{"id":12476,"date":"2025-05-13T10:48:08","date_gmt":"2025-05-13T16:48:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rctc.edu\/echo\/?p=12476"},"modified":"2026-04-01T09:41:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-01T14:41:14","slug":"cashless-for-your-convenience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rctc.edu\/echo\/cashless-for-your-convenience\/","title":{"rendered":"Cashless, For Your Convenience?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Twizt'd

Twizt\u2019d Cafe\u2019s \u201ccashless\u201d sign<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cTWIZT\u2019D CAFE IS A COMPLETELY CASH-LESS EXPERIENCE,\u201d so reads a placard at the cash register of RCTC\u2019s Twizt\u2019d Cafe.<\/p>\n

The only accepted forms of payment, according to the placard, are Apple Pay, Credit Card, Debit Card, and Twizt\u2019d Card. This led Echo staff, until recently, to believe that students without bank accounts or phones were left without a way to get hot food on campus.
\nAs it turns out, however, the cafe\u2019s parent company, A\u2019Bri\u2019Tin Catering, does offer a solution for cardless customers.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can pay cash to put it on an RCTC, Twizt\u2019d gift card. You can do that in any denomination possible. So, we\u2019re not turning people away if they [only] have cash,\u201d says Seth Brittain, CEO of A\u2019Bri\u2019Tin Catering company.
\nLast fall, however, that system was not so well-known. \u201cThey grab the pizza and soda, you can\u2019t put it back, so otherwise it would get thrown away or they get it for free,\u201d said Diane Whiting, a 9-year veteran of RCTC\u2019s food services. \u201cI have offered to have them come back, or find a friend, or I use my card and take their cash, as long as it\u2019s close. Sometimes I make out and sometimes I don\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI was unaware of this process,\u201d said Kelly Pyfferoen, Vice President of Finance and Facilities about the cash-to-Twizt\u2019d-card process.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are always willing to work with A\u2019Bri\u2019Tin to share any type of information that they want the greater student population to know about,\u201d said Pyfferoen.<\/p>\n

Twizt\u2019d Cafe came to campus in 2023. Its parent company, A\u2019Bri\u2019Tin Catering, is an event catering company based in Farmington that recently got into the college campus cafeteria game.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe actually started in the catering business, catering weddings and special events and things like that. The local Dakota County Tech College reached out to us to run the food service. We cared about people, cared about food, and we jumped in,\u201d says Brittain.<\/p>\n

They were the sole applicant when RCTC put out a request for proposal seeking a new campus food vendor. Pyfferoen, along with two representatives from student life, two from athletics, and three student volunteers, took part in the selection process.<\/p>\n

Twizt\u2019d Cafe operates on campus unsubsidized, which dictates some decision-making. Predicting demand for food services on campus has been tough to navigate since the drop off of in-person classes during the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the biggest things that that we\u2019ve learned, and this is our second year on campus, is that we operate completely unsubsidized. So, we don\u2019t get any additional funds from the colleges or from the states to run that food service. So obviously that dictates how we do things,\u201d says Brittain.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have definitely had some bumps in the road since our contract began in the summer of 2023,\u201d says Pyfferoen.<\/p>\n

For example, a satellite cafe in the health services wing opened briefly during fall semester, then closed abruptly with a campus-wide e-mail sent on November 11, 2024. Pyfferoen says she was given a week\u2019s notice.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, we were losing, losing money every hour they were open. It was really difficult situation,\u201d says Brittain of the cafe, though he remains committed to his mission at RCTC.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I look back at my college experience, some of my best memories were my time in the cafeteria with other students, like, that was kind of our thing to do, and we feel really blessed to be a part of the environment. And I wish that we continue to do more to do better,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

The other food options on campus, vending machines and the RCTC book store, are both overseen by Pyfferoen, who says there are no plans to deviate from current payment offerings.<\/p>\n

Editor\u2019s note: our initial interview contact for this story, A\u2019Bri\u2019Tin\u2019s regional manager, John Tepley, passed away unexpectedly. We send our heartfelt gratitude for his service to RCTC students, and our deepest sympathies to his family, friends, and those who loved him.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cTWIZT\u2019D CAFE IS A COMPLETELY CASH-LESS EXPERIENCE,\u201d so reads a placard at the cash register of RCTC\u2019s Twizt\u2019d Cafe. The only accepted forms of payment, according to the placard, are Apple Pay, Credit Card, Debit Card, and Twizt\u2019d Card. This led Echo staff, until recently, to believe that students without bank accounts or phones were […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1050,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[81,51,48],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-food","category-news","category-campus"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rctc.edu\/echo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rctc.edu\/echo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rctc.edu\/echo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rctc.edu\/echo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1050"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rctc.edu\/echo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12476"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rctc.edu\/echo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12476\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rctc.edu\/echo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rctc.edu\/echo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rctc.edu\/echo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}