Campus Breakfast Delivery will bring Refectory breakfast to students’ doors on West and Central Campuses beginning next semester.
This new program, founded by sophomore Raffi Garnighian, will provide a varied breakfast menu to students on a pre-paid monthly basis. Over 200 students have signed a pre-registration form and another 150 are “on the fence,” Garnighian said. His goal is for 1,000 students to participate. He noted that although there is a two-dollar delivery charge added to the bill, the prices for individual food items are lower than at the the Refectory Cafe at Duke Law.
The purpose of the program is to conveniently provide students with nutrition.
“The idea came from the fact that there’s really not anywhere open at the hours people are requesting, between 7:30 and 8:00 a.m., that provides breakfast that is well-made…. There’s something missing,” Garnighian said. “If you have an 8:30 class, it’s very hard to pick up food.”
Both owner and operator Laura Hall and manager Denise Toloski of the Refectory Cafe at the Law School are excited about the program. Although business at the Refectory is “already really good,” Hall said working with the delivery service will increase business even more.
“It makes [students’] lives a whole lot easier for getting out of bed in the morning,” Hall said. “Now they have breakfast already there. They’re going to get the most important meal of the day—right there.”
Hall said the process of getting the program running was simple.
"They came and asked us if we’d be interested in delivering breakfast because they loved our product and I said ‘Happy to.’ It was that easy,” she said. “I have a son at college too and I thought, ‘How great would it be if someone was delivering him breakfast?’"
Campus Breakfast Delivery is awaiting approval to use a mobile device to make payments using food points.
“Right now… [students] would go next semester within the first week that they get back and they would swipe their cards at the Refectory one time and that would be it,” Garnighian said. “But I’m trying to get the mobile option so I could go to people’s dorms and get their number or do it through a website.”
Garnighian and Hall worked together to develop a diverse menu.
“They asked me what we could provide, so I gave them a whole list of what we could provide and they came back and said, ‘Okay, here’s what we would like to pick,’” Hall said. “They were very thorough and they got all of the nutritional information, so everyone knows exactly what they’ll be getting.”
To get workers to deliver the food in the morning, Campus Breakfast Delivery advertised on DukeList. Junior Marie Komori saw the job opportunity and will be delivering for the program next semester.
“A lot of students will benefit because a lot of people, including myself, often do not have enough time to get breakfast in the morning before class,” Komori wrote in an email Wednesday. “Being able to eat breakfast will have numerous benefits on health, mental alertness, etc.”
Sophomore Sherry Tianwei is interested in using Campus Breakfast Delivery because her classes have tended to disturb her mealtimes.
“I just received a flier on the way to the Bryan Center and I think this is a good chance for me to reschedule my mealtime," she said. "My class time is always around my mealtime, so normally I may not have breakfast or even lunch if there’s a class. It’s much more convenient for me.”
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