Gas station/munchie spot reopens

February 5th, 2010 | By Chloe Moryl | Section: Features

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On Oct. 10, 2009, the Kum & Go, located on the corner of 5th and West, was demolished. Students, perhaps faculty, and community members alike were left with limited options from which to procure their light night slurpees or packs of chocolate doughnuts for the dark winter months, including the entirety of Hell Week and finals week.

After returning from Winter Break, however, all can delight in the new, improved and finally open Kum & Go, which officially opened its doors to the Grinnell Community in mid- January. But WTF is the difference between the old and new Kum & Go?

“In all honesty, it feels like you can’t go in there drunk,” said John Burrows ’10, Kum & Go aficionado. “It’s a lot brighter and has more cameras.”

“It looks too fancy. I feel out of place,” said Kum & Go frequenter Dylan Naylor ’13. “I feel unwelcome. I’m not classy enough.”

This description of “classy” stems from the freshly tiled linoleum floors that grace the entire inside, along with the significantly larger Kum & Go clothing selection, possible due to the increase in square feet of the actual space.

“They offer a wider Kum & Go apparel section, which is nice,” Burrows said. “I’m saving up to buy the PJs.”

In addition to clothing, the beverage selection has been vastly expanded, offering an array of coffee blends and flavors. The massive soda machine allows a customer not only to add flavored syrups, such as cherry and vanilla, to a carbonated beverage, but also added a mysterious dispenser marked “lean,” which one can only assume helps boost fat-burning while sipping your 64-oz mountain dew and chomping down on your low-fat frozen burritos.

If frozen treats are your jam, in addition to burritos and burgers piled high in the freezers, the new Kum & Go also comes complete with a milkshake machine. Initial reviews of this machine, however, are shaky at best.

“They don’t taste like milkshakes,” said Emily Evans ’13. “I strongly doubt there was any milk product.”
Naylor agreed, “They really could be more milky and more shake-y. They were neither.”

However, the new Kum & Go, despite its advancements in milkshake technology, lacks the extensive selection of hot dog accoutrements that the Kum N Go of yore boasted.

Seriously, I just want some jalapeños.