Every semester Sodexo, the food service for Tarleton State University, does a survey to help better serve the students, faculty and staff.

“[We hope] to better serve students and faculty and staff at Tarleton by staying up with the eating trends of the new generation of students. We also provide this information to Tarleton to grow food service and retail operations in the direction that best serves the university,” the General Manger of Sodexo, Tanner Smith said.

Sodexo sends out the survey at least twice a year and every year the positive responses increase.

“Our usual responses have a high percentage of satisfaction. The percentage of positive responses this year was greater than any prior year,” Smith said.

Over the past few years with the help of positive reviews and suggestions, Sodexo has been able to add and upgrade many things within the food services on campus.

“We have added new retail, updated old retail, modified menus, added additional options, changed hours of operation, changed meal plan options and partnered with a lot of events going on around campus,” Smith said. “In addition to that, Sodexo has proposed new retail concepts to grow on campus and provide more options.”

Even with a high percentage of positive responses, there can still be a good amount of negative ones. However, Sodexo uses those to make the changes and do better for the campus.

“We compare [the results] to years past, provide the information to Tarleton clients and review with the management staff to address any issues that are submitted. Since [the survey] is anonymous, we review the likes and dislikes and make changes to menus, options and recommend any changes to Tarleton that require their approval.” Students, faculty and staff can request things that they would like to see different and many times, Sodexo gets the same thing quite often.

“Alternate meal plan options, additional variety at the grill station, pizza/stir fry/omelets are all awesome and they want them more often and to do more bars down the middle are some of the most common responses. Additional vegetarian options and we serve too much chicken were also some common responses,” Smith said.

With the survey from this fall and the responses of over 300 students, faculty and staff, Sodexo is working on reviewing the requests and seeing what they can do in the new year to better serve the campus and improve the options.

“[We will] continue making changes to better serve the student body and visit with Tarleton client’s about next steps in adding additional retail and dining spaces,” Smith said.

Keep an eye out for more options, updated menus and changes in the right direction for Tarleton’s food services around campus by Sodexo.