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University of Nebraska-Lincoln students and visitors will see changes to the dining options at the student union in the next year. Nearly all of the restaurants will be changed, moved or closed.
University Communications said in a news release that the changes “will phase out third-party franchises and introduce campus-managed dining concepts designed to enhance food quality, improve service and increase the value of student meal plans.”
The university operates some of these third-party vendors directly, while others were contracted. Imperial Palace and Subway were outside vendors, and the university franchised Chick-fil-A and Steak ‘n Shake.
Danny Steiner, the associate director of strategy and development for Housing and Dining Services, said the university can leverage resources from dining halls and food retail locations to provide a better experience.
“We get a lot of benefits from large food orders and some power behind the amount of food that we're bringing in to run those things,” Steiner said. “We can really capitalize on that as we bring these other concepts that are on our campus under our umbrella.”
Valentino’s will move to a renovated location in 2026. Subway and Imperial Palace will be replaced with university-run restaurants serving the same types of food.
Steiner said students will be able to use their dining plans’ meal swipes at the university-run restaurants.
“We're always trying to build value in our meal plans,” Steiner said. “Currently, we have a lot of different vendors across campus where you can use a meal swipe, but this will expand that. By moving from Subway to Husker Heroes as the sandwich concept, we’ll allow that to be a meal swipe.”
Steiner said the student meal plan prices for the next academic year are set in place and will not change.
Chick-fil-A will expand to meet high demand, and the Steak ‘n Shake will be removed.
The Nebraska Union Steak ‘n Shake was the brand’s only Nebraska location. While UNL still has the rights to the brand, Steiner said there is no new location chosen yet.
“It wasn't the most successful in the location that's closing, but we retain the ability to reopen it,” he said. “We're trying to figure out where that best fits, if at all, on our campus.”
Steiner said UNL Housing and Dining conducted surveys and focus groups to plan some of the changes. It also looked at how well the restaurants were doing financially.
Construction has already begun and will likely continue through the 2025-2026 academic year. Steiner said work will be done in phases so students have multiple food options available.
The news release said there will be at least one more dining concept announced in the coming year.