Brown and Brew has altered its business hours once again and will no longer open on weekends.
This schedule change is not unprecedented. The coffee shop, located in Curtis Hall on Boston Avenue, got rid of Saturday and Sunday hours two years ago. Last year, it expanded its hours to include Sundays, but effective this month, it has eliminated those hours again, according to Director of Dining and Business Services Patti Klos.
Citing a decrease in overall customers, Klos said Dining Services made the decision late last spring.
Klos said weekend business had been slow for several years. "Every week we look at participation and we look at times of day, and we had noticed this trend all year long," Klos said.
Despite calls from students requesting weekend hours last year, Sunday Brown and Brew patronage still lagged behind the shop's number of weekday customers, according to Ralph Perrotto, assistant director of dining and business services.
While students may have utilized Brown and Brew during the weekend, their presence did not necessarily translate into business for the café, Klos said.
"We know that some students are impacted because they might have gone there and we regret any inconvenience that might cause, but there just wasn't enough activity going on other than just a study space, and we can't afford to staff just a study space," she said.
Perrotto attributed the decline in weekend sales to the availability of other on−campus alternatives.
"Many of the students that used to patronize Brown and Brew now utilize The Tower [Café], and we also are required to have operations open in the [Mayer] Campus Center for extended hours," he said. "So there are only just so many operations that can be open at any given time."
Brown and Brew and The Tower Café, which is located in Tisch Library, are both under the auspices of Dining Services; they share a manager, supervisors and some employees, according to David Ford, the manager of both locations.
As a result, student workers at Brown and Brew have not lost any shifts despite the cut in operating hours, according to Ford.
"Whoever is looking for a shift has been taken care of at Brown and Brew or The Tower Café," he said.
Student workers have the opportunity to move throughout the various Dining Services facilities, Ford added.
"We all work for Dining Services, we all work for Tufts," Ford said. "If [employees] don't have enough shifts, they're free to look elsewhere on campus. If you really want to work, you can find somewhere to work, whether it's The Tower, the campus center. We all try to help each other out."
Joshua Hale, the student manager of Brown and Brew and The Tower Café, agreed. Student employees usually work two shifts a week, according to Hale, a senior.
"It hasn't really affected people too much," Hale said. "It just meant that I had to hire one less worker."
Klos said the turnover at Brown and Brew resulting from student employees graduating reduced the number of potential employees who would have been displaced.
Non−student employees work only Monday through Friday and thus were not impacted by the elimination of weekend hours, according to Klos.
