My Experience
I created a business plan for New Amsterdam Market’s permanent operations for when or if it moves into the both Tin Building and the New Market Building along the South Street Seaport. The market currently operates on a seasonal cycle with weekly Sunday markets in the parking lot outside of these two buildings. New Amsterdam Market fosters a new and growing economic sector: small businesses such as butchers, grocers, mongers, and other vendors who source, produce, distribute, and sell foods made with regional ingredients as well as carefully selected imports. The plan envisions the Market as also taking on a developmental role for local businesses by providing much-needed business facilities and functions in addition to a regular market. After in-depth interviews with current vendors as well as experts in the food systems field, the Market plans to approach its future position in the local food economy through three main channels: retail, wholesale / distribution and processing.
In addition to the business plan, I also created two surveys to better understand the needs of the consumers and vendors. Over 150 market attendees have taken the consumer survey and the results have been extremely useful in conversations with the Economic Development Committee about the benefits of the market to the neighborhood.
My internship allowed me to use a variety of skills I had learned in my first year at Columbia. Drawing from the information that I learned in Accounting and Corporate Finance, I created financial statements for New Amsterdam Market. I was able to look holistically at the operations of the market and understand the key elements to include in the business plan. In addition, when I did not have the previous knowledge in a particular field, I was able to utilize Columbia resources to obtain it. I met with a Columbia professor who teaches a class on marketing research in order to understand the key criteria for creating a marketing survey.
There were several challenges for me during this internship. The first challenge was that the project description was extremely open ended. It was decided that the final deliverable would be a business plan, but the process of how to create it was entirely up to me. In addition my boss, Robert LaValva, had an idea of the elements he wanted included in the final plan, but the information we obtained in interviews continuously changed the structure of the plan. I learned to take notes each time Robert described the future market to our interviewees so that I could adjust the plan accordingly.
In addition, because the plan’s implementation date is unknown, I had to balance between the placement of specific company information and more generalized information about certain types of businesses within the final business plan. For example, we may know that New Amsterdam Market would like a meat processing facility in the building, but depending on how long the plan takes to come to fruition, the companies New Amsterdam Market would rent to may have already found another location.
After school I would like to work in the natural food space. This summer, my goal was to learn as much as I possibly could about the local food scene in New York. I interviewed over 30 vendors, restaurateurs, and natural food company executive directors. Almost every vendor at New Amsterdam Market is a small business owner who has been in operation for less than two years. Speaking to these individuals, I was able to see what it would be like to work in a start-up food company. This experience reaffirmed my desire to work in this field.
Until this summer, I had not realized how much I valued the transfer of knowledge from my work to my life. Working in food allows me to stay current on food trends, understand the significance of supporting local agriculture and the nutritional value of eating farm to table. In addition, I have become a resource for friends and family to learn how to make better decisions about the foods that they eat.
