The University of Iowa will slowly remove Starbucks products from Food for Thought Cafe and other locations as a new vendor replaces them: Canteen.
Students who visited the Food for Thought Cafe in the first week of classes may have seen a sign explaining Starbucks would no longer be serving inside the campus.
Director of Dining Services Don Stanwick said the UI contracts with vendors, and those contracts typically last between one and three years.
However, if the partnership is amicable for the company, then there are a limited number of one-year renewals allowed by the UI, about five or six, before the contract expires.
This gives the company some freedom to adjust or pull contracts based on performance. It also gives other companies the chance to make deals, so there is variety in the system, he said.
Right now, the UI is transitioning from using Starbucks as a main vendor to Canteen, a workplace food and drink vending firm. The Starbucks contract officially ended May 31, but students are still getting their daily Starbucks.
“Starbucks has been a wonderful partner, and they’ve allowed us to continue doing stuff throughout the summer and keeping equipment and everything up through the middle of September, as we transition,” Stanwick said.
Over the next few weeks, students should expect to see Canteen products replace their usual Starbucks drinks. Canteen has already replaced Starbucks in the marketplaces and dining halls with drip coffee.
“We’ve been running out of the Starbucks product that we currently have, and then we’ll be filling in some of the new products with the black and bold coffee, with the tea elixirs, with the espressos as we bring that into the university over the next couple weeks,” he said.
Stanwick said he is excited for the new products that will be sold, celebrating the new vendor and the options it will bring to students. He thinks apple harvest, turmeric, and ginger apple are interesting flavors that students will enjoy.
“I’m really kind of excited to try those,” he said.
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Not only is Stanwick excited about Canteen’s new flavors, but also about the company’s contract with a coffee brand: Black and Bold. He particularly liked this coffee brand because they are a local roaster based in Des Moines, and they give back to students and children in need.
“They have a really strong program, and we’re really excited to bring them onto campus,” he said.
Despite the shakeup in vendor options, Stanwick said prices will stay relatively the same.
“We’re not sitting there to raise prices or do anything differently in terms of that,” he said. “It’s just really kind of what the market dictates and what the company charges for the product, and that’s how we set our prices, but we should be right in line with what you see as Starbucks.”
Second-year nursing student Anja Miller noticed the announcement and slow transition into the Canteen vendor when she visited Food for Thought last week.
“I came here, and I didn’t know they were removing it until I saw the sign,” she said. “There was a sign out here during welcome week that said, ‘We no longer are going to have Starbucks.”
First-year pre-dentistry major Torbjorn Leraand said he was distraught after finding out about the removal. However, he got over his emotions quickly and noted he liked ordering Starbucks at Food for Thought Cafe because of the convenience and not the coffee itself.
“I’d say as long as they still serve coffee, I’ll still be visiting,” he said. “Like, does it have to be Starbucks coffee? Wherever’s convenient. The library is pretty convenient, though.”
Miller shared similar notions as Leraand about the convenience of Starbucks being served on campus, but the removal of the brand makes getting the product a hindrance to her.
“It’s not that big a deal,” she said. “I normally don’t want to go up the hill to the actual Starbucks store.”
First-year political science major Iris Oviedo had an opposite view to Leraand and Miller’s stance on convenience. However, she shared in Miller’s brand loyalty. As someone who only gets coffee once a week, she would rather go to a different coffee place than buy coffee from a new vendor at Food for Thought Cafe.
“It’s okay,” she said. “There’s other coffee shops around. I’ll just start drinking water or buying bottled drinks, too.”
Dining and Cooking