Massachusetts Daily Collegian

A free and responsible press serving the UMass community since 1890

A free and responsible press serving the UMass community since 1890

Massachusetts Daily Collegian

A free and responsible press serving the UMass community since 1890

Massachusetts Daily Collegian

Tray-less to pay less

Americans have a history of overconsumption, especially when it comes to food. With the elimination of trays at all dining commons next fall, University of Massachusetts Dining Services has come up with a practical solution to cut costs.

UMass Chancellor Robert C. Holub just announced $10 million in budget cuts for next year. It’s clear every department and organization on campus will have to tighten their belts.

Removing trays from the DCs will cut down on food waste, water usage and electricity.Simply put, if students have to walk back and forth to carry each new plate, they are inclined to take only what they will actually eat.

One of the leading food companies in the world, ARAMARK, recently conducted a survey concerning the removal of trays from college campuses.According to the study, at the University of Maine Farmington, on average each student consumed 46 fewer pounds of food each year after trays were removed.

The head of UMass Dining Services Ken Toong, hesitantly predicts removing trays will cut food costs by 3-5 percent.

UMass DCs serve approximately 9 million meals per year. The average cost of food for each of those meals runs roughly between $2.50 and $3. If removing trays saves only 3 percent of food costs, the change would result in a savings of $270,000 per academic year.

In fairness, Toong would not give me what he predicted the tray removal might save, he was too cautious. The $270,000 is an estimate that I reached by doing basic math on some of the numbers he supplied.

Even so, $270,000 is a lot of money. Recently, there were rumors that the baseball team was going to be cut. According to UMass coach Michael Stone, the total budget for baseball is around $180,000. We now know the baseball team is able to play another year. For a short while however, the 32 players on the team thought that the sport they had worked their whole lives to excel at was going to be taken away.

The University was about to ask a group of people to make a huge sacrifice in order for the school to remain in the black. Removing trays from the DCs could save even more money than it costs to keep the baseball team through a policy that asks students to sacrifice much less.

In terms of revenue, UMass runs the third-largest dining services in the country. Dining Services is completely self-sustaining. This means that student fees and tuition money do not go to the DCs, Dining Services is solely in charge of creating and maintaining their own revenue streams.

Ken Toong wants to ‘put the [savings] back into the food.’ Recently Mr. Toong was named National Food Service Director of the Year by FoodService Directors magazine. Toong has proven himself to be an excellent leader and innovator for UMass. Removing trays is the most recent example of one of his decisions to improve UMass.

‘No one but [UMass] and UC Berkley have an organic salad bar,’ boasted Toong.During our interview he made a point of talking up his efforts to buy organic and locally grown food while stressing the importance of an overall higher quality product for the students. He is looking to use the saved funds to further enhance these goals.

In the interest of full disclosure, I work at one of the DCs on campus. I was hired this past semester and after looking around for campus work with no luck, I went to the Worcester DC and was given a job on the spot. The money isn’t great but the paychecks have supplied me with a critical weekly stipend of money to pay for the regular college necessities.

If the DCs were not making an effort to save money, they would be forced to either raise the cost of meal plans or lower food quality or lay off employees. From what I can see, Dining Services is doing its best to avoid sacrifices in order to balance its budget.

Food costs are also not helping ‘- everything seems to be getting dramatically more expensive. According to The Wall Street Journal, the price of corn has risen from its decade-long price of around $3 a bushel up to $7 in the span of just two years. The paper recorded that wheat has gone through a similar increase, and that meat prices will be much higher as time progresses.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture summed up the problem by predicting a 5 percent increase in overall food prices for 2009.

Toong has looked at his budget and realized quickly that something must be done to counteract these rising costs. What better solution, with such little student sacrifice could you hope for than simply forgoing our DC trays.

Michael Phillis is a Collegian columnist. He can be reached at [email protected].

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