Dining services opens ‘The Den’ in Athletics Center

For student-athletes, Athletics staff, and regular gym-goers alike, the Peterson Family Athletics Complex is a daily fixture, but notably far from the college’s main dining hubs. The Den was created to close that gap, bringing convenient access to food to a corner of campus that had long gone without it. 

In its pilot phase, The Den is open Monday through Friday from 2 p.m. to 8 p.m. and is located behind the concessions area in the athletics complex. The initial menu includes power and acai bowls, smoothies, salads and grab-and-go options, designed to offer healthier choices not widely available at other campus dining locations such as The Grille.

“I’m very excited about the opportunity to have healthy food options without leaving the building,” Assistant Athletic Director Franklin Dean-Farrar said, toting a smoothie. “We work weird, crazy hours in athletics, and it’s nice to have an option that's right here.”

Dean-Farrar said that prior to The Den opening, Athletics staff only had the Tavern on the Tee (which is not open year-round) as an easily accessible spot for food. 

“I think it’s something that student-athletes and athletics staff have needed for a while,” women’s field hockey player Claire McMichael ’27 said. “We’re all busy, so it’s nice to have a food option that is close to where we spend a lot of time, and I think it will help the whole campus to have something in this corner.”

Head Women's Tennis Coach Olivia Leavitt, who had also ordered a smoothie, appreciated the stress relief that The Den potentially offers student-athletes. 

“Sometimes our athletes are coming over here twice a day, right? If they have to worry about going from here to class back to here, and they're worried about food or grabbing a snack, it’s great to have something on both sides of campus,” Leavitt said.

According to several people in both Athletics and Retail Food Operations (RFO), conversations about having some kind of dining option in the Athletic Complex have been floating around for years, but the idea for The Den crystallized only quite recently. The Campus reported in a March 15 article that the opening of Domino’s Pizza in Middlebury has caused a shift in sales for on-campus retail dining options. Assistant Director of Retail Operations Justin Edson said this has prompted the RFO team to reassess how they reach the Middlebury community. 

“The sales volume isn't missing in retail. It's just changing — people are coming to different places at different times,” Edson said.

More specifically, there has been an increase in retail traffic during the daytime. Given the record-breaking year in sales for concessions at the Athletic Center during hockey games and other sporting events — Edson reported a 61% increase in sales from the last academic year, inclusive of sales from The Den thus far — it started to make sense to reconsider the springtime, when there has traditionally never been a concession stand. 

“We were talking about expanding our concessions athletics offerings for some time now, and we wanted to offer something for the spring, knowing that our sales volume has kind of shifted,” Edson continued. 

Together, RFO Assistant Manager Andrew Davison and Assistant Director of Athletics Ali Paquette pitched the idea of The Den the week leading up to spring break. An opening day of March 31 meant they had less than a two-week turnaround. However, The Den surpassed opening day expectations and had to close early due to higher-than-anticipated traffic.

“Crazy. It was crazy… it is just one of those things where there was such a great turnout that I didn’t order enough product,” Davidson said. “I didn’t know what was going to happen.”

With less than a week of operation under their belt, The Den served approximately 100-120 people on its busiest days, according to Edson. Looking ahead, Edson hopes to explore weekend hours aligned with game schedules, offer a seating area, and possibly continue operating next fall. 

“We're really all about serving you guys, the students, so we're just trying to find all the avenues that we can best do that for you guys,” Edson said.