By Alejandro Cortez
Dominican students, faculty and staff now need go no further than the Cyber Café to load up on their favorite caffeinated beverages. Chartwell’s recently added Starbucks tea and coffee to their drink offerings.
So far, the Cyber Café only serves drip coffee and teas but Venegas said they will soon incorporate the Frappuccinos, iced teas and smoothies that many college students live on. Venegas said, “We were suppose to get [the smoothie machine] this week but we ended up getting the wrong machine so we’re hoping to start selling by next Monday for sure.”
Managing Director of the Cyber Café Stephanie Venegas said Starbucks Coffee representatives came to Dominican on March 27 to train Chartwell’s staff members how to prepare their famous beverages.
Because Starbucks drinks can be time consuming to prepare, Venegas hopes to hire a barista to lighten the workload on Chartwell’s employees.
The Starbucks kiosk opened March 30 and Venegas and staff members gave out free drink samples to entice the student body.
Venegas said the decision to switch to Starbucks was started by rumors of dislike, “From what I heard, a lot of the students were complaining that they didn’t like the coffee here.” says Venegas. Chartwell’s made the decision to do away with the Fair Trade and Organic Peruvian coffee and add Starbucks into the picture.
Freshman Erica Rocha said offering Starbucks at Dominican will increase demand by students, causing them to purchase coffee more frequently.
Sophomore Iridian Arrellano said offering Starbucks coffee will bring more attention and is a great addition to the Cyber Café. Arrellano also expressed the desire to use her Starbucks loyalty card, “It would be amazing if I can just add money to my rewards card and pay like that.” Venegas said many customers ask if they can use their Starbucks rewards cards to purchase Cyber Café coffee and earn points but, unfortunately, the registers are only equipped with credit card machines and cannot accept loyalty cards.