The Kirkwood School District Foundation partnered with 37 Kirkwood High School business and marketing students to give the Chili Bowl a fresh look through social media and other promotional efforts. | photo by Ursula Ruhl
As a beloved community tradition, the Turkey Day Chili Bowl is also the Kirkwood School District Foundation’s largest yearly fundraiser.
This year’s 28th annual event will be held Wednesday, Nov. 27, with a new start time a half hour earlier at 4:30 p.m.
Tickets went on sale in mid-October for 30-minute slots, and were nearly sold out as the Times went to press on Wednesday afternoon. Roughly 1,400 people typically attend each year.
Hosted by Kirkwood School District Foundation supporters each year the night before the Thanksgiving Day football game between Kirkwood and Webster Groves high schools, local restaurants compete in the Chili Bowl by offering up their best chili recipes for attendees to sample.
Vying to become the 2024 chili champ are restaurants Anthonino’s Taverna, Amigo’s Cantina, Billy G’s, BrickTop’s, Crushed Red, Texas Roadhouse, Three Kings Public House and Honey Bee’s Biscuits & Good Eats/Spencer’s Grill.
The festivities are held in the Kirkwood High School cafeteria and Walker Commons. Tickets are $15 for adults and $5 for children 12 and under, with free admission for ages 2 and under. Tickets include a chili sample from each participating restaurant, a hot dog and chips. In addition to voting for their favorite chili, attendees can also participate in a silent auction.
Student Partnership
Lifelong Glendale resident, former Nine PBS’s “Chew In The Lou” broadcaster and parent marketing volunteer Joe Prosperi said the Kirkwood School District Foundation partnered with 37 Kirkwood High School business and marketing students to give this year’s Chili Bowl a fresh look through social media and other promotional efforts. Three of the participating students are juniors, and the rest are seniors.
Although Prosperi’s children don’t attend Kirkwood High School, his wife Jennifer Prosperi is a current Kirkwood School District Foundation director, with both of them supporting the district in a variety of ways.
“Coming from working in media myself, it was wonderful to see students being really proud of their community, and at this younger age, wanting to get everything right,” said Joe Prosperi. “It was fun to step into a mentorship role, with the students providing a fresh set of eyes regarding possibilities. They learned new marketing concepts, but I also learned in the process.”
Prosperi said students especially concentrated on understanding what competing restaurants wanted to focus on, underscoring a true appreciation for their cooperation and donations.
Through the process, participating restaurants demonstrated their chili cooking and allowed students to film interviews and clips for social media. Students created new signage for sponsors as well.
“We’re lucky in that this event gets so much community support, and that local restaurants show up every year in support as well,” Joe Prosperi said. “This year’s students did a great job of providing an excellent experience for participating restaurants.”
Kirkwood High School marketing and entrepreneurship teacher Bryce Bunton said the students developed over 60 pieces of social media content for the Kirkwood School District Foundation to select from and integrate into its Facebook and Instagram posts leading up to the event.
“It’s always fun to watch students present to someone other than us teachers. It becomes more real when they are meeting and working with business owners and members of our community outside of the school building,” Bunton said.
Zach Kirk, also a marketing and entrepreneurship teacher at Kirkwood High, added that when students work with professionals outside the classroom, they have a deeper sense of pride in their work.
“It’s fun to see them come back from their video shoots and hear the excitement and energy in their voices because they just got a real world, professional experience, which makes them excited about what’s to come when they leave high school,” Kirk said.
“We have every student create a video, and — it never fails — we always have a few students who knock it out of the park who we didn’t expect to,” Kirk continued. “They either rose to the occasion of the challenge, or maybe had a hidden talent we might not have seen yet in class. It’s invigorating as a teacher to find unique opportunities for our students.”
Kirkwood High School senior Ella Baumstark said being involved with the event was fun and interesting. Along with the skills she honed during the project, she also enjoyed learning about the dedication and commitment competing restaurants have to the Chili Bowl and the Kirkwood School District.
“Being on the marketing side of the Chili Bowl was especially entertaining because we were able to have a close-up view on restaurants’ involvement in this important event,” Baumstark said.
Hannah Hughes, also a senior at Kirkwood High School, said she enjoyed discovering how much restaurants love to be involved in the Chili Bowl and Turkey Day traditions.
“It was amazing to see how much effort is put into keeping the town culturally alive,” she said. “Most of this year’s participating restaurants are returning members, as the event is both fun and involved. As someone who’s not from Kirkwood, it was really neat to learn how big of a tradition the Chili Bowl is, and how greatly the people of Kirkwood value it.”
Hughes added that she contributed a behind-the-scenes perspective of a restaurant’s participation in the Chili Bowl by creating a video about why the restaurant enjoys being involved.
“To have a part in the process leading up to the event itself was very moving and informative for me,” she said. “It also felt important to partake in a role among so many other individuals and companies.”
The Chili Bowl takes place from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. on Nov. 27, followed by the Turkey Day Pep Rally starting at 7 p.m. in the David Holley Assembly Hall.
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