Goal: Encourage students to sit together and share tables.
At Marketplace on Neil, a dining facility on south campus, there’s an issue where students don’t want to sit together, especially when there’s one person sitting at a four-person table. I’ve experienced this myself. Getting a table is a competitive sport! This is a problem when tables aren’t used efficiently.
According to a recent dining survey, lack of seating is students’ biggest complaint. Students have also said they don’t mind sharing a table. So that got me thinking.
Audience: Students eating in Marketplace on Neil, specifically during busy times like lunch and dinner
Process: Originally I thought the copy would be:
Share a Table. Share the Buckeye Spirit. (SHARE KINDNESS GRAPHIC)
When I shared that with the dining managers, they gave the feedback that the message was getting lost and the sticker was confusing. Students wouldn’t know what it meant. The whole idea in my initial thought was a way to notify other students that you were open to share the space with someone else. Such as “Seat open for a study or quiet companion” I was thinking something like this:
Results: The stickers are on every other table and operations managers reported an increase in students sharing tables.
Debbie Wakefield 