Chaotic start for new caterer

‘My first impression was chaos,’ said Sandra Munniks of Rikilt. ‘You have to hunt for products. There were no information tags to show how much a sandwich costs and what ingredients it has. I think that things will improve. If not, we’ll just go back to the Restaurant of the Future.’ Cormet Campus Catering has taken over the canteens of Wageningen UR since mid July from Albron. Up to last week, it only served a limited summer variety in the café on the ground floor. Yesterday morning, it also started to operate in the big canteen on the first floor. The porcelain plates were no longer placed at the entrance, but at the back, next to the small stand with Chinese takeaway meals. Nobody – not even a Cormet worker – could find the plates. Cardboard plates were brought out instead. ‘We haven’t got everything ready yet,’ explained commercial director Frank van Zomeren of Cormet. ‘We will be fully operational only on 3 September. We are still equipping the counter, and there will be more sandwiches and salads. We placed the plates at the Chinese food counter because they needed these then. That takes some getting used to, but perhaps they should be placed in another part of the canteen. We’re still looking into this.’ ‘One good thing is that you can also pin here,’ said MSc student Arjen Blankesteijn. ‘Before the summer, you could only pay with a Chip card.’ It turned out, though, that the cashier system is not very flexible: you need to decide beforehand how to pay. A student had insufficient balance when he started to chip but changing halfway to pinning was not possible. The row behind grew longer and longer. What about the taste? ‘Fine,’ said student Arjen while his croquette sandwich was still on the table. Jokingly he added: ‘I always have a croquette sandwich, so this is a very good repeat experiment.’