To the students who have recently transferred or are freshmen on campus, I would like to formally apologize for the current state of the Runner Cafe, as you truly missed out on something special. Before, you would have the complete freedom and privilege to go about the cafe freely, but now you are treated as a scoundrel that must have an eye held against them.
I loathe the current state of the Runner Cafe. I hate placing an order for a simple soda that takes them 15 minutes to give me a cup and to fill up my own soda. I hate being charged extra for even thinking of taking my meal outside the cafe. I hate that now there is a buffet option that makes me feel miserable that I wasted my money if I don’t take a catering size of food. I hate that I keep needing to use my debit card instead of paying simple cash as I did before when I grabbed something small and didn’t have time to insert cash into my account instead of using kiosks that require the use of debit card.
I am not alone in these statements. Students have complained about other changes made about The Runner Cafe and campus dining.
“A lot of the time the workers don’t really know what to do, especially if you’re having issues with it. So yeah, I feel like that would probably be the best to find a better method to the Grubhub takeout boxes,” said Bee Nava, senior at Cal State Bakersfield.
Recent change made to the Runner Cafe is the over reliance of Grubhub in placing orders for both inside and take out, the decision to establish an all eat buffet in the Runner Cafe restricting part of the cafeteria to only paying buffet eater, and new restrictions on meal swipes and meal plans.
“Last year you were able to pretty much go everywhere, but now it’s just confined towards only the cafe, and to me that invokes like an insecurity within food, especially if you change your meal plan just to have a little bit more money to spend around campus,” said Juliana Castaneda, CSUB sophomore living in the dorms.
While another sophomore complains about the 1-hour time limit to both eat and pick your meal and $15.75 price tag for the current buffet that appear to dominate the rest of the Runner Cafe.
“I feel like if there wasn’t a time limit, I’d be able to go at whenever I can and be able to get whatever I want for like a good price, I’d say,” said Heaven Faith Leoro Hernandez.
John Medina, retail brand manager of The Runner Cafe, has not responded to any questions or comments concerning The Runner Cafe.
However, for the time being, I now spend the rest of the school semester resisting any attempt to use the Runner Cafe during my luck breaks. I now either go to another eatery, such as, Panda Express and snacks from the Runner Express on campus or simply wait out the day until I can go to restaurants off campus. Perhaps until the Runner Cafe stops burning a hole in my wallet or treats me like some uninvited guest that must leave immediately for just wanting a soda and didn’t want to pay to use their buffet, I will return, but until then, I choose to only take their ice water.
