May Garden spices up social life Restaurant reinvents itself, adapts to student demands

Author: Rachel Durfee

Is there a new Wednesday night hot spot for Middlebury students? It looks like there could be. This past Wednesday, college students headed to May Garden, a Chinese restaurant located in Marbleworks, where, for a $5 cover charge, they received one free beer and unlimited free appetizers. Anywhere else it may seem strange, but in a small town like Middlebury where options are limited, students seem more than willing to flock to any establishment that provides a good draft deal and space to house college kids.

Since another local watering hole, Mr. Up's, famed for its Wednesday night dollar drafts, changed operations after being penalized by the liquor inspector in March, College students have been searching for a new place to let loose mid-week. In early April, the owner of May Garden, who goes by the name of Davy and has owned and managed the restaurant since October 2005, was chatting with some Middlebury students about the recent Wednesday night dilemma. The students asked if they could come to the restaurant that Wednesday with some friends to have drinks and socialize. Around 60 people showed up and after the success of that night, the idea for last Wednesday's entrepreneurial evening was born.

Three College students ran the bar, serving dollar bottles of beer and three-dollar well drinks. When the bottles ran out later in the evening, students sipped contentedly out of dollar cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon. The crowd eventually spread out from around the bar into the restaurant area, where people could group around large tables. Davy was visible throughout the evening, enthusiastically passing around Chinese appetizers like "Chinese pizza" and sharing a grin with every customer.

Jamie Wong '06, one of the bartenders and a server at May Garden, described the evening as "really fun" and the clientele as "very respectful." Fellow bartender Elizabeth Clayburgh '06 said, "It was good to see a crowd out on Wednesday night again. We would love to keep this going for the rest of the year and hope that it has a positive effect on Davy's business."

The restaurant remained open until about 2 a.m. with no major problems. Next week will see some changes, such as the elimination of glass bottles, an additional bouncer and perhaps a wider offering of drinks at slightly steeper prices. There may also be a student DJ. The goal, however, stresses Davy, is not to make money on a Wednesday night or to turn May Garden into a bar. His main objective is to promote his restaurant and draw a bigger crowd from the College for the food side of the business. His hope is that Middlebury students will come in on a Wednesday night, have a good time and then return to the restaurant for meals and take-out.

The restaurant has taken measures to keep out underage drinkers and prevent people from taking their drinks outside. It has also posted the restaurant's capacity and buys all alcohol through a distributor.

Despite difficulty cleaning the carpets the day after his Wednesday night extravaganza and pointing out nicks in the woodwork where students opened beer bottles, Davy remains as friendly a host as ever, saying he hopes to make Wednesday nights at May Garden a basically volunteer, student-run operation - "by students, for students." Wong says she didn't volunteer for the money (she and fellow bartenders Clayburgh and Sakel Heng '07 made only about $17 in tips), but to help Davy out and keep the venture fun yet manageable. Davy was quite happy with the evening's turnout, saying with his now-famous grin, "I want kids to have a good time and enjoy life."