I’ve got a pretty big appetite. My roommate calls it a “big back” problem, but I just call it hunger. You’d think I’m lucky — there are plenty of options for food on and around campus; the issue is, they are all expensive.
It’s an arm and a leg to eat anywhere on Franklin Street, and you’d be better off buying a Van Cleef bracelet than shopping for eats at our friendly neighborhood Target. So, if you’re anything like me — on-campus, carless and stretched thin on time — the allure of a CDS meal plan draws you in.
Then you realize it’s just ripping you off.
The first time I considered this might be the case was a few months ago. I left my table in Lenoir Dining Hall to grab a sugar cookie, and when I got to the cookie stand, I saw a sign that said something along the lines of, “Please take no more than two bakery items.” Two? With how much my meal plan costs, I was expected to have at most two sugar cookies? On the way down the escalator, I thought long and hard about the sign while scarfing down my fifth sugar cookie.
But I soon put my resentment aside for a while. After all, with classes in full swing and a statistics grade in dire need of saving, there were more important things to worry about. Surely, I would never think about dining hall costs again. Enter student Stuart MacMillan.
One day, late last semester, he told me he’d been looking into bananas. It turns out, he’d been researching how many bananas a person would need to take from a UNC dining hall to break even on their entry cost. His findings were laid out in a graphic titled “Bananas to Break Even,” which quickly got plastered all over campus.
When I saw this graphic, those sugar cookie thoughts came flooding right back in. According to Stuart’s research, as of December 3, 2024, the bananas supplied by CDS are purchased for $28.99 per 40 pounds — that’s $0.24 for each banana. A student with the Block 120 plan, which is the second cheapest meal plan offered, pays $15.33 on average to enter any UNC dining hall. Based on these figures, this student would have to take 64 bananas from the dining hall to break even on what it cost to enter.
Sure, a company needs to make a profit to stay in business, but Aramark, which provides food services for Carolina Dining Services, and generated nearly $19 billion in 2023, would be just fine without ripping off college students. Aramark’s control over UNC’s dining services seems to have created a situation where students, already burdened with tuition fees and other college expenses, are also forced to subsidize inflated meal prices for subpar food.
And then there’s the hidden costs that come with dining at UNC. There’s a reason why students frequently complain about the “value” of their meal plans. It’s not just about the meal itself but the lost opportunity to eat elsewhere. UNC’s location offers countless restaurant options, but many students get stuck in a situation where they’re paying top dollar for convenient food that could easily be outdone by a local restaurant. And while Franklin Street can be pricey, you’d actually save more money purchasing three burritos a day from Cosmic Cantina than sticking with your meal plan.
