Overall Rating Silver - expired
Overall Score 51.92
Liaison Katie Beitz
Submission Date May 15, 2018
Executive Letter Download

STARS v2.1

Oklahoma State University
OP-7: Food and Beverage Purchasing

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 0.74 / 6.00 Ilda Hershey
Sustainability Coordinator
OSU Physical Plant
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

This credit requires:

  • A completed STARS Food and Beverage Purchasing Inventory
  • An itemized inventory based on output from the Real Food Calculator, or
  • An alternative inventory that includes for each product:
    • Product vendor
    • Product label/brand
    • Product description
    • The category in which the product qualifies (Third Party Verified or Local & Community Based)
    • Information justifying inclusion: the standards met if the product is third party verified; ownership, size, distance, production methods for Local & Community Based products 

Part 1

Third Party Verified and Community Based Products

Percentage of dining services food and beverage expenditures on products that are third party verified under one or more recognized food and beverage sustainability standards or Local & Community-Based:
14

Part 2

Animal Products 

Does the institution wish to pursue Part 2 of this credit (expenditures on conventional animal products)? (If data is not available, respond “No”):
Yes

Percentage of total dining services food and beverage expenditures on conventional animal products (meat, poultry, fish/seafood, eggs, and dairy products that do NOT qualify in either the Third Party Verified or Local & Community-Based category):
77

Food and Beverage Purchasing Inventory

Required if pursuing either part of the credit:

A brief description of the sustainable food and beverage purchasing program, including how the sustainability impacts of products in specific categories are addressed (e.g. meat, poultry, fish/seafood, eggs, dairy, produce, tea/coffee):
OSU's University Dining Services purchases as many items from local sources as possible and considers the amount and type of packaging of new products. UDS has used CBord, Foodservice Suite and MICROS to check the purchasing and sales history of sustainable food and beverage to reduce food waste. UDS utilizes Microsoft Excel to manage the data in order to calculate the percentage of sustainable food and beverage. • Since 2009, OSU's Food & Agriculture Products Center has collaborated with UDS in sourcing locally produced products and as a result UDS has annually contracted with an average of 40 “Made In Oklahoma” companies for a wide array of food products. • In 2016, OSU purchased more than $600,000 of locally-sourced products from 37 Oklahoma businesses, including: fruits and vegetables, cage-free eggs, dairy products, breads, fresh and processed meats, honey, candy, energy bars, sauces, salsas, and peanut products. • Fair trade coffee is available across campus. Our “Farm Fresh” program features local farmers and provides healthy food choices with locally grown, refreshing, ripe flavors from fruits and vegetables. Dining Services introduces new menu items in all dining locations along with nutritional information to educate the student on the importance of sustainability and healthy eating choices.

An inventory of the institution’s sustainable food and beverage purchases that includes for each product: the description/type; label, brand or producer; and the category in which it is being counted and/or a description of its sustainability attribute(s):
A brief description of the methodology used to conduct the inventory, including the timeframe and how representative samples accounted for seasonal variation (if applicable):
US Foods generated a report of purchased items and manually identified all products sourced in Oklahoma. The Purchasing Manager reviewed each different item and vendor to determine if it was Sourced, Made, and/or certified as MIO (Made in Oklahoma w/in 250 miles) to capture subtotals of each. For other MIO vendors, a computer specialist for Food Service Suite (FSS) generated the “Purchase Summary by Rollup Group” Purchasing Report. This report was saved electronically as an Excel file. The file was sorted and grouped by Item-Vendor information to subtotal the extended cost. The Purchasing Manager reviewed each different item and vendor to determine if it was Sourced, Made, and/or certified as MIO to capture subtotals of each. The Sustainability Coordinator further evaluated the MIO products to ensure they met the Community-Based criteria as well.

If uploading output from the Real Food Calculator, provide:

Percentage of total dining services expenditures on Real Food A (0-100):
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Percentage of total dining services expenditures on Real Food B (0-100):
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Required if pursuing either part of the credit:

Which of the following food service providers are present on campus and included in the total food and beverage expenditure figures?:
Present? Included?
Dining operations and catering services operated by the institution Yes Yes
Dining operations and catering services operated by a contractor No No
Student-run food/catering services Yes No
Franchises (e.g. national or global brands) Yes No
Convenience stores Yes No
Vending services Yes No
Concessions Yes No

Optional Fields 

A brief description of purchased food and beverage products that have other sustainability attributes not recognized above :
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Additional percentage of dining services food and beverage expenditures on conventional products with other sustainability attributes not recognized above (0-100) :
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The website URL where information about the programs or initiatives is available:
Additional documentation to support the submission:
Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
Bill Moloney, Wayne Prater, Crystal Burton, University Dining Services.

The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.