Cookie-tastic Jr Business Case Competition

After the success of last year’s first-ever Jr Business Case Competition, Greenwood’s Grade 7s to 9s were once again invited by the Business Committee to put on their business thinking caps. The Jr Business Case Competition took place on Dec. 19.

The competition saw participating students focusing on the assigned case for the day, with the morning to prepare their presentation followed by two rounds of judging in the afternoon. This year saw a significant increase in participation – with 50 students making up 12 teams.

The participating groups were tasked with helping a fictional local cookie business, Sugar and Dough, increase their sales and gain new customers. The Business Committee executives wanted to make the experience fun and exciting for the participants. The Lodge was adorned with cookie decorations to get students in the right mindset. 

The case was first drafted by one of the Business Committee execs, Kobi Cheng ‘25 and then further refined with input from other committee members and AI tools. “We had to ensure [the case] was accessible, exciting and kid-friendly,” says Claudia Schmid ‘25, another Business Committee exec. The case needed to be understandable for participating Grade 7 to 9 students who would only have limited exposure to business concepts and knowledge as Greenwood begins offering business courses starting in Grade 10. Additionally, senior members of the Business Committee and students in the Grade 11 and 12 Business Case Study courses helped to coach the students. In the afternoon, the groups were assigned a room and presented their solution to the two judges in that room. The judges selected the best from the presentations they saw to move on to the next round of judging. 

“I was very impressed with each team’s professionalism and their confidence,” Claudia Schmid ‘25 says. “They showed a great command of vocabulary and extremely polished presentations.” 

Congratulations to the winning team:

Other finalist teams:

The winning team admits they were at times apprehensive about the competition. “There were many times during the day where we would say, ‘Let’s just drop out,’” Victoria Mainprize ‘28 remembers. Myla Maceroni ‘28 adds, “But every time that happened, a teammate would encourage us all to continue and that we’ll figure it out.” And they did figure it out! The judges were impressed with the team’s proposal to update the business’s branding, ideas to gain new customers and their analysis of risk and mitigation strategies.

“This experience helped me develop a lot of presentation skills,” says Rachel Richler ‘28. Kate Jakubek ‘28 reflects on the senior students who provided advice during the competition, “We also learned a lot from the Grade 11s and 12s who were there.” 

All the members of the team came away from the competition with a newfound appreciation and interest for business. “It’s lucky we did this competition before course selection because this made me consider that I might enjoy taking business courses next year,” says Victoria ‘28. 

A special thank you to Mr. Preston for helping the Business Committee with this initiative as well as to Mr. Vachon and to the senior business students who volunteered their expertise.