Consulting Cup comes to a close

Undergraduate | Jan 18, 2017 | Casey Shenloogian

The 2016 Consulting Cup Challenge winners. (Left to right) Dean Donna Rapaccioli, Sophia Woody, Patrick O’Donnell, Gabrielle McNees, Rabela Bodini, Christopher Dollesin, Luke Fiore.

The results are in.

The winner of the 2016 Consulting Cup Challenge is … RWG Chipotle!

Six sophomore teams earned the honor to compete for the cup, which represents the highest accolade in the second-year business core curriculum.

All sophomores formed teams to spend a full semester researching and studying one of six companies: Chipotle, Tesla, Facebook, Whole Foods, Apple, or Johnson & Johnson. They analyzed the firms’ marketing, financial, and consumer data. The “challenge”? To use all of this information to identify and resolve a challenge or propose an opportunity that would be profitable to the company.

The Consulting Cup itself is an annual event where the best teams, chosen by the Gabelli School faculty, make formal business presentations to a panel of judges, competing for a cash prize.

This year’s notable Fordham alumni judges were Dick Brennan, GABELLI BS ’83, anchor and reporter, WCBS-TV; Marie Hickey, FCRH ’83, New York bureau chief, Extra; John Meagle, FCRH ’83, chief marketing officer, Centenary University; Jennifer Pulsone, FCRH ’05, news director, iHeart Radio; and Terry Sheridan, FCRH ’83, Long Island bureau chief, WSHU Public Radio.

The RWG Chipotle team took home the trophy with its winning ideas of a snack-sized burrito, aptly named a “burriGO”; adding a second register in stores for pickup orders; and reinventing the Chipotle mobile app.

“We had talked about what it might be like to win before, but hearing our team’s name called was incredible,” said Christopher Dollesin, who was also voted his team’s MVP and best speaker of the night. “It was a lot of hard work, but the most rewarding part of the experience was getting to work with such an incredible team.”

His team member Sophia Woody echoed this statement.

“We just had a feeling from the very beginning that we would work well together and put together a great presentation, and we ended up following through,” she said.

Congratulations to all of the teams who participated!