The First Facility Management Blog

Aside from huge bankrolls, new stadiums, and diva players, the Dallas Cowboys and New York Yankees now have another thing in common. They have teamed up to form Legends Hospitality Management LLC;, a Newark, NJ-based food service provider designed to rival more traditional concession outsourcing firms like Sodexo and Aramark. Each team will own about one third of Legends, with Goldman Sachs picking up the remainder.

Despite having little or no experience in this area, the initial focus of the company will be on operating catering, concessions, retail merchandising, and other facility management enterprises for major sports and entertainment facilities. Legends will handle services at the new, state-of-the-art Yankees and Cowboys stadiums (set to open in 2009) on a multi-year basis. The intention is to expand beyond these anchor teams to provide services to professional and college sports teams and other event facilities worldwide.

In a pre-recorded message played during a recent press conference, George Steinbrenner (owner of the New York Yankees) and Jerry Jones (owner of the Dallas Cowboys) chat about the goals of the new venture:

“What this is about,” Jones said.

“Is for the fans,” said Steinbrenner.

“That’s right,” Jones said.

Richard Sandomir of the New York Times writes:

The teams vowed to rewrite the script for serving food to fans in their and other facilities, for those in the regular seats and the better-heeled ones in the luxury suites.

“It’s the nonsuite holders where we hope to see the biggest jump in satisfaction,” said Mike Rawlings, the Legends chairman, and a former Pizza Hut president, who cited research saying only 31% of fans are satisfied with ballpark customer service.

He promised faster service, shorter lines and hot food that will stay hot.

He did not say what a beer would cost the average fan but stressed how sports fans, even in a bad economy, are more concerned with quality than price.

“Franchise owners want happy fans,” Rawlings said.

“They want them at game day.”

In a recent press release, Hal Steinbrenner, co-chairman of the New York Yankees explained, “The old model of stadium concessions is broken. Fans want and deserve a better experience for their sports entertainment dollar. Working with Legends to leverage the talent and experience resident in the Yankees’ and Cowboys’ organizations will enable us to set a higher bar for sports franchises while delivering greater value to fans.”

Said Rawlings, “Our mission at Legends is simple. We want to become the authority on fan experience so that we can provide team and stadium owners, athletic directors, and venue operators with innovative ways to build business value for their sports franchises off the playing field. While we’ll leverage the experience of our leadership team and the Yankees and Cowboys organizations, we also fully intend to broaden and deepen our capabilities in the coming years through a combination of acquisitions, strategic partnerships, and continued internal growth.”

So watch out lunch lady, the Cowboys and Yankees are aiming for your hairnet and meatloaf.

The American Correctional Association (ACA), in partnership with ARAMARK Correctional Services, has presented research results indicating that “quality and morale” of correctional officers is paramount among that group’s top concerns. 

On a 10-point scale, officer quality and morale came in with a 9.2 weighted mean score.  Other “high priority” issues include lack of mental and medical health professionals (7.9), security and violence within the facilities (7.7), shrinking budgets (7.7), lack of transition and rehabilitation services (7.7), inmate health (7.7), and food and facilities management (7.2).

The findings were delivered during the ACA August meeting in New Orleans and reaffirm the industry’s commitment to developing the corrections’ workforce to better manage the country’s ever-increasing inmate population. 

“Every day, our teams work in hundreds of jails and prisons across the United States,” said Tim Campbell, president of ARAMARK Correctional Services, which provides food, commissary, and facility management in correctional facilities. “This collaborative research allows us to leverage our industry knowledge to develop innovative programs that help our partners perform their duties, maintain positive inmate behavior as well as save taxpayers’ dollars.” 

“We wanted to determine the top issues facing our members in order to help provide them with the education and training necessary to mitigate the challenges,” said James Gondles, Jr., executive director of the ACA. The industry group has developed a Center for the Correctional Workforce of the Future, with funding from the Bureau of Justice Assistance, and plans to develop targeted programming based on the research findings.

More than 80% of the 205 respondents to the 2007 online survey serve as jail administrators or wardens managing facilities with an average size of 763 inmate beds. Two-thirds represented either city or county jails while one-third reported from state prison systems.

To identify the key issues tested in the study, one-on-one interviews were conducted with wardens and jail administrators from across the country as were a series of correctional officer focus groups. Their responses resulted in a list of 35 issues which were then grouped by interrelated concerns, resulting in the seven top concerns.

The resulting white paper, “Effective Partnership: A Reorientation of Managed Services to Focus on Corrections Outcomes,” can be found on the ARAMARK Web Site at www.aramark.com/RelatedFiles/acawhitepaper.pdf.

The 2008 Olympic Games officially begin tonight, and over the next 16 days millions of people will converge in the city of Beijing. In the lead up to this global event, we’ve heard about the numerous venues built to supplement China’s existing sports facilities. This year’s Olympic Games will take place across 31 competition facilities (12 new, 11 pre-existing, and 8 temporary). There are also three non competition facilities–Olympic Village, Olympic Media Village, and the Olympic Main Press Center.

