On-line courses offered by Saint Joseph's University

(SPECIAL: Tuition-free through February 2008)

NEW COURSES:

New Food Product Development I: Background, Strategy and Early Stage Development. This course will cover issues related to new product strategy such as the importance of new product development to the firm; value creation; types of innovation and types of new products; new product failure and success; the new product process, including a focus on stage-gate processes; organizational structures for new product development, including cross-functional teams and the importance of outsourcing; plus early stage development activities, including opportunity assessment, ideation, concept development and testing, product testing and shelf-life testing, and scale-up from the bench to the pilot plant. This course is available January 1, 2008 by John Lord.

New Food Product Development II: From Marketing Plan through Launch. Part II will pick up where Part I ends. We will discuss the various elements of the marketing plan needed to support new product introduction, including packaging design and development, brand name, positioning, pricing, advertising and promotion. We will also discuss the launch process, including the coordination of various sourcing, production and logistical activities, the sell-in process, and execution of the launch, from start ship through monitoring the launch. This course is available January 1, 2008 by John Lord.


Developing a Business Plan II: Understanding your Company, the Environment, and the Customer. The first course in business planning dealt with the qualitative part of developing a business plan. This course deals with the financial and quantitative side. The numbers drive everything we do and in this course we will discuss how to develop a sales forecast, creating and understanding the financial statements for your business, analyzing the health of your business using ratio analysis, adjusting your forecasts to match actual performance, and finally writing the business plan.
This course is available January 1, 2008 by Marty Meloche.

For a brochure of the following on-line courses offered by SJU, please click HERE.

RETURNING COURSES:

Title: Developing a Business Plan: Understanding your Company, the Environment, and the Customer

Description: This course will help you through the first steps of business planning. Whether you are a start up venture writing a business plan or an ongoing enterprise developing a new strategy or just trying to evaluate your current strategy you should find this course helpful. This is the first of two business planning courses and deals with understanding your business, your customers, your environment, and yourself. Without this understanding and based on it an evaluation of the business climate for your product or service, the numbers mean nothing. The second course will deal more specifically with the financial; and quantitative elements of the business plan.

Title: Introduction to Foundations of Marketing

Description: The food industry in the United States is an almost 1 trillion dollar industry. It is the largest commercial sector of the economy and largest employer. The industry is vast and complex, consisting of thousands upon thousands of individual farms, markets, production plants, wholesalers and brokers, trucking companies, warehouses, restaurants, institutional feeding operations, retailers and other key players such as banks, advertising agencies and marketing research firms.
In this course, we will first briefly review the nature, size and scope of the food industry in the United States. Then we will define and discuss marketing as both a social process and as a business activity.

Title: Designing Food Products for International Markets

Description: This course is organized into sections that describe Pennsylvania’s success in exporting, our major trading partners, and specific topics associated with exporting. Online users will find additional information on major export markets, including lists of potential buyers by country and product as well as Pennsylvania suppliers.

Title: Entering International Markets

Description: This course provides a comprehensive review of the various methods of exporting products addressing the differences between the types of export intermediaries, agents, distributors, partners, and agents you can choose. An introduction to the types of documentation necessary for exporting food products and preparing for customs will be presented. Steps for preparing product for distribution will be provided. Finance options and issues are then introduced. Finally, an overview of the range of information sources available to assist with preparing for export.

For a brochure of all the SJU Courses, please click HERE. To register please click HERE.

On-Line Courses Offered by The Ohio State University.

The Snack Food Association (SFA) has partnered with The Ohio State University (OSU) to bring to you a four course series in food science training.

These courses are designed to provide food science training and information to professionals in the food industry. The courses are entirely online and have 9 weekly units, live chats, and podcasts. You will earn 5 Continuing Education Units (CEUs) for completing each course. Completing four courses in the five course series will earn you a Certificate of Proficiency in Food Science from the Food Science Technology Department at OSU.

The syllabus for the courses to be offered can be found by following the links below. The general course fee is $500, but SFA members receive a 10% discount on each course. If you are a member of the Snack Foods Association, please contact Christopher Melchert at 703-836-4500, ext. 211 for more information.

To register for the course, please print out the registration form and fill it out and fax it to Christopher Melchert at 703-836-8262 who will process your registration. If you have registration questions, please email Christopher Melchert at cmelchert@sfa.org. The course fee is $500 for non-members and $450.00 for members. SFA accepts credit cards and company checks. Upon receipt of your registration SFA will forward your registration form to OSU, who will create an account for you and officially enroll you into the course and send you course information.

Courses in the Certificate of Proficiency in Food Science series include:

Food Safety and Quality
Food Chemical Safety
Introduction to Food Processing
Introduction to Food Science
Food Biosecurity