Every year we look forward to ANC, and this year was no exception. We came to Charlotte excited to show off what we have been building, from Zee Zees' new Chicken Meat Sticks to the launch of our sister brand, Zee Kitchen, and its hero line, the Meatball for All. But putting our own innovation on display is only half of what makes the show worth it. The other half is getting to gather with the best and brightest in the industry and take in everything they are bringing to the table too. That back and forth, sharing what we have made and learning from everyone else, is what keeps sharpening how we show up for kids and their school meals. We each walked the floor with a different lens this year, and here is what stood out to us.
Talk to enough directors and a pattern shows up fast. They are not really buying products anymore. They are managing scarcity. The numbers back up the mood. 99% say they need more funding, 98% are fighting food costs, and 95% are struggling with labor and equipment. Nearly 70% say reimbursement no longer covers the cost of a lunch. For the first time, more than half report serious concern about whether their program will survive the next three years, up from 46% a year ago. When margins are this thin, every SKU has to earn its spot on the tray.
What makes this year different is that the pressure feels structural now, not just another down cycle. The 2025 SNAP cuts are quietly rewiring how schools get funded. As an estimated 4.7 million people fall off SNAP, fewer students get auto-certified, a school's Identified Student Percentage drifts toward the 25% CEP threshold, and whole districts risk losing free meals for all. About 74% of operators told us they are worried about exactly this. At the same time, the July 2027 sodium and added-sugar limits are turning clean label from a nice-to-have into a hard purchasing filter. If a product cannot show a clear path to those standards, it simply will not make it onto a menu.
So the old playbook, a good product at a fair price, doesn’t cut it anymore. Directors want to do more scratch cooking. About 71% already do, but 93% say they do not have the staff, training, or equipment to do more of it. That means the real value has moved into everything wrapped around the product: speed-scratch components that save labor, hands-on training that builds a cook's confidence, and a straight answer about what happens in 2027. The suppliers who win the next few years will not be the ones with the lowest price. They will be the ones who make an impossible math problem solvable.
The clearest signal was sweet heat, or swicy, which ran through everything from Sweet Heat Birria to spicy breakfast sandwiches to chili-lime snacks. What I liked is that most of these led with flavor rather than punishing heat, and that is exactly how you introduce something bold at scale. Global flavor has made the same jump from novelty to normal. Korean BBQ, Asian-inspired sauces, and Mexican street builds right down to street-corn seafood nachos were all on offer, no apology attached, because directors now trust that kids will actually eat them. That trust is the part that stuck with me. And manufacturers are pulling this off while still solving for compliance and labor, with bite-size breakfast formats, portable protein, and speed-scratch bases that let a short-staffed kitchen still put out an ambitious menu.
Underneath all of it sits one shift that is not going away: protein is now the thing the plate is built around. Chicken, protein bowls, wraps, egg bites, and grab-and-go snacks were everywhere, which told me we called this one right. Our Zee Zees Chicken Meat Sticks and Zee Kitchen Chicken Meatballs were designed for this moment, aligned with where both the regulations and consumer trends are moving. The lesson I take back to product development is to read culture early and then translate it patiently. The innovation that wins is the one that is craveable, compliant, and easy on a kitchen all at the same time.
What I love about ANC is the passion in the room. It is floor after floor of brands who genuinely care about making school meals that kids actually want to eat, and you can feel that energy in the innovation they bring year after year. This year, breakfast made the point for me. It has quietly become one of the most interesting parts of the day, full of protein-forward, whole-food options that no longer feel stuck in the morning. Watching breakfast for lunch show up as a real menu strategy, we’re seeing a shift that says dayparts just aren't the hard lines they used to be.
Another insight that I noticed as I walked the floor at ANC are the new brand entrants in the K-12 space. More retail brands are paying attention to K-12 now, and the reason says a lot. As GLP-1s cause major shifts in consumption and purchasing behavior in retail, K-12 has developed into a legitimate channel strategy for brands looking to protect their growth. Rather than a threat, I see it as proof of the power of school meals. When more brands start competing for space on the tray, it confirms that school food matters, and that competition only raises the standard for what lands in front of kids.
Speed scratch has gone from a nice idea to a flat-out expectation. It was everywhere this year, from signage, to handouts, to sessions, everyone was talking about it. But we do not talk enough about how much it asks of kitchens that are already stretched thin, and that is the exact gap our Scratch Batch recipes were built to close.
If there was one thing the whole industry seemed to want, it was the student's voice. Everyone is asking to hear from kids, and the biggest opportunity now is building the means to surface those consumer insights from the students sitting at the cafeteria table with their trays every day.
School food is under more pressure than it has ever been, with tighter budgets, shrinking certification, and a compliance clock ticking toward 2027. It is also more full of possibility than it has ever been, with kids ready for bolder food and new brands showing up because they finally see what this category can be. Those two things are not really in tension. Together they are the whole opportunity. The programs and partners who do well from here will be the ones who treat constraint and ambition as the same problem, and make food that is affordable, compliant, easy on a kitchen, and craveable enough to drive participation. That is the future ANC pointed to this year, and it is the one we are building toward.
Amy King
K12 Area Sales Lead
E: aking@nationalfoodgroup.com
P: 248-560-2323