Utah State Dining Services explains its choice to bring in Subway
On Sept. 6, after years of collaboration with Taco Time and Caffe Ibis, the Utah State University Hub is adding another familiar name to the menu: Subway.
“Dining has done a lot of things on our own and we do some things well,” said Alan Andersen, the director of USU Dining Services. “But bringing in Subway is a tradeoff. There’s value in name recognition and the systems and marketing that come with the company.”
Andersen said he hopes name recognition will bring in more students.
“Taco Time is more regional, but Subway is all over the world. So even international students can come in and immediately recognize it,” said Andersen.
Though the Subway may come as a surprise to students returning this fall, Dining Services has been working on this project with Utah State’s Student Association and previous student body president Michael Scott Peters for some time.
“We’ve been planning to renovate the hub for a long time,” Peters said. “I met with Alan to brainstorm ideas based on our budget and input from students. It didn’t get publicized very much, but Dining really sought feedback from students and student body officers.”
One thing Andersen emphasized is the importance of saving money in the process.
“Not everyone realizes that USU Dining is self-sufficient, so we aren’t using tuition money or student fees to operate,” Andersen said. “We knew we needed to make the Hub more cost effective. Because Subway is already coming in with training systems and great marketing programs that we certainly wouldn’t be able to afford, we can kind of piggyback off of that.”
Taco Time wasn’t always the only outside company feeding students on campus. Andersen mentioned that when the Hub first opened about 20 years ago, a Pizza Hut was also stationed there for five years until their contract with the university ended.
The Hub also used to house Hogi Yogi and Teriyaki Stix, which were replaced in 2013 by the In B’tween sandwich shop and Teriyaki Bull, both created by Dining Services.
“We always like to have at least one outside company here,” Andersen said. “Both are owned and operated by USU, so the revenue comes back to the university.
But for students hoping to buy their Chick-Fil-A sauce and nuggets on campus in the near future—don’t get your hopes up.
“We’re looking for ways to be frugal. Anytime a company comes in here, we pay a franchise fee and royalties. That’s a big part of the reason we chose Subway and not, say, Chick-Fil-A. It cost us about $80,000 to put in the Subway, which is relatively inexpensive, whereas putting in a Chick-Fil-A would have been at least a quarter million.”
– naomiyokoward@aggiemail.usu.edu
@naomiyokoward