A new dawn for late night student favorite JJ’s Place

JJ’s Place as students know it will be gone come next semester. Currently a late night eatery, where both Flex and Dining Dollars are accepted, JJ’s Place will be transformed into another Columbia dining hall.

According to Victoria Dunn, director of Dining Services, the trend on most college campuses is to have an all-students-care-to-eat system that is open from 8 a.m. until midnight.

“Students wanted to be able to have both breakfast and a late night snack,” Heather Tsonopoulos, Marketing and Communications manager, said. This is just what the new system of dining halls hopes to accomplish. “With Ferris Booth changing [to a dining hall], it just made sense to change JJ’s too,” Dunn said.

Yet, students should not expect the general menu of JJ’s place to change. Old favorites like burgers and chicken fingers will still be available, but there will be some new additions, such as a breakfast grill and a smoothie bar. Just as JJ’s currently operates, everything will be made fresh to order, but next semester, students won’t have to wait in line for their food. Instead, a microphone system will be set up, allowing students to find a seat and pick up their food once their names are called. “It’s a quality product made fresh to order,” Dunn said.

JJ’s Place aims to maintain a relaxed environment with the transition. Not only will the board games stay, but according to Dunn, more and newer board games will probably be purchased. The pool table will also remain, and the presence of wireless will make it easy for students to get some homework done or surf the Internet while dining.

But the current marketplace section will be drastically reduced, keeping only the top 30 to 50 items in stock around the cash register, since “grocery business is minimal with off-campus Flex,” as Dunn said. CoreFoods, Columbia’s nonprofit organic foods cooperative that is run by students, will remain with minimal changes.

According to Stephanie Jurburg, CoreFoods’ manager of operations, CoreFoods plans on keeping most of its products. But because the current space for CoreFoods will be converted to the entire marketplace, CoreFoods will have to share shelf space. To avoid any potential issues with the limited space, CoreFoods has “petitioned for storage space so that we can keep the same amount of products and simply re-shelve them more often,” Jurburg said.

The Feel Good stand will remain unchanged and continue to sell grilled cheese sandwiches for charity out of JJ’s Place.

Both Dining Services and students seem optimistic and excited about the changes to the Columbia dining system. As Dunn said, there are more than “400 students already signed up for meal plans.”