“Breakfast Battle” Helps Fill Pantries

Latham’s team in the Breakfast Battle consisted of John Latham, Keri Subbert and Laura Cunningham. - Photo Courtesy of Deb Brown

“Racing through the grocery store” took on new meaning as Latham Hi-Tech Seeds and nine other county businesses competed Friday in the first ever Breakfast Battle, sponsored by Franklin County Farm Bureau.  This event was held in honor of National Food Check-Out Week, which celebrates the abundance and safety of America’s food supply plus helps kick off March National Nutrition Month.

Team members met at Fareway in Hampton, Iowa at 8 a.m. to see who could find everything on their shopping lists in a record amount of time.  According to contest rules, each team had to meal plan a breakfast, lunch and dinner.  Then they had to turn in their shopping lists before they were “on the clock.”  The objective was to see which could purchase all of their groceries in the least amount of time.  When they got to the checkout, the cost of the grocery items had to total between $45-50.  If the total was less, they had to add to their cart.  If it was more, they had to remove items from the cart.

Competition was fierce as the team battled!  Fortunately, Latham Hi-Tech Seeds’ team was voted “fan favorite” and earned 10 seconds off its final time.  Thanks to all of you who voted for us on Facebook!  It’s just too bad that it was worth 60 seconds off the total because those ladies from ABCM were fast shoppers!

Congratulations to ABCM/Rehabilitation Center of Hampton for purchasing three meals’ worth of groceries in just 1 minute, 25 seconds! – Photo Courtesy of Deb Brown

Although Team Latham didn’t place where we had hoped, we did help raise money for a worthy cause.  It’s nice knowing that 13 families will benefit from the groceries and donations that we helped collect.

The inaugural Breakfast Battle was such a huge success that Franklin County Farm Bureau plans to host it again in 2013. Watch for Team Latham to perform better in the 2nd Annual Breakfast Battle.  We’ll have a team uniform.  We’ll train.  We’ll be ready to “do battle” in 2013!  And, that’s a promise.