At the beginning of the semester, Hsin Cafe began offering a 10 percent discount on all purchases made with cash or credit in an attempt to save money.
Maroon & Gold Dollars can cost the restaurant a fair amount of money. With every purchase made with M&G, Hsin Cafe has to pay a certain percentage of the purchase to Aramark, the company in charge of food services at ASU.
“It’s like using a credit card, you have to pay a certain percent of the purchase,” said Hsin Cafe employee Albert Juang. “With M&G the percentage is just a lot higher.”
Last year, Hsin Cafe paid Aramark about 10 to 20 percent of all M&G purchases. Juang did not comment on the current percentage of his profits that go to Aramark or about the M&G program in general.
Hsin Cafe and El Portal are two of the few restaurants on the Downtown campus that accept M&G, making them popular among students as an alternative to eating in the Taylor Place dinning hall.
Ana Gandarilla, the manager of El Portal, is not offering discounts for certain payments because she said many students who use M&G bring friends who pay with cash.
“We’re proud to have M&G,” Gandarilla said. “We get a lot of support from whoever’s in charge.”
Bowl of Greens, the newest restaurant to open in the Cronkite building, does not accept M&G because they found the program too expensive, said owner Jay Green, adding that the business is doing fine without the M&G program.
“The price was ridiculous,” Green said. “It was a benefit for them, not for me.”
Despite the lack of the M&G option at Bowl of Greens, Green said he still gets about half of his business from students. El Portal gets more than half of their business from students using M&G and 70 percent of Hsin Cafe’s customers are students, most of whom pay with M&G.
Even with the discount on cash and credit payments, Juang said he hasn’t seen a decrease in M&G payments.
Freshmen Max Davis and Eric Williams said paying with cash was “too expensive” and they would never consider using anything but M&G to buy food, even with the discount.
Sophomore Stephanie Guevara said she thinks M&G is the most convenient option.
“It’s easier than carrying money,” Guevara said. “I go the gym and then go eat and there’s more of a chance to lose money.”
Other students living on campus said they frequently eat at restaurants that accept M&G to conserve their money and would like to see more options where they could spend their meal plan dollars.
Amy Jones, assistant manager of Mi Amigo’s, a Mexican restaurant in the Arizona Center, said the restaurant has not seen the business increase they had hoped the Downtown campus would bring, even with the 10 percent discount they offer students.
“(ASU) should encourage restaurants to accept M&G or the center could do something for students,” said Jones, in order to benefit downtown businesses, as well as students.
Contact the reporter at cydney.mcfarland@asu.edu
