Harry M. Stevens - father of sports foodservice

Sports venue foodservice these days is all about luxury and diversity. There is fancy catering in corporate sky boxes, waitservice in selected seating areas and myriad food choices for the "common folk" in the stands.

Few people remember that it all started very simply, with hot dogs and sodas and a man named Harry Mozley Stevens. Much of what forms the basis for sports foodservice -- easily managed foods like hot dogs, popcorn and peanuts, vendors roaming the stands with their trays of wares and concession stands behind the seating areas -- are the inventions of this English immigrant.

"I think the rest of us in the concessions industry envied the way Harry M. Stevens did business," said Michael Thompson, president of Sportservice, which is arguably the second-oldest sports concessionaire.

"[Stevens'] company was a great example of how concessions should be run, and the company's treatment of clients was obviously an extension of the beliefs Harry M. Stevens himself professed. He created the idea of partnerships that drives the industry today."

Ironically, it was not food but scorecards that started Harry M. Stevens on his way to becoming the father of sports concessions. Stevens, a steel mill worker who brought his family to Niles, Ohio, in 1882, found himself on strike in 1887.

In order to keep his wife and three children fed during the strike, Stevens became a traveling salesman, peddling the biography of an Ohio politician.

One day, while in Columbus, Stevens decided to attend a baseball game. Although he enjoyed it, one thing bothered him, as it did most people in the stands. Players wore numbered uniforms without names, and it was difficult sometimes to tell who was who. Stevens came up with a solution.

He persuaded the Columbus team's owner to sell him exclusive rights, for $500, to the production and sale of a program and scorecard. He sold advertising space in the program and hawked the publication himself in the stands before the games, using the now-memorable line, "You can't tell the players without a scorecard."

Stevens discovered he had a knack for selling. His business expanded quickly, in geography and in product lines. Cities like Milwaukee and Pittsburgh followed, and sodas, peanuts and popcorn became standard fare.

In 1893 Stevens was hired to be the official concessionaire at New York's Polo Grounds, which proved to be the move that sent the company soaring.

Stevens moved his company to New York, where it would remain until it was sold to Aramark in 1995.

The Polo Grounds was the site of Stevens' next stadium-feeding innovation. On a chilly day in 1907, his regular food items, especially soda and ice cream, weren't selling well. Fans wanted something hot.

Stevens had an idea. He sent an associate to a local deli and had him buy a supply of dachshund sausages and long rolls. Stevens split the rolls and inserted the sausages and instructed his vendors to offer them for sale. The sales pitch?

"Get yer red hots! Get 'em while they're hot!"

The sausages were an instant success. Their place in history was ensured the following day by a local cartoonist who happened to be at the game.

The cartoonist wanted to depict the scene, but he wasn't sure how to spell "dachshund." So he called the boiled sausages "hot dogs" -- and the name stuck.

Stevens also introduced, in the 1920s, the idea of inserting straws into soda bottles. He believed that straws would help fans sip their sodas while still keeping their eyes on the game.

Furthermore, he introduced the idea of exclusivity, giving companies sole rights to supply a particular product in return for advertising.

In 1895, Stevens sold space in his program at the Polo Grounds to a local peanut vendor. The vendor paid for the ad space in product, rather than in cash, and Stevens sold the peanuts at the ballpark. The unusual agreement succeeded, and Stevens made Cavagnaros Peanuts the only peanuts sold at the Polo Grounds.

And, according to Amusement Business magazine, Stevens' deal with Cavagnaros also was the origin of the phrase "working for peanuts."

Harry M. Stevens Inc. seemed to have its greatest impact on fans watching our national pastime, and the company did have several well-known stadium accounts, such as Yankee Stadium and Fenway Park.

But Stevens was more than a ballpark concessionaire. The company dominated racetrack concessions for years, with long-term contracts at prestigious tracks such as Saratoga and Churchill Downs. By the 1950s, Stevens had concessions for nearly every racetrack from Boston to Miami.

Stevens also was the concessionaire at the original Madison Square Garden. For a time the company even managed a resort hotel, The Richmond, in Staten Island, N.Y.

Harry M. Stevens Inc. was a family-run business. Stevens believed that family members would best reflect his own philosophy, which was that every client deserved a personal touch.

"The Stevenses were very honest people," said Bill Koras, who was president of the company until its sale to Aramark. Koras was only the fifth president in the company's history and the only one who was not a family member.

"They emphasized high quality and believed in the faith of a handshake to seal a deal," Koras added. "That's rare in an industry where you often need two rooms of lawyers to work out contracts."

Koras is a Stevens "family" man in deed, if not in name. A year after the Aramark deal, he still visits those Aramark accounts that were part of his old firm.

Harry M. Stevens died in 1934, and the company that bore his name no longer exists. However, Stevens' legacy will last as long as there are professional sports and venues in which to play them.

COPYRIGHT 1996 Reproduced with permission of the copyright holder. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission.
COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group