Advantages of a Commodity Co-op Every food item you buy, except commodities, you order what you want, when you want it, delivered where you want it, from whom you want. If the item is processed you get the item you want, from the processor you want, without back hauling. Why are commodities the exception?
Commodity Class 101 Basic Commodity Information “A” Commodities are beef, chicken, eggs, turkey, pork, fruits and vegetables.
“B” Commodities are cheese, oils, peanut butter and grains. These commodities are offered to the state as a checkbook, each state may spend as much money as they want on as many items as they want.
Bonus commodities are just as listed, they are sometimes A items and sometimes B items. If USDA needs to make a special buy for a variety of reasons the product is offered as a bonus and does not come out of entitlement dollars.
Each district is given an entitlement of dollars on which they can spend toward commodity items. The entitlement amount is determined by multiplying the previous year’s average daily participation with the designated rate. A state may restrict the dollars spent between A and B commodities, USDA does not.
States use a “fair market value (FMV)” established by USDA to establish the “price” of each commodity that will be charged against a districts’ entitlement. The amount spent of a district’s entitlement is then reported quarterly by the PAL (Planned Assistance Level) report.
All commodities must be offered to each eligible agency on a fair share basis. Once the commodities have been offered, each state determines how to handle the commodities that are not taken by some agencies and how to allocate the difference between the FMV and the price actually paid.
Processing Many districts cannot use commodities in the form they come from USDA, or a better form is available for processors. A district cannot use a truckload (40,000#) of fresh chicken but a processor would rather have fresh chickens than frozen.
Non-Processed Non-processed (brown box) commodities may be ordered in the format the districts wants. As an example you may have any combination of potato rounds, french fries, potato triangles or fresh potatoes to a processor.
A processor must complete an End Product Data Schedule (EPDS) and have it approved by the state. This schedule, among other things, shows the amount of each commodity used toward a finished product and the value of the commodity per case.
The value of the commodity is passed back to the school district by either a rebate, fee for service or Net Off Invoice (NOI).
Benefits When done correctly a Co-Op is able to do the following things: • Offer direct delivery of commodities to each school in a district. • Offer delivery on the same truck as a scheduled delivery. • Offer delivery on a more frequent basis. • Have the product delivered to a storeroom instead of left on the dock.
The members pick the processors they want, if any. • The members pick the products they want from the processor. • Bids or RFP’s for all products are done by the Co-Op instead of each individual district. • Trade commodities within a Co-Op as if each member was an individual school in the same district.
Advantages of a Commodity Co-Op • Never run out of commodity chicken • 25 different commodity chicken choices • Never run out of commodity turkey • Never run out of commodity pizza (NFDM) • Unlimited commodity burrito’s, grilled cheese, cheese sauce, block cheese, sliced cheese, shredded cheese, indeed all cheese products.
How to Maximize your “PAL” • Know what you are getting 6 months in advance • Know what bonus items are coming • Get Value Pass Through (VPT) approved • Use NFDM as much as possible • Use Combo beef when available
Delivery Costs $250 total stop minimum $2.00 pick-up at GFS $2.50 for multiple stop, multiple times, processed items $2.75 for multiple stop, multiple times brown box items No Cost for NOI items $.30 D J Coops
Contact Us Rick De Burgh Lunchlady@msn.com (800) 441-6067 25115 Ave Stanford B-135 Valencia, CA 91355 www.djcoops.com