Latham Employees “Do Battle” to Support Local Food Pantries

Julie, Laura, & Amy at the end of the “Breakfast Battle”

Just yesterday, Latham Hi-Tech Seeds participated in the 2nd Annual Franklin County Farm Bureau Breakfast Battle.  This event, held in honor of National Food Check-Out Week, promotes the abundance and safety of our country’s food supply.  One interesting fact shared during the event was that each year National Food Check-Out Week is celebrated at the time that most Americans have earned enough of their annual income to purchase all the food they will need in a year.  How fortunate we are to have an abundance of safe and affordable food to be able to pay for it in two months’ time!

National Food Check-Out Week celebrates the time when most Americans have earned enough of their annual income to purchase enough food for one year.

Latham Seeds was one of 9 businesses participating in this event.  Battle began early last week with a “Facebook Fan Favorite” poll on Facebook.  Many of you may have seen our calls for help in voting, and we THANK YOU for the great response!  Latham Hi-Tech Seeds was voted “fan favorite” of the event – an honor we’ve captured for the second year in a row.  Team Latham edged out the number two team this year by almost 10 votes, receiving 10 seconds off our total time.

Yesterday at 8 AM teams met at Fareway in Hampton, Iowa, to compete in additional events including a challenging round of Ag Trivia.  Each correctly answered question was worth 10 seconds off your grocery shopping time for the latter part of the competition.  While the questions were tough, the Latham team brought down one correct answer for an additional 10 seconds off our total time.

The next step of the competition required each team to draw a menu from the stack.  Our menu consisted of Chewy Granola bake for breakfast; lunch was a Creamy Egg Salad sandwich; and supper was Creamy Chicken and Vegetables.  The challenge then was to race through the store selecting each of the required ingredients while spending between $45 and $50.

This year’s competition was even more intense than last year!  While we didn’t come in first place, we did a great job of selecting items with a total of $46.66.  Nine families will receive groceries and additional monetary donations collected through this event will go to neighboring food banks.

Having another battle under our belt, team Latham is feeling experienced and has already begun training to “do battle” again in 2014!