National Stadium aka "Bird's Nest"

Managing and securing all of those spaces will no doubt require diligence by the various facility, security, and hospitality staffs. Following are some of the companies involved in the activities.

Johnson Controls has installed sustainable building solutions in 18 Olympic stadiums and supporting facilities. The company’s installation covers 123 million square feet of Olympics grounds, monitoring more than 58,000 points in stadiums and office buildings. Venues containing Johnson Controls products include:

*National Stadium (Bird’s Nest) with a YORK dual-duty brine centrifugal chillers, ice thermal storage system and chiller plant automation system

*National Indoor Stadium, or Turtle’s Back, with YORK centrifugal chillers connecting to Metasys building management system

*CCTV Headquarters Building, or collaboration building: YORK centrifugal chillers, dual-duty brine centrifugal chillers and ice-thermal storage system, connected to Metasys building management system

*Beijing Olympic Tower: YORK centrifugal chillers and a variable speed drive

*Beijing Olympic Green Tennis Court: Metasys building management system

*Beijing Olympic Forest Park: Metasys building management system

Meanwhile, GE Energy is providing long-term services for a new power plant that will supply electricity for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games, as well as heat and power for the city of Beijing in the future. Under a 10-year contractual services agreement (CSA) signed with Beijing Taiyanggong Gas-Fired Thermal Power Co. Ltd (Taiyanggong) of China, GE will provide all parts, repairs and services for two GE Frame 9FA+e gas turbines at the new plant. The agreement also includes risk-sharing mechanisms and performance guarantees to help ensure that the 750-megawatt facility provides reliable and cost-effective heat and power to Beijing.

Taiyanggong is owned by Beijing Energy Investment Holding Co. and SP Power Development Co. Ltd.

GE is a worldwide partner of the Olympic Games. The company has provided support for more than 400 infrastructure projects such as Taiyanggong in and around Beijing, including work at all 37 official Olympic Games competition venues and 168 commercial buildings.

Olympic Village is using Echelon’s LonWorks® technology to create an energy efficiency lighting control system. The smart LonWorks based control system integrates all lighting subsystems to optimize energy usage while maintaining a safe and aesthetically pleasing environment.

The Olympic Village is the largest non-competition venue in Beijing, and will accommodate over 23,000 athletes and team officials for both the 2008 Olympic and Paralympic Games. The Village has over 370,000 square meters of apartment space, including 22 six-floor buildings and 20 nine-floor buildings, and facilities such as general information centers, meeting rooms, medical clinics, religious centers, multiple restaurants, a library, parking areas, and entertainment and leisure activity centers.

The smart lighting control system integrates lighting subsystems for the apartments, public areas, car park areas, and all landscape and beautification lighting. The system was installed by Lang Meng Technology, Inc., a firm that provides smart home and lighting control solutions based on LonWorks technology.

Panasonic ASTROVISION large display screen systems and enhanced RAMSA professional audio systems will be used across the Olympic venues. Twin 152 square meter ASTROVISION LED screens and 264 RAMSA WS-LA3 large format array loudspeakers will show the action in the “Bird’s Nest” National Stadium.

An official worldwide partner of the Olympic Games, Panasonic is also involved in the security operations. More than 2,000 AV surveillance cameras are installed to help ensure safety and security.

Also involved in security at the Games is Vicon Industries. The producer of video surveillance systems has had its camera domes and pan-and-tilt drives chosen to be part of an integrated video surveillance system to be installed at the “Bird’s Nest.” The opening ceremony tonight and the closing ceremony on August 24 will take place in that facility, which seats 91,000 people.

Vicon China, headquartered in Hong Kong with offices throughout China, is providing local support for this project.

In other security measures, ICx Technologies, a developer of advanced sensor technologies, won the contracts to supply IdentiFINDERs to the Government of China for use at the Olympics. IdentiFINDERS are handheld, radioisotope identification devices (RIID) that are able to locate, measure, and identify sources or contaminations from gamma and neutron radiation.

The units are able to differentiate between dangerous radioactive materials, medical and naturally occurring radioisotopes, such as bananas. This type of equipment is being deployed to detect radioactive materials that might be used as a weapon by terrorists in a radiological dispersal device, a so-called “dirty bomb”.

All the people involved in the Olympics will need to eat, and ARAMARK Corporation will meet those needs as the official catering service provider for 2008 Summer Games. The Beijing Organizing Commmittee (BOCOG) chose the company in May 2008. The signing of the contract with BOCOG marks the 14th time ARAMARK has been selected to serve at the Olympic Games.

ARAMARK, together with its partner Beijing Tourism Group, is providing catering services for the Athletes’ Village, Media Villages, International Broadcast Center, and the Main Press Center at the 2008 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games in Beijing. ARAMARK will serve more than 3.5 million meals throughout the 60-day duration of both the Olympic and Paralympic Games. In addition, ARAMARK managed the design and construction of the kitchen and dining facilities for the Olympic catering venues.

Let The Games Begin!