The 2020 College Power Players cope with COVID

Food Management’s College Power Players listing annually tabulates the 25 largest campus dining programs in the country. However, given the impact of coronavirus on enrollment, attendance and dining participation, we felt that any attempt to create a new fall 2020 list would be distorted by the limitations, restrictions and fluctuating circumstances the virus continues to inflict on schools, especially in the areas of students residing on campus and consequently on meal plan sales.

Indeed, while most of the schools on the list have more or less maintained topline enrollment numbers, the number of students actually living on campus has dropped in most cases, some quite dramatically, no doubt due to a combination of COVID-related worries and the availability of online classes, and this has naturally affected the number of meal plans sold. Indeed, in some cases, meal plans and even access to campus dining is being restricted to resident students to limit crowds and staff-to-customer as well as customer-to-customer contact.

On the other hand, most of the listed schools are allowing at least some form of dine-in service limited by social-distancing requirements, and most also have mobile-order options to facilitate takeout service, which remains the primary form of dining access this fall at almost every school.

To illustrate the impact of the COVID pandemic on schools and meal programs, we have included the enrollment, resident student and meal plan sale numbers from last year’s College Power Players listing with each entry along with the numbers provided for fall 2020.

Food Management plans to publish the 2021 College Power Players listing next spring, when a clearer picture of where the largest players in the college dining market stand heading into the 2021-2022 school year may begin to emerge.