During the three days leading up to the 116th Boston Marathon, the beef checkoff made sure that the runners were well equipped with fuel for the finish. Runners and their families came to the Sport & Fitness Expo to pick up their numbers and registration packets; an estimated 85,000 health conscious athletes attended the expo over the three days. And, this venue provided the perfect opportunity to speak with the world’s most elite runners about lean beef as a great source of protein.
The beef checkoff, through the Northeast Beef Promotion Initiative (NEBPI), served 4,000 samples of lean beef snack sticks to the runners to showcase how beef can be a portable source of protein for athletes. Many attendees commented that the beef snack sticks were better than protein bars, which were also being sampled at the expo. One expo attendee said, “Even with all of these protein bars and running gels, beef will always be the original source of protein.”
National Beef Ambassador team members Kim Rounds, Arika Snyder and Rossie Blinson were also on hand to serve samples and interact with the booth visitors. The Ambassadors were able to have many discussions with attendees about how cattle are raised as well ways to incorporate lean beef into an athlete’s diet. The Ambassadors were also able to keep the social media world updated on the Boston Marathon by tweeting and posting to Facebook.
Local Boston retailer, Johnnie’s Foodmaster partnered with the beef checkoff on a 4-week beef promotion leading up to ‘Marathon Monday’ through in-store point-of-sale materials including lean beef recipe booklets, iron man signs, and meat department posters. This “Power up on Protein” retail beef promotion also included a sweepstakes component open to all Johnnie’s Foodmaster shoppers and Boston Marathon Expo attendees. The grand prize for the sweepstakes includes a $200 steakhouse gift card prize pack, a “I Heart Lean Beef” engraved iPod nano, and the Healthy Beef Cookbook.
Approximately 16 Team BEEF runners participated in the Boston Marathon this year. The Team BEEF runners came from all over the United States including: TX, FL, MO, WI, MI and NY. All of the runners have a passion for promoting beef and serve and great industry spokespersons.
Mark Niblo, Team BEEF runner from Missouri, says that he always enjoys wearing his Team BEEF jersey at the Boston Marathon. He said, “All 26.2 miles, people are yelling Go ZIP!” This was Mark’s fourth consecutive year running in the Boston Marathon.
For more information about the beef checkoff at the 2012 Boston Marathon contact Kristin Wilkins kwilkins@pabeef.org. To see pictures from the event, visit the Team BEEF is Running the Boston Marathon Facebook page.
For more information about your beef checkoff investment, visit MyBeefCheckoff.com.
The Beef Checkoff Program was established as part of the 1985 Farm Bill. The checkoff assesses $1 per head on the sale of live domestic and imported cattle, in addition to a comparable assessment on imported beef and beef products. States retain up to 50 cents on the dollar and forward the other 50 cents per head to the Cattlemen's Beef Promotion and Research Board, which administers the national checkoff program, subject to USDA approval.
Source: The Beef Checkoff Program