Central dining is evolving

Change is constantly occurring for Central’s Dining Services, and the latest increase in numbers for Holmes Dining have shown that students approve.   

“This last fall quarter [sales] went up by 40 percent, and we don’t have 40 percent more students and we didn’t raise prices by 40 percent,” said Patrick Stanton, director of business planning and budget accounting.

The number trends for Holmes Dining are generally on the rise and have been continually higher than last year’s numbers since the recent renovations. In the first two weeks of winter quarter, sales increased by 73 percent.

Overlooking week one—which Stanton said you should “throw out” due to the special events for incoming students—the beginning of fall quarter this year left Holmes with $14,610 in sales during just the second week of the quarter. Sales peaked at $18,172 in week nine before dropping around the holidays.

In fall of 2014, Holmes Dining’s sales peaked during the first week of the quarter. It broke just over $15,000 in sales before dropping to $12,000 where it remained for the majority of the quarter.

According to Stanton, Central Marketplace’s numbers have stayed consistent throughout the process with no direct impact shown to be affecting their sales.

The survey

A total of 806 student responses came in for the campus-wide survey that was sent out last spring, the results of which prompted Central Dining to seek changes.

In response to the survey, 1891 Bistro and the mobile food truck on campus were introduced.

Questions in the survey hit on topics that covered food preferences, favorite dining locations on campus and the importance of ingredients and prices.

One survey question asked students to compare Central’s dining experience to that of other universities and colleges. The majority fell to the 32 percent of students who felt that Central was “slightly worse” than others.

“We kind of knew that something was going to have to change,” said Joel Klucking, associate vice president of Finance and Business Auxiliaries and interim chief financial officer.

With 71 percent of students stating in the survey that they didn’t regularly eat in the Holmes Dining Room, the process to renovate the dining room and create more traffic flow became a priority.

“The rationale for this was to move people from this really busy space [Central Marketplace] into an underutilized space. And we see that it’s working,” Klucking said.

Creativity in the kitchen

In response to the survey, Executive Chef Derek Smith began setting his focus on bringing creativity into the kitchen, emphasizing a constant evolution of menus.

In order to keep the innovation flowing, Smith said he plans to continually mix-up concepts in the future.

He’s currently looking towards trying out different plating options and possibly introducing sliders, which have been growing in popularity.

“I think it’s been overall very positive,” Smith said. “We’re having a good conversation with the student body now and we’re adjusting as we go.”

Ongoing communication

The prices of food are still not expected to increase in response to the changes, which Stanton referred to as “fairly modest in cost.” Instead, students could possibly walk away from Holmes spending less than they might have with the former all-you-can-eat price.

Creating strong communication between students and staff has also been key to improving the students’ experiences with dining, Smith said.

Last quarter, Dining Services held a student tasting for the fall quarter menu and they plan to carry out another tasting at the end of this quarter.

According to Smith, the future tasting is set to take place in Holmes on a Friday in order to get more people involved in the ongoing conversation between students and Dining Services.

“I just want this to resemble going home or going into downtown Ellensburg,” Smith said. “I want it to be a wealth of offerings and to feel like this is their place.”

Future food

Beyond Holmes Dining Room, other venue changes have been reconfigured or created in response to what the students requested, though new additions are still in the works.

The food truck was one part of the new overhaul and, while the approval of its name is still a work in progress, the food truck’s success is something Central hopes to replicate in the near future.

With menu items for the food truck selling out, Klucking said that Central is currently in the process of expanding Dining Services with the addition of a second food truck on campus.

According to Klucking and Stanton, plans are already being made to find the vehicle once the weather improves and test drives can be carried out.

The arrival date of the new truck is planned for around the same time as spring break.

“It’s going to be a constant evolution,” Klucking said. “We will constantly be looking at the venues and which ones are working, which ones aren’t and make whatever changes are necessary.”