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Toots Deli, the Megacookie Co.
& Other Enterprising Concerns
By Sara Schaffzin
You can earn extra money
during the school year by working
in the lib rary, or in the
bookstore, or in the dining
halls. Or you can create your
own job.
H ow do you succ eed in bu sin ess as a
ca mpus en tre pre ne ur?
By tapping into student lifestyles.
That , any ho w, seems to be th e a nswe r
for successfu l student-run businesses a t
Rochester, whi ch have been making
18
profits for their operators since way
back in th e day s wh en D av e M uirhead
'58 cashed in on th e brand-new craze
for "pizza pie s" by makin g and sellin g
them from a seco nd-hand hearse that
rolled around th e ca mp us a couple of
ni ghts a week .
Food, clothing , mu sic, and
transportation have been prime
markets for campus ca pita lists ever
since . R ecord and stereo dealers ha ve
flourished, as have th e purveyors of
late-ni gh t eats. David Hirschlcr '83
and his friends M ark Douglass '84 a nd
Neil So lomo n '84, for example , run
" Toots D eli, " a pizza-and-sn ack sta nd
with bran ches in Susan B. Anthony
H alls, H oeing basement, a nd Wi lder
T ow er . " Toots" gets its fare from an
off-cam pus del icatessen and ret ails it at
its on -ca mp us locat ions, wh ich are
ope n every night u ntil on e or two in
the morning.
H irschle r admits to low start-up
cos ts, an adv an tage that bu sin esses in
th e ou tside wo rld don 't hav e. Student
concessions pay no licensing o r othe r
fees to the University. unless th ey a re