M&G is a tax-free way for students to spend money at participating facilities located near ASU campuses. El Portal, located on the first floor of the Walter Cronkite School, and Hsin Cafe, located on the first floor of the Taylor Place dorms, are two of the latest restaurants to begin accepting M&G.
“Since August when we started accepting M&G, I have seen a 30 percent increase in the amount of customers we get in a day,” said Byron Rhymes, an employee at the Mexican restaurant El Portal. “I’ve been a lot more tired lately.”
El Portal has always accepted SunDollars, which work similarly to M&G dollars, but Rhymes said they decided that “it just made sense to accept M&G because that’s what the students down here use.”
“I only went to El Portal because I saw the M&G sign,” said Lily Rodriguez, a nursing freshman.
Ben Juang, part owner of the Asian restaurant Hsin Cafe said that accepting M&G “brings the restaurant a lot of business.”
Hsin didn’t accept M&G for their first year of operation because “the school fee was very high,” said Juang.
ASU approached Juang and offered him a better rate for fear of the Taylor Place dorms cafeteria not being able to handle the increase in students for the 2010 school year, he said.
Hsin pays 10 percent of all of their M&G sales to ASU. Accepting M&G is a positive thing now from a business perspective, but Juang said he worries what will happen in the future.
“Some students have a really low balance of M&G already just two months into the school year,” said Juang. “I don’t know what will happen after it is gone.”
Carolina Beltran, nursing freshman said, “The food at Hsin is really good, but I probably wouldn’t come as often as I do if they didn’t accept M&G.”
Domino’s Pizza, located on North Central Avenue and Thomas Road, has accepted M&G for at least two years. Anne Clayton, a manager at Domino’s said that without M&G their “evening sales would be severely affected.”
“From 9 p.m. until we close, 50 to 70 percent of our business is from ASU customers,” said Clayton.
There have been some complaints from students about the time it takes to use M&G at Hsin Cafe. Juang said that the machine to run the M&G card can take up to five minutes to process. Juang said he brought this issue to ASU’s attention, and he said that ASU told him the problem is an old machine but have taken no action to replace the machine.
“I want to apologize to students who have had to wait for the card to process,” said Juang. “It’s out of my control.”
Hsin Cafe is owned by Juang and his brother and is open seven days a week from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. for dine-in or carry-out. Hsin was Juang’s father’s name, and the restaurant is a tribute to Juang’s parents’ dedication to the family.
El Portal is owned by Mary Rose Wilcox and family run as well. Wilcox owns another El Portal restaurant in downtown Phoenix off of Grant Street. El Portal is open for breakfast and lunch and has been operating since January 2009.
Contact the reporter at aebnet@asu.edu
