@suzyQ7 Right, but that’s not quite the same point a suggesting the food is a major driver of cost increases overall. Also, I can tell you having just gone through it that Bowdoin’s R&B cost was in line with most of it’s peers, so if their food service is better it’s not driving a unique cost increase. Since R&B is broken out independent of tuition costs, if their food is more expensive (and I don’t know that it is), it must be coming at the expensive of something else in the R&B category as opposed to direct educational expenses. And it’s easy to imagine many ways how that could be true. Bowdoin may have quality food – much of which is locally sourced – but it wasn’t close to the most extravagant spread in terms of the range of food offered in the tours we did (where we always made a point of eating in the cafeterias). I would place it, at best in the middle in terms of range of food offerings on any given meal. So while the quality may be good, perhaps they save by having a less expansive per-meal menu which allows for less food prep staff, less procurement costs, etc. There are many ways to take the same approximate budget and prioritize it differently to get very different results.
Out of curiosity, I just reviewed to 2016-17 cost for all the NESCAC and (since Gladwell singled it out as the better alternative) Vassar. I have them listed below, sorted from least to most expensive. I break out tuition, R&B and any other mandatory fees. I do not include any optional fees (like supplemental insurance) or estimates fees (books, supplies, etc.). So this is a straight comparison of required costs. In a few cases the schools didn’t provide a readily-accessible category breakdown, so I just listed the total.
Here’s the highlights:
- They are all crazy expensive
- They are all pretty close to each other in total cost overall
- Bowdoin is actually the LEAST EXPENSIVE of the entire group, NESCAC’s + Vassar included. It’s R&B is right in the average (despite the food’s reputation) but the tuition sets the low end of the range.
- There is absolutely no correlation between reputation/prestige/admission-difficulty and where they rank on this list.
- I’ve been the the student cafeteria’s of most of these and the quality varies widely and there is no discernible correlation between that and the R&B cost.
Bowdoin
$49,416 Tuition
$13,600 R&B
$484 Fees
$63,500 Total
Colby
$64,060 Total
Hamilton
$50,730 Tuition
$13,010 R&B
$510 Fees
$64,250 Total
Bates
$64,500 Total
Wesleyan
$50,312 Tuition
$13,950 R&B (underclassmen)
$15,858 R&B (upperclassmen)
$630 Fees
$64,892-66,799 Total
Connecticut
$65,000 Total
Amherst
$65,330 Total
Williams
$51,490 Tuition
$13,690 R&B
$300 Fee
$65,480 Total
Vassar
$52,320 Tuition
$12,400 R&B
$770 Fees
$65,490 Total
Tufts
$51,304 Tuition
$13,566 R&B
$1,126 Fees
$65,996 Total
Trinity
$50,530 Tuition
$13,680 R&B
$2,460 Fees
$66,490 Total
Some breakdowns @citivas:
Amherst
Room $7,430
Board $6,280
$13,710 total R&B
https://www.amherst.edu/offices/controller/student-accounts/tuition-and-fees
Conn:
Room and Board $13, 615
http://www.collegedata.com/cs/data/college/college_pg03_tmpl.jhtml?schoolId=400
Bates:
Room and Board $14,105
http://www.collegedata.com/cs/data/college/college_pg03_tmpl.jhtml?schoolId=125
Colby:
Room and Board $12,610
http://www.collegedata.com/cs/data/college/college_pg03_tmpl.jhtml?schoolId=233
…the Collegedata figures are probably a year or two old.
These are all 21 meals a week plans, or unlimited, or very similar (Amherst offers a plan for non-first years with no breakfast but more cash to use at the retail places, but it costs the same as the full meal plan at the dining hall). I went to Vassar myself and almost never ate breakfast in the DH so that would have been the plan for me 
Whoops. I left out Middlebury for some reason. It slots in between Hamilton and Bates.
$49,698 Tuition
$14,269 R&B
$415 Fees
$64,332 Total
Speaking of Middlebury, one of the things I really liked about it is they have unlimited meals for everyone. No swipes, no quota. You can eat as often as you want, as much as you want. If you’re a granger and want to get in 5 smaller meals, as long as you do it within the hours they serve food that’s cool. You can eat lunch at one place then head over to the other if it has your preferred dessert. Etc. They don’t even bother with cards – you just walk in and pick out your food. I didn’t come across any other schools that did that on our touring though perhaps some do. And like Bowdoin they source a lot of local food.
To the point above about 21 meal plans, just to clarify a lot of schools (including Bowdoin) are doing 19 meal plans with weekends being 2 per day (brunch and dinner). At these schools there is no 21 meal plan – they only are open for two meals a day Sat and Sun.
"Every dollar spent on luxury food service is a dollar not spend on “other things”.
That would be true if all the money to operate the school came out of the same bucket. It doesn’t. If they cut back cafeteria costs and save money, that money doesn’t go to the library.
You could have cheaper food and charge students less, but the fact that no competitors are using that strategy suggests that it fails in the marketplace. People wouldn’t choose Connecticut over Trinity if the board plan were half the cost…we’re talking about $3000 a year out of $65k. Since the savings are trivial, it’s more effective to compete on quality.
Interesting that this thread is continuing. Two great schools, both of which S wants to apply to. Ironically according to net price calcs run on our lowish income, Bowdoin’s financial aid would be better than Vassar’s!! Less money up front and…no loans. I suspect that our financial figures fall differently in the applicant pools, with Bowdoin simply having fewer low income kids applying, and Vassar having a whole lot of middle and lower middle income applicants?
On the other hand, speaking in general about campus cultures and wealthy, the vibe is different at a school where only a fraction of students are on Pell grants, versus a quarter of the student population. More marked at other schools perhaps. Vassar and Bowdoin actually seem much more alike than different from our short visits.
I agree with previous comments that Maine is a harder sell than Poughkeepsie. Even tho they might only end up going once or twice a semester, being able to get to NYC on the commuter metro from P’town makes it seem more cosmopolitan, even though Bowdoin’s town feels just as (or more) cosmopolitan.