Harry Majin submitted on

Saturday 3rd October 2015

Complete

I am a third year student, who has just returned after the summer break. 

With no food in the house, my friend and I decided to head over to the SUSU Cafe for lunch, as last year we enjoyed the burger meal deal on many occasions.

To our horror, we were informed by the apologetic lady behind the counter that the burger meal deal has been scrapped. The burger itself is still available, but doesn't come close to the value offered by the £4.95 meal deal of last year.

To put the price shift into perspective, last year you could get a burger, large chips, two sides and a drink for £4.95. The same meal would now cost you around £6.50. This is a pretty drastic rise when you consider the fact that as students, we do not have a huge amount of disposable income. The burger meal deal represented real value for money and kept us coming back last year; the same cannot be said for the new prices.

I hope you can address my concerns, as I am not the only one who holds them.

Answers

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Anonymous submitted on

Wednesday 14th October 2015

Complete

During the summer we changed the offer within the Café to meet the demands of the majority of our customers. This was done in the summer because change means an awful lot of work going on behind the scenes that includes pricing, negotiations with suppliers, design work for new point of sale, staff training and simply trying to continue with our commitment to supplying good food at reasonable prices with the student purse foremost in our minds. Simply put, change does not happen overnight and the least amount of disruption to our members dictates the best time to make change is during the summer months (in particular August).

With regards to the offer, we now boast more vegan choices (constantly in demand) heavily discounted breakfast/Brunch is available all day, we now have a hot carvery filled breads section, we have introduced smoothies for those students who value nutrition above all else and also introduced a Panini selection that is heated up for the customer whilst they wait. To compliment the Brunch style service we have introduced more choice which now includes steak, chicken, pork, vegan chef specials and daily chef specials (a meal deal at £4.95) along with improving our beverage selection. Despite our best intentions we have still reacted to our members who have asked for additional items to be considered such as additional vegetable selections and more potato choices. The reintroduction of the chef’s specials has been a direct result of members’ requests and our understanding that the perception of supplying quality food at cheap prices must continue to be delivered.

We have considered very carefully what we should offer within the Café to best complement our other services and we firmly believe that the offers we deliver in both Bar Three and The Bridge are best served with the Café offer not competing against them, but adding to our vast array of food choices to give more options to all. There are still many meal deals on offer within the Café and we are determined to ensure we keep our commitment to our members on choice, quality and pricing throughout.