Coffee, bagels and boba: SU Dining’s summer makeover sparks debate
Get the latest Syracuse news delivered right to your inbox.
Subscribe to our newsletter here.
While growing up in Connecticut, Matilda Odin considered the local Einstein Bros. Bagels shop her favorite bagel place until the joint closed when she was eight years old. Years later, Odin was reunited with the bagel house as a Syracuse University sophomore.
“I’m really excited,” Odin said. ”This was my favorite bagel place when I was little, and then it moved away, and I haven’t seen one since it came into here, so I’m happy about that.”
Einstein Bros. Bagels in the Life Sciences Complex is one of the many new on-campus dining options in the Syracuse University Campus Dining expansion for the new school year.
The Life Sciences Café, Pages Cafe and Biscotti Cafe on campus have all been replaced by commercial brands for this school year: Einstein Bros. Bagels, Starbucks and Beyond Boba.
These new additions are among a trend of many corporate brands making their way to campus in an effort to help students easily identify dining options, Carrie Frobe, associate director of retail dining at SU, said. Students now have several for food outside the dining halls, reflecting student feedback and meetings with various university officials, she said.
While some students, like Odin, were excited about the changes and new places to try on campus, people like SU senior Liv Gwitt see them as unnecessary.
Gwitt wishes Pages would’ve stayed independent.
“I prefer Pages to Starbucks because it’ll be open later, and you can use your meal swipe,” Gwitt said.
WHAT YOU SHOULD READ NEXT
Syracuse University dining rolls out mobile ordering, starting at Dunkin’
Syracuse University launched mobile ordering capabilities for on-campus dining locations. It’ll start at Dunkin’ in Schine Student Center.
With two other Starbucks locations on campus — one on West Campus near Brewster, Boland and Brockway halls and a smaller location inside The Canteen in the National Veterans Resource Center — having three locations within one campus is redundant, Gwitt said.
Other students, like SU sophomore Malakai Yepes, said having big-name brands makes campus feel more like home. With a packed class schedule, the variety of on-campus food brings more options to have in between classes.
“Some changes you are going to like, some you aren’t,” Yepes said. “I think that ushering in a new stage for Syracuse in terms of their dining is going to have those changes, but honestly, I’m welcome to them all, even if I don’t like them all.”
However, some students had no idea these changes were being implemented until they stepped foot on campus. As students piled into the Life Sciences Complex on Tuesday, some stopped, shocked by the change, with a few taking pictures and audibly gasping.
On the other hand, students eagerly lined up inside Bird Library to try the new Starbucks. The newest change to Bird will help split the long line for coffee at Dunkin’ in the Schine Student Center next door, allowing customers to be served faster at both coffee spots.
Though the line ran nearly out the door, some students weren’t too overjoyed.
Another new addition to this year’s dining options is the replacement of Biscotti Cafe with Beyond Boba in Schine.
Mams Jagha, an SU junior, saw the new beverage place’s sign and decided to give it a try. She usually goes to Marshall Street, where boba places Hi Tea and Mala Magic are located, but was happy to see a boba place that was more convenient on campus.
Jagha, who ordered a strawberry-flavored drink with strawberry popping boba, said the addition of a boba place was in line with boba drinks becoming more popular in the country.
“It is really smarter to add a boba place, because it is trendy,” Jagha said. “So (SU) being trendy is cool.”
The expansion also provides more work-study opportunities throughout the school year, which students like Jagha appreciate.
“I think it’s helpful for everyone having more stores, restaurants, because it gives people more jobs, just more shifts in general, to make more money,” Jagha said.
