The Deal With the Den

As a faithful resident of central campus for the past three years, I don’t often find myself in the vicinity of The Den, our newest café located in south campus. However, with the beginning of this year, advertisements for The Den seem to be cropping up around campus, putting it back on my radar. I decided to take a closer look at how Conn students feel about The Den and the services it provides.
Through a series of informal conversations with students, feedback about The Den proved to be lukewarm. Students frequently cited location convenience, variety and the ability to use Cro money and credit cards as perks of The Den. Will Hardy ’14, a resident of Harkness, said he prefers The Den to other coffee spots on campus, explaining, “The coffee is quite good and when you are looking to grab a hot cup, it’s always quick.” Yet others pointed to the “industrialized interior,” incessant flashing of TV screens, and the fact that it is run by an outside business as drawbacks. While few people had any zealous feelings one way or another towards The Den, many felt strongly about student versus corporate businesses on campus. “I don’t really like buying the coffee [at The Den] because I like buying from places that are student-run and get their products locally,” explained Julia Pope ’14. Hallie Selinger ’14, echoed her friend’s comment, explaining, “I would much rather support the Coffee Closet… I know the people that work there and I would rather buy the baked goods made by students.”
Proponents of Coffee Grounds felt similarly about supporting sustainable practices and student groups. Jocelyn Reaves ’15, the manager of Coffee Grounds, described the ways in which a student-run business caters to the interests and values of the student body. Reaves explained, “Coffee Grounds is built on the idea of sustainability. We buy local coffee, milk and as many ingredients for our baked goods as possible.” Sarah Pincus ’14, a resident of Jane Addams back when The Den was new on campus recalled, “I was excited when it opened because it was so convenient, but I didn’t like the sterile environment… it wasn’t cozy like Coffee Grounds. I would rather spend my money supporting a student organization that’s great than use my Cro card at a place I don’t like to study in.” While many of these objections are a matter of personal preference, it became clear that some students are misinformed or simply unaware of some of the policies and practices of The Den.
In a conversation with Joanna Baker, The Den’s general manager, the energetic and impassioned Baker was able to help clear up some of these shared misconceptions. First, while some seem to think that The Den hasn’t been doing well financially, Baker reports that this year has been the best since the café opened in 2011. The Den currently serves over 100 customers each weekday and about 320 each weekend. Baker believes that this increased success is partially due to the menu changes, extended hours (now open seven days a week: Sunday to Wednesday, 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. and Thursday to Saturday, 11 a.m. to 1 a.m.), and more late night programming in the space, such as trivia nights and jazz performances.
Additionally, Baker is striving to make the physical space “warmer and more inviting” to students. In late August, Baker got approval from the College to select student art to frame and hang in The Den. She hopes that this addition of student work, along with new rugs and a community board for campus announcements, will help students feel more involved in the space. This commitment to students is also echoed in the people employed by The Den; of the twenty-four employees, twenty-one are Conn students. “It is important to me that the staff be a majority of Conn students,” insisted Baker. “I think it is important to embrace where you are and to feel like you have pride and ownership of a place.”
On the matter of sustainability, I admit that I was among the uninformed about the source of The Den’s products and refuse. I simply assumed that all of the products were pre-packaged and commercialized. While this is true for many of the food items, all of the coffee used at The Den is fair trade and their milk brand, Farmers Cow, comes from dairy farmers right here in Connecticut. Additionally, all of the used coffee grounds are given to the Sprout Garden to be used as fertilizer.
While many of my misgivings about The Den were assuaged by this conversation, the matter of an outside company running The Den continues to be a complex issue for me. Baker is not blind to student reservations about Sodexo’s involvement, stating: “[I know] there is a consensus that there is a corporation that is managing this café… I am a part of that corporation, however, I work for Connecticut College as well… and it is important to know 100% of the money that comes into The Den goes back to the College.”
While it is unclear what exactly is done with the money once it is absorbed by the College, I feel that my continued reservations about The Den lie in my personal opinions on all large-scale corporations. I believe that The Den is on the up-and-up; it demonstrates a clear commitment to Conn’s value of sustainability, student engagement and community, yet I just can’t get myself to be completely comfortable knowing I am just one of the 75 million consumers that utilize Sodexo’s “quality of life” services daily. This is clearly not a concern shared by others on our campus, as roughly six students, four of which were specifically tasked with getting campus opinion, were part of the committee that selected Sodexo to run The Den.Perhaps my reservations about Sodexo betray my discomfort with a world that is increasingly endorsing multinational business conglomerations. Honestly, I’d rather be a faithful customer to a coffee shop serving a campus population of 2,000 than just another profit figure on a spreadsheet of billions.