Boston Public Schools (BPS) serves more than 54,000 students in 125 schools, or 74% of the school-age children who live in Boston, Massachusetts. As one of the most diverse school districts in the nation, BPS was in search of a school meal provider that could design and produce culturally relevant meals their students would love.

The Challenge

The student families at BPS were dissatisfied with the former meal service provider because of a lack of fresh, local and regionally relevant meals. BPS knew that they had to find another partner that would prioritize fresh, culturally responsive food.

BPS switched over to Revolution Foods meals in September 2017, acknowledging our product design capabilities and ability to craft meals for diverse communities across Boston. 

What We Did 

Revolution Foods designed, produced and delivered 10,000 breakfasts (including Breakfast in the Classroom) and 15,000 lunches daily across 62 sites. 

In addition to the meals provided, Revolution Foods worked with BPS to support their overall food program. We partnered with FoodCorps to deliver nutritional education programs, including monthly vegetable tastings, new meal focus groups, and support for after school healthy cooking classes. 

We opened a state-of-the-art culinary center right in the heart of Boston to increase production capacity for BPS and collaborated with local vendors such as Channel Fish Processing to design regional favorites. One of the most popular dishes that came from the collaboration was the creation of a New England-inspired “Wicked Big Fish Sandwich,” a sweet potato-crusted pollock on a whole-grain bun. 

As a partner, Revolution Foods goes above and beyond to make sure that our customers feel supported every step of the way. We helped BPS transition from NSLP to SSO/SFSP, including moving from shelf-stable to freshly prepared meals, adding weekend meals, and executing social media and PR campaigns to drive program awareness and meal participation.

COVID-19 Transition 

In 2020, the pandemic brought a new set of challenges to feeding students. Revolution Foods transformed its business to adapt to the new circumstances with the goal of nourishing as many students as possible. We designed, produced and delivered as many as 200,000 meals per week to accommodate fully remote and hybrid learning models for BPS students.

We distributed meals via centralized pickup sites for remote learners and in-school consumption for special-need students. After seeing that many families in the BPS network were not able to pick up their meals, we hired drivers to deliver meals door-to-door to ensure that we could get meals to everyone who needed them.

The Results 

Boston Public Schools saw a 4% increase in meal participation after switching to Revolution Foods. Our partnership created over 80 new jobs in the Boston community from our local culinary center. The social media and PR campaigns we executed to drive program awareness helped generate a 45% participation increase. 

If you’re interested in partnering with Revolution Foods to bring healthy meals that students love into your school or community program, contact us today!