TO THE EDITOR:
The news that South Building is considering leasing the operation of Student Stores comes as a not-so-unexpected surprise. In my 22 years with the store, 20 as director (I retired in 2010), we were always looking over our shoulders at the lease operators. In my experience, when a university considers leasing, there is a lot of spin, guile and misdirection. So let’s look at what we know from the published reports:
Claims of savings of several million dollars in textbook costs to students. This is preposterous. The on-campus brick-and-mortar sales of course materials at Carolina is less that $10 million. Plus, there might well be another $10 million sold off campus through Amazon and other online retailers. And despite the buzz around leased course materials, that model just isn’t popular with students. Unless Follett sells below cost, those projected savings aren’t there.
$2.5 million to remodel. Right, imply the cost of gutting the sales floor and bringing in the Follett campus bookstore look. We spent over $10 million renovating the Daniels Building from the ground up from 2005-08. Its systems and infrastructure are fine; these remodel dollars are cosmetic.
Employees offered tremendous opportunity for professional growth. Well, no. A few of the younger employees who are willing to relocate may be offered promotions, but that’s about it. And there will be no further growth of their state employee pensions, with only a corporate 401(k) as a retirement benefit.
Finally, what about student employees? The store employs 200 student employees, which collectively puts hundreds of thousands of dollars into student pockets every year — a form of financial aid which should be recognized. The bookstore chains are chronically short staffed, and often do not hire enough employees, of any kind, to offer good customer service. There will likely be fewer jobs for students and less student payroll within the University.
Finally, the financial details. The overhead of Daniels Building maintenance, repairs and utilities is hundreds of thousands a year. Then, there is the debt service on the remodel loan. Those do not go away. Are they paid from the $2.5 million to $3 million figure? If so, that reduces the net from the lease operator by quite a chunk. If not, then who pays?
The University may well lease out Student Stores, but it owes the campus community, students and store employees, whose life and livelihood are being diminished, a fair and even-handed examination of the facts. Leased stores are sometimes seen as a panacea, especially by those in the high-level professional administrator class who move from school to school leasing stores with no particular loyalty except to their own careers.
