West Burlington’s DECA class feathers The Nest coffee shop.
By Chris Faulkner
Coffee shops abound in the area, but there’s only one run by high school students.
In the foyer, when you first walk into West Burlington High School, you’ll see against one of the walls a sign identifying The Nest, an appropriate title given that the school nickname is the Falcons.
Business has been slow these days, but the current DECA president, Tristin Lee, has been working to change that.
Distributive Education Clubs of America are in many high schools.
“It’s based around giving students a business experience, allowing them to see the business world and provide them the skills needed for a career in business,” Lee said.
But West Burlington has the only DECA in the area that has its own business.
“Most of them take place within competitions, or they speak to business leaders or something like that,” Lee said.
Prices are meant to reflect a student’s budget, so coffee, smoothies, and tea start at $1.75 a cup for regular and $2 for a large. You can buy Rice Krispie treats, and the other day Nutri-grain bars were on sale at two for $1.
The Nest was the brainchild of former business teacher and DECA sponsor Scot Fransk, who is now teaching at Central Lee. He is starting a business there as well, Lee said.
Two years ago, when Lee was just a freshman, Fransk and some of the senior DECA members opened the business. “It gave the students a unique experience, as well as providing a positive impact on the school culture,” Lee said.
But this isn’t just a glorified lemonade stand where students take turns pouring coffee and taking payment, which must be by card only, as students aren’t allowed to bring cash.
“We’ve created departments. We have a department based on operations to make sure everything runs smoothly, it’s clean, and everybody knows how to work it,” Lee said.
“Then we have a marketing department that focuses on creating specials and bringing students to the business. And we have an inventory and finance department which actually focuses on how much money we’re making and making sure our products are not being stolen by employees and make sure we have enough of everything.”
It wasn’t always this organized, but Lee said when he became president back in December, he wanted to make it a complete business experience.
That includes the downside.
“We had two slushie machines, but one of the slushie machines broke,” Lee said. “So, right now, we’re going to try to figure out how we’re going to contact the manufacturer and see if we can get another part.”
Then there’s the business slowdown.
When Fransk left, Lee said, “We took a decline, so we no longer had that solid figure of someone who knew how to keep this going. It became much more focused on students, and the students weren’t as interested.”
Any money The Nest does make goes into a school account and then back into the business.
Lee said The Nest is supposed to be open throughout the day, but there have been some scheduling conflicts this trimester — another real-life experience — but he hopes to get those worked out for the final trimester.
At the beginning of the year, Lee said students from a Workplace Experience class helped out at The Nest, even though they weren’t in DECA.
Lee wants to get into the management field.
“I think that being able to speak to people is essential in all career fields,” Lee said. “So this is more focused on getting those people skills for my future career.”
Lee added: “Eventually, I want to be a lawyer, and I want to go into politics after that. Being able to work and talk with people and relate to them is extremely important in both those careers.”
Broden Hanson, a senior, works up front but is also part of the financial end of the business.
“It has a lot of potential to teach students about business and keeping up on certain things like inventory.”
He wants to become a welder but sees value in working at The Next.
“It teaches me more about finances and the business side of anything. I also keep up on inventory, and I think just being able to work the number side of any business is good,” Hanson said.
