Cal Dining Representatives
Shawn LaPean Michael Laux Christina Voyles
Director of Cal Dining Assoc. Director of Dining Administration Brand and Marketing Manager
[email protected] [email protected] [email protected]
Director of Cal Dining Assoc. Director of Dining Administration Brand and Marketing Manager
[email protected] [email protected] [email protected]
Welcome to Cal Dining
Cal Dining is the establishment at UC Berkeley that provides many meal options to UC Berkeley students, faculty/staff, and non residents. The dining establishment consists of four residential dining locations: Cafe 3, Clark Kerr, Crossroads, and Foothill. In addition, several on campus retail locations are available which include: Golden Bear, Pat Brown's, Ramona's, Pro Shop, Terrace Cafe, Common Grounds, and Qualcomm. Please see our about page for a map showing all dining locations.
Cal Dining: From Farm to your Plate
In the last 11 years, Cal Dining has served from 1.9 million meals a year to 5 million meals a year. As such, Cal Dining spends a lot of time deciding what type of food should be on their menu. They want to strive for a balance of both nutritious, healthy food, but at the same time want to appease to the student demands at UC Berkeley and need to take that into account. Currently, the establishment seeks to purchase food from local vendors and farms but they need to also make sure that they do not purchase expensive food, otherwise they will have to increase the payment of their meal plan since they are self funded. In addition, Cal Dining makes note of what is currently popular with students and strives to give in to that demand. For example, although unhealthy, fried chicken strips is currently the most popular item through Cal Dining and as such they make sure to keep it on their menu as long as they see that there is sufficient student demand.
It seems that the students' complaints that Cal Dining is not "healthy" enough seem to be based on false assumptions since we found out that through our interview that Cal Dining in fact makes many commitment to ensuring that their food remains high quality and healthy. If we want to truly change the Cal Dining Menu we need to make sure that more students change their individual eating habits to a healthier option so that Cal Dining can follow in their footsteps. |
Did you know?
- Cal Dining spent about $35,000 on silverware last year due to lost/stolen utensils
- There are 300 full-time staff members, 55 to 60 people in management and administration and about 400 student employees.
- For full-time employees, the lowest wage paid is $15.60/hr
- Student wage starts at $11.25/hr
- The menu is planned out five weeks ahead. About 3,000 students living outside of dorms still purchase a meal plan.
- About 3,000 students living outside of dorms still purchase a meal plan. Other major colleges have an average of 400 students outside of the dorms who purchase a meal plan.
Cal Dining: The Meal Plan
Cal Dining started a "meal point" based system for their meal plan in order to allow more flexibility to students when choosing their meals. Each point is more or less equivalent to $1 so an $8 dinner is equivalent to 8 meal points. Residents in the dorms can choose between a standard, premium and ultimate meal plan while nonresidents can choose between the blue, gold, and platinum meal plans.
As of 10/31/14 the number of people with meal plans are as follows:
Resident Meal Plans:
Ultimate: 436
Standard: 5,056
Premium: 1,171
Non-Resident Meal Plan
Blue: 2,207
Gold: 435
Platinum: 212
Faculty/Staff: 543
Grad Students: 238
Cal Dining receives a huge number of visitors each day, and must focus on adequately focus on supplying this demand for food. According to our sources, the estimated number of customer between Monday-Thursday averages 15,000-30,000 people. During gamedays the volume is much higher with there being up to 50,000-60,000+ customers.
As of 10/31/14 the number of people with meal plans are as follows:
Resident Meal Plans:
Ultimate: 436
Standard: 5,056
Premium: 1,171
Non-Resident Meal Plan
Blue: 2,207
Gold: 435
Platinum: 212
Faculty/Staff: 543
Grad Students: 238
Cal Dining receives a huge number of visitors each day, and must focus on adequately focus on supplying this demand for food. According to our sources, the estimated number of customer between Monday-Thursday averages 15,000-30,000 people. During gamedays the volume is much higher with there being up to 50,000-60,000+ customers.
Strengths:
Cal Dining has many programs that reflect a commitment to serving local, organic, and sustainable food.
- Cal Dining offers meal plans to eligible Seniors living in the Redwood Gardens Co Op
- They also produce food for child care programs
- When determining the menu, Cal Dining makes special accommodations to students' dietary restrictions and religious requirements.
- Cal Dining participates in the Real Food Campus Commitment, omitting UC Berkeley to purchasing 20% "Real Food" by 2020 and solidifying the institution’s support for the development of a sustainable, local, fair, and humane food system. Currently Cal Dining's menu is 38-39% local overall, with 50% of the food being local in the dining halls, well above the commitment challenge.
- Cal Dining has reduced food waste by 16% by removing trays from the dining halls and providing smaller plates during meals.
- Cal Dining provides a dietitian for students who are interested in learning more about their eating behavior.
- Cal Dining provides a number of organic items on their menu including: milk, cheese, tofu, eggs, and a 100% salad bar
Weaknesses:
Despite the numerous strengths that the Cal Dining establishment has, due to an ever increasing budget problem, they continually face obstacles regarding what is economically feasible and what is desired.
- Cal Dining is not subsidized by the university or the state and is self funded, leading to a limited budget.
- The establishment has to pay 13% of their total revenue to UC Berkeley every year.
- They receive 100% of their funds through student meal plans.
- Serving 100% local food increases the cost of the meal by $1.45 which translates to an overall cost increase of $3-4 million per year.
- Employees aren't as sustainability conscious, and need further education.
Recommendations:
In the hope of increasing transparency and student interaction with Cal Dining, we propose the following suggestions:
- Increased accessibility to information regarding Cal Dining's local, sustainable, and organic products (via posters, digital displays, etc).
- Polling students about their experience and understanding of Cal Dining's offerings.
- "Did You Know?" campaigns to increase awareness when new products are added to menus.
- Information during new student orientations.
If you have any thoughts to any of the points above, please share your discussion in the forum below: