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Evelyn’s Cafe at EMPAC Expanding Hours

January 19, 2013
local, PSA, recommendations, restaurant
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EMPAC‘s Evelyn’s Cafe will be expanding hours to serve lunch every weekday from 11 am – 2 pm this coming Tuesday, January 22nd.
I can’t wait – previously they only served lunch on Thursdays. It’s always nice to have another lunch option in Troy.

Press Release & more deets below:

The Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) and Hospitality Services at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute announce the expansion of hours for Evelyn’s Café. Beginning Tuesday, January 22, the café will be open for lunch Monday through Friday from 11 AM–2 PM, in addition to supporting public events. The menu will be seasonal and will focus on locally sourced items.

“This expansion of café hours makes EMPAC an exceptional gathering space, providing opportunities for a meal with colleagues or a snack before or after a performance in the special atmosphere of the building. We hope to continue the expansion into the morning and evening hours in the future. And we are pleased that the daily offerings include “eating local,” a unique menu on campus,” said Johannes Goebel, director of EMPAC.

“We are committed to showcasing local and sustainable ingredients to create a seasonal contemporary menu for our guests,” said Elaine Reynolds, Hospitality Services marketing director.

Evelyn’s Café opened in 2008. The café will continue to be open one hour before all curated events as well as during intermissions and after most performances. Rensselaer’s student run and sustainability focused Terra Café will be serving lunch on Wednesdays.

Vectors of Research—Circles of Art

EMPAC—The Curtis R. Priem Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center—is where the arts, sciences, and technology interact with and influence each other by using the same facilities, technologies, and by breathing the same air.

Situated on the campus of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, EMPAC is dedicated to building bridges between our human senses, to modes of perception and experience, to creating meaning in a physical environment, and to the intangible world of digital technology.

Four discrete venues are designed with unique technical infrastructure to enable audiences to see, hear, and move in space in endlessly different ways. EMPAC hosts artists and researchers to create new work and presents events which ask audiences to join the quest for new perspectives.

Hospitality Services at Rensselaer is a passionate, dynamic, and fun-loving team striving to satisfy diverse tastes and appetites on the Rensselaer campus. With an emphasis on convenience and flexibility, Hospitality Services provides a variety of menu choices that reflect a commitment at Evelyn’s Café to local and sustainable offerings.
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, founded in 1824, is the nation’s oldest technological university. The school offers degrees in engineering, the sciences, information technology, architecture, management, and the social sciences and humanities. For over 30 years, the Institute has been a leader in interdisciplinary creative research, especially in the electronic arts. In addition to its MFA and PhD programs in electronic arts, Rensselaer offers bachelor degrees in electronic arts, and in electronic media, arts, and communication — one of the first undergraduate programs of its kind in the United States. The Center for Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies and EMPAC are two major research platforms that Rensselaer established at the beginning of the 21st century.

ShopRite’s Can Can Sale

January 5, 2013
frugal, local, markets, PSA, Uncategorized
1 Comment

I don’t usually post press releases, but ShopRite’s press release below for their Can Can sale gave me just a twinge of nostalgia. I don’t have cable: do they still do the ShopRite Can Can dancers in commercials? The cartoon Can Can dancers singing about ShopRite’s Can Can sale are the first image/sound that spring to mind when I hear about it.

The website itself doesn’t list many specifics things about the sale, other than it’s going on. You’ll have to search through the local circular for that. In Albany/Cap Region we’ve got Bumble Bee solid white tuna for $0.99 per can (limit 4) and a whole bunch of canned veggies & beans for $0.49 each. There’s some more stuff on sale, but those are probably the things I’ll hit up.

SHOPRITE KICKS-OFF FAMOUS CAN CAN SALE

 

January 2, 2013 (Florida, NY) – ShopRite’s famous annual Can Can Sale, begins Thursday, January 3rd and will run through Saturday, January 19th. This year marks the legendary sale’s forty-second anniversary.

 

The Can Can sale, made famous by low prices and those iconic Can Can dancers, continues to have a loyal and devoted following among ShopRite customers who eagerly await this annual event.  Over the years, the Can Can Sale has changed and grown.  Originally intended to focus solely on ShopRite Private Label products, today many national brands are included, as well. In fact, Can Can proved so popular that in 2002, ShopRite introduced a Summer Can Can Sale.

 

Although there are no sales figures available from the early days of ShopRite’s Can Can, the company estimates it has sold more than 3 billion cans over the sale’s 42 year history.

 

The 2013 ShopRite Can Can sale begins Thursday, January 3rd and runs through Saturday, January 19th at all ShopRite stores in the Northeast.

Giveaway: 2 Tickets to the NYS Fair

August 18, 2011
free stuff, holiday, PSA
10 Comments

Have you ever been to the New York State Fair? It’s held August 25th – September 5th in Syracuse, NY. The NYS Fair wants you to come, and they’re giving away two tickets that you can win!

This weekend I was talking with someone who was well familiar with the NYS fair, having grown up going to it just about every year. Though I grew up in NY, I’ve never been to the State Fair. I imagine my mom’s side of the family would enjoy going, since there are livestock shows. We hail from dairy folk, and there’s even a Dairy Day (August 29th, if you’re so inclined).

There are bunch of free acts to see, ranging from that Buddy dude from Cake Boss to Gym Class Heroes, and even the Pointer Sisters. Plus, you know, rides, and food, and awesomeness and such.

Kids 12 and under are free, so if you’re a family with some wee ones, this could mean free entry. Not too shabby.

If you wanna win two tickets and a parking pass:

Comment to win. If you tweet this link &/or put up a blog post, add the links as extra comments/entries. So you can technically enter 3 times.

Please comment with a valid email address.

You will be asked for your address. If I get this out in time, you’ll have tickets mailed to you, if not, you’ll get will call tickets to pick up when you get there.

This is open to anyone who wants to go there. Live in Buffalo? Awesome, enter. If you live in Western Mass and feel an urge to go NYS Fair-ing, type away!

Comments will be closed and giveaway over tomorrow night, whenever I go to bed. Or reeeallly early on Friday morning. At the very least you’ve got a solid 24 hours.

CLOSED: Congrats to L!

Restaurant Promo FAILS

July 11, 2011
Albany, PSA, quirky, restaurant
2 Comments

Dear Restaurants,


If you’re gonna do a promo, do it right.

XO,
Albany Jane

Let me elaborate. Some restaurants do promos. Some don’t. Some to promos really well. Others… not so much.

I really dislike crappy restaurant promos. A lot of the restaurant.com coupons are just promos for restaurants. The restaurants usually don’t get any of the money you pay for the coupon. Restaurant.com gets that little sum. And the restaurants eat what they lose in the hopes they’ll gain a new customer (who won’t use restaurant.com coupons for every visit). That’s why you have coupons like La Fiesta‘s for $50 on sale for $25. With the caveat that you have to buy $100 of food. La Fiesta isn’t getting the $25 you’re paying on restaurant.com. So their way of recouping some amount of money is to force you to buy $100 of food in the small print so they’ll at least get $50 in sales. However, from a consumer point of view, you’re paying $25, and then another $50, so you’re basically paying to get 25% off of your total bill.


Personally, I don’t really like how that works. It’s less money for the restaurant overall. If you want a promo, offer a 25% off printable coupon and sent it to Steve. He’s got enough exposure in the region (i.e. FREE ADVERTISING) to get the word out so you’re not paying restaurant.com to lose 50% on a sale that the customer’s only getting 25% off of.

If you’re running a promo, make sure it’s a desirable one. I’m not going to run out to a restaurant that’s offering me a free salad with purchase of two entrees and two appetizers.

I recently got a rather confusing coupon/promo from a local restaurant. It’s a good learning experience for other restaurants.

This promo came with a long-winded letter that was basically a “Happy Birthday, we are sending you something”. It’s a nice gesture, but there were a few things that made it flop:

1) It was sent generically to “customer”. If you’re going to bother to send something out to someone for their birthday and you have their name and address, do a mail merge from Excel to Word to make their name pop up. Customers appreciate these little touches. (If you need help, email me. I’m an excel nerd)

2) Make sure you send it in the right month. If you just send them out randomly, make sure they’re good for an entire year.
I received this coupon in the middle of a month that was not my birthday. The coupon was redeemable only for a person with their birthday in that month, on their birthday, and expired 10 days after I received it. Which basically meant I couldn’t use it. All this does is make me think you randomly picked my name out of a hat and don’t pay very much attention to details like… numbers. Plus, if the birthday was at the beginning of the month, by the time it reached the customer, it was already expired for use.

3) KISS – Keep It Simple, Stupid! (Sorry, I know you’re not stupid) Customer’s don’t need a longwinded letter wishing them a convoluted “Happy Birthday”. Really. All you have to type is the equivalent of “We LOVE YOU/ YOU ARE AWESOME! Happy Birthday, here’s something on us!”. The more you write, the higher the potential for confusion gets.

4) If you’re going to send a coupon, make it a good one. Especially for customers you see fairly regularly. Or even sporadically, but recognize. It makes them feel valued. A coupon that gives you one free dessert or app with a requirement of three entree purchases isn’t much of an incentive. What it comes off as is: “I would like you to spend a lot of money here in the hopes that a small free thing will make it worth your while,”.
Don’t get me wrong, this is a good aim of owning a restaurant. Give the customer some little low-margin items that make them feel valued, at little cost to yourself. But don’t nickel and dime your customers. One of my fave local restaurants will give me a little snackytizer when I sit down. It’s a little gesture that makes me feel welcomed, but not so much that it would make me uncomfortable. It’s like when you go to a bar with popcorn – you think “Ohh, snacky! Now let me get some drinks.”
Wolff’s and Bombers have a great business model: Free drink on your birthday. You’re going to bring friends, and they’re going to spend money on their own food/drinks. And as the birthday person, you’re all like “Wolff’s is AWESOME for giving me a free boot of beer on my birthday!”

Does this make sense?

Look, this is just one customer’s perspective, take it as what you will. I’m sure there are customers that are totally willing to scam anything free. I’m more of a customer that’s like “Hmm, they’re giving me something for free. That’s nice. I like that. They are nice. I want to buy something to support these nice people.” Maybe it’s guilt. I like to think that it’s seeing genuinely positive attitudes of businesses in the area.

BBQ and Such by Big HaHoona BBQ

June 15, 2011
BBQ, local, PSA
1 Comment

Got word of this event. Check if if you’re free:

Classé Catering is introducing a new line of mouthwatering barbeque cuisine, Big KaHoona Barbeque.

Award-winning Chef Jeremy Kane has created a menu that combines the best of classic American barbeque tradition and will sample:

· 24-hour Smoked Pulled Pork

· Smoked Beef Brisket

· Skillet Cornbread

· Big KaHoona Burgers (grilled onion, pineapple, jack cheese, lettuce, tomato, remoulade )

· Hous-made Chili

· Zesty Jumbo Chicken Wings

· Chef’s Mac N’ Cheese

· BBQ Baked Beans

· Creamy Cole Slaw

· Sliced Watermelon

· Assorted Soft Drinks – Iced-Tea, Lemonade, Soda

· Beer, Wine

This launch party will feature live music by Robanic with the Caribbean Sound , a special fire show by The Incredible Larry, BBQ/beer pairings, entertainment and giveaways.

WHEN: Thursday, June 16

4 to 7 p.m.

WHERE: Pruyn House

207 Old Niskayuna Road, Latham

Proceeds from the suggested $5 donation will benefit The Food Pantries and Friends of Pruyn House.

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Event Producers | Classé Catering is an innovative Capital Region-based corporate and social event firm that is renowned for distinctive cuisine, memorable guest experience, exquisite presentation and inspired design. For 18 years, Classé Catering’s elite event team of more than 100 professionals has delivered flawless results as the exclusive and/or preferred caterer at more than 60 unique and historic sites across Tech Valley .

Blogging Objective

June 3, 2011
PSA
8 Comments

Hey, so I’m not sure if anyone’s noticed lately, but one of my “things” this year is trying to post some points of improvement for local businesses.


I want to see local businesses thrive – more than survive! So when I see a consumer-side problem; I include it, and ways to improve it. Granted, it’s from me, so it might not be the most coherent stuff ever, but…

Consider this FREE ADVICE.


Here’s the deal:

Problem. Possible solution(s). At least get you thinking about potential problems you may not be aware of, and potential ways to improve your business and increase revenue. Other businesses can also view different situations as learning experiences.

I love Albany. I love food. I want the Albany food scene to be the best it possibly can be!

These observations are going to be purely on a spontaneous as-it-happens moment. If you are a business and you’d like some insight, shoot me an email and we can try to work something out.

Spring Potluck

April 29, 2011
local, PSA
4 Comments

Hello my amazingly good looking and well-fed readers,

I’m thinking a Spring Potluck of sorts is in order. Somewhere in a park. Or maybe just near a farmers market. Whatevs, it’ll be a good time. If you’re interested drop me an email (albanyjane @ yahoo.com) so I know to keep you in the loop. Or just leave it in the comments if you’re not too worried about spam. I’ll make it easy for you.

If I’ve emailed with you before, I prob still have your email, so I’mma be sending things your way any way (3rd Auntie, I’m lookin at you!).

Cheers,
Albany Jane

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