GW, it's time to dump Sodexo.

So, listen, GW. It's time we had a talk. I've been hanging out with you for a while now, and things have been going pretty well. I like my classes, my professors, my internships, DC in general... but, um, there's a problem.

It's Sodexo.

I just hate to see Sodexo holding you back like this. You've got so much potential, you could be so great, if only you could get over Sodexo. Sodexo doesn't treat you right, and he definitely doesn't treat me right, and you know what? It's time to move on.


Slightly more seriously: Sodexo's management of J Street is a train wreck. unreasonably high by-weight prices at the cafe that make the pathetically few healthy options a splurge (fresh fruit: heavier than greasy/rubbery/unidentifiable crap that's been over a sterno for 7 hours), a meal plan that hands Sodexo a good chunk of cash every semester whether or not you can palate their food, and exactly zero hours on weekends (it's not that they think college students don't eat on weekends, it's just that, well, hey, when you've already got our money, why bother being convenient?). I could go on, but in the interest of avoiding any more unbearably run-on sentences, I won't. Suffice it to say: I've been doing some research (i.e. poking around on the internet for the last half hour), and hey, guess what, of the comparably sized colleges I've looked into, not a single one offers a dining hall not open on weekends. nor does a single one offer less than twice as many on-plan restaurant options.

Anyways, to the action plan. What can we do about it? Well, as is often the case, the same thing we do about genocide in Darfur and the tragedy of Pluto's demotion to "trans-neptunian object":

JOIN THE FACEBOOK GROUP.

(A postscript: a similar, if more practically attainable, goal has already been discussed on this very blog last week.)

(A final postscript... yes, I know, ten-year contract signed in 2006. Whatever. Maybe if we start yelling about it now, in eight years GW will notice we're not happy about it.)

(A really seriously final postscript, for any typo-hounds: yeah, it's called Sodexo now. no more silent 'H'.)

Socialist Dining?

David Ceasar's op-ed in this Thursday's Hatchet hit the nail on head...

Simply put, the food at J Street today is rather abysmal. Students choose to eat elsewhere because there is better food at better prices at GWorld partners outside the Marvin Center. But it hasn't always been this way.

This is my fifth year at the University, and I've witnessed firsthand J Street offerings get progressively worse - in both quality and diversity of choices. Regrettably, it's been a devolution, not evolution of changes.

Well I've only been here three years, each has seen an J Street "update" -- each making the venue dramatically less attractive.

My freshman year I ate at J Street several times a week and was fairly happy with its offerings. Name brand eateries such as Subway and Starbucks were generally fast and served products on par with any of their other franchises. Since then, Sodexho has turned most everything into generic brands that just aren't good quality.

This year, I can count the times I've eaten at J Street on one hand... and that's too many.

In recent weeks, Student Association leaders have lobbied the administration to diminish the unpopular mandatory minimum spending at J Street.

I also feel very bad for the freshman and sophomores forced to spend a large chunk of their gworld money there, subsiding what would otherwise be an unprofitable endeavor for the food service company.

Ceasar correctly concludes, "The crux of the supply-and-demand problem lies in the quality of the dining options."

The university and Sodexho are providing a product that simply can't compete with the plethora of other options downtown has to offer. Until they fully recognize this, they'll continue to have no other choice than a socialist/welfare based cafeteria regime. I mean the food kind of does taste like something from a Soviet gulag. Free market capitalism anyone?