The football snack shack needs to stock up  

Graphic by Isabelle Wang

Football fans (or not) are disappointed when their favorite dopamine-inducing candies and snacks are sold out.

Although the Falcons have completed their final home football game of the year, I feel that justice has not been served. And no, I’m not concerned about the officials resetting the game clock to give an opponent yet one more chance to win a game, however upsetting that kind of injustice might be.

Whenever I leave a football game, my stomach is always roaring with hunger after 2 hours of screaming my lungs out in the stands and playing my flute numb with every pep tune besides Fight Song. I usually go for the snack shack food because it only takes half a football field’s worth of walking to purchase delicious candy, popcorn, and burgers.

However, the snack shack’s inconsistency in stocking up enough food is a huge problem, especially for exhausted marching band kids. Since freshman year, I have indulged in food at football games in the same way I would at a movie theater, where you buy the $10 large popcorn and $5 soda for the fun of it, even though you could technically smuggle in your own snacks. Throughout the years, however, the snack shack’s inconsistency in providing food often resembles a movie theater that runs out of popcorn or other concessions, which is both a pure disappointment for me and a failed business opportunity for them.

Especially during important games such as Homecoming or football’s senior night, the snack shack hypes up new food arrivals and forgets about the typical nachos and burger supply. I decided to withhold my cash when I saw the $10 cost for ShareTea boba that would empty my pockets. Although many of my peers and middle schoolers eagerly purchased the trendy drink, I preferred to go for classic, cheaper options. 

However, money becomes the least of my worries when I haven’t eaten dinner because of the tight sequence of seventh period to homework to pre-game music warmups. Until the third quarter, band members like myself are stuck blasting exhausting pep tunes, fueled by only Goldfish and Starburst candies while watching other parents and students stream toward the smoky scents of grilling meat. 

After I sprint across the stands and finally wrestle my way around the mob of line-cutters, the counter volunteers inform me that they ran out of nachos. How about a cheeseburger? No, because they ran out of that too.

After three years of attending football games, I have developed a love-hate relationship with the snack shack. It saves me on the days I am too busy to get dinner, but even if I wanted to spend money on overpriced yet delicious burgers at the snack shack, there are probably none left.

I, like most students, just buy food for the fun of it (or because I didn’t eat dinner), but the football snack shack undermines its own business model by consistently lacking enough stock of the classics. They should take note of the popular sales and cater better to the interests of students, rather than put all their money and effort into novelty foods. The shack’s sales are handed to them on a silver spoon — it’s just up to them to take advantage of it.