Wednesday, October 22, 2008
At the end of almost every day, Steve Sobczak recalls the same thing: He bought two bags of chips, two bottles of soda and lunch — all of which were on campus.
Sobczak, Kansas City, Mo. graduate student, is one of many students choosing to eat on campus to avoid wasting expensive gasoline, among other reasons. As a result, KU Dining Services is seeing more student activity and larger revenues than ever before.
Alecia Stultz, assistant director of dining retail, said every dining venue on campus had 100 more customers per day on average since last year. This increase is due, in part, to the enrollment of 30,102 students this year — the largest the University has ever had.
“It’s almost awful — it’s like I can’t go fast enough,” Emma Swendson, Atchison freshman and Hawk Shop employee, said of the increased student traffic. “I’m getting frustrated, and so are they.”
Each year, KU Dining Services tries to increase its revenues by 3 to 5 percent, Stultz said. Last year, the highest sales day for The Underground was $18,181. Stultz said the Underground surpassed that figure an average of once a week this year.
KU Dining Services spent about $8,000 this year for outdoor seating to alleviate crowding at The Underground. This is the third consecutive year Dining Services has expanded outdoor accommodations.
Because of rising food costs, students are also spending more when they eat at campus dining locations. The average amount students spend per visit has increased to $4.28 per meal, up from $3.98 last year.
“It’s been challenging for us,” David Mucci, director of KU Memorial Unions, said. “We weren’t expecting the explosion in food costs that we’ve had.”
KU Dining Services also launched its “Lose the Lids” campaign, an effort to reduce waste by moving lids and straws beyond the cash registers in campus eateries. It resulted in a 60 percent decrease in 32-ounce lid usage since the beginning of the year, which has saved approximately 3,000 lids and $108.
Stultz said that the little money saved was always quickly spent elsewhere.
“That money can go toward four cases of crunchy chicken for the crunchy chicken cheddar wraps,” Stultz said.
The next step for KU Dining Services was to use eco-friendly cardboard salad containers. The new containers are 11 cents cheaper than the old containers with lids. Stultz said Dining Services was trying to reduce its use of Styrofoam and petroleum-based products.
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Comments
Campus eateries enjoy record profits
"wanked them away"?
Ahahahahahahahaha. Sorry Caleb, but that's great. :-)
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