The Shack, located in Topeka, KS at Washburn Rural High School, is one of three school-based enterprises within the district. Our mission statement for The Shack is to provide quality apparel and accessories while providing superior customer service to the Washburn Rural students, staff, and community.
The Shack was opened for operation in 2014 and since has evolved into a class, Marketing Applications. This course provides students an opportunity to act with more responsibility, gaining various work skills such as problem-solving, decision-making, and social skills while allowing students to work in a retail environment.
The Shack serves the entire district (approximately 6,000 potential customers) which means financial analysis is essential. Through financial research both digitally and face-to-face, we follow our market’s preferences and track customer demand. Using Square, a Point of Sale System, we are able to digitize our financial records for future use and analysis, keeping The Shack up-to-date on our financial status to stay as efficient and profitable as possible while ensuring customer satisfaction.
Tracking our market’s demands and those within our market allows for The Shack to properly advertise and have the best products for our consumers. When working with customers, selecting the right vendor is a top priority. Selecting the proper merchandise for The Shack is decided by the following market trends. Ordering low stock numbers initially allows for a low-risk investment which can always be increased upon later.
The Shack strives to ensure that our products are affordable and high quality to please our consumers. Evaluating our pricing decision is done through looking at the revenue of certain products over time. Using this information, The Shack is able to make educated decisions for the future to ensure customer satisfaction while maintaining affordable pricing.
Our Student Based Enterprise is run during the fifth hour of the day which also consists of lunch periods. Three to four people are responsible for working The Shack during this time while a class is run in the business classroom; designing, creating, and introducing new products and ideas. Those in the classroom email vendors and clients to help create the desired finished product.