DeSales Dining’s campus community-focused videos draw big reactions on social media

DeSales University Dining Services’ social media has been capturing the attention of the campus community thanks to the efforts of this semester’s team of marketing interns and their friends.

Eileen Murphy, a senior marketing major from Cherry Hill, N.J., and Caroline Stierle, a senior marketing major from Branchburg, N.J., are in their second year as interns with DeSales Dining, operated by Sodexo, and were joined this semester by Jodee Domey, a junior marketing major from Wakefield, Mass. Together, they’ve been creating and posting a lot of creative videos on the dining social media pages that feature and partner with the campus community.

Their videos often follow social media trends while highlighting features of campus dining.

“We go in to work Tuesday and Thursday and make videos,” Domey said. “Jordan [DeSales Dining Marketing Coordinator Jordan Burden] tells us what to promote or advertise, and we go off and brainstorm funny videos and make it happen.”

“Another thing we’ve tried to do is get more involved with students and faculty on campus,” Murphy said. “That’s why we brought Braeden in with the drinks on campus.”

While Braeden DeGrazia, a junior homeland security major from Allentown, N.J., isn’t currently a dining marketing intern, he features in many of the team’s videos reviewing drinks and food from dining.

“I’m on the track team, Eileen is on the team, and she said to me it would be really cool if I could do a review,” DeGrazia said. “I love Dave Portnoy’s reviews, I’m a huge fan, so I thought I’d do a Dave Portnoy-style review. People liked it.”

DeGrazia starts all his videos with a rousing “What’s up, Bulldogs?!” and brings infectious energy to the screen as he tries one sip of a signature drink, or one bite of a new dish. He’s often joined in the videos by fellow students or dining employees. On a recent video, he was even called out by DeSales President Fr. Jim Greenfield, who was featured doing his own review of a drink on dining’s social media.

“Just want to let you know that I think my skills at testing are a little better than Braeden DeGrazia’s,” Greenfield said jokingly, before taking a big sip of his autumn-themed drink.

Another recent feature of the marketing team has been to partner with campus athletic teams to highlight their drink of the week, or to have them sample a drink or dish from campus dining.

“We’re a small campus, and I feel like a lot of people on campus are student athletes,” Murphy said.

“To bring in interest and involvement, you’ve got to bring in the students, especially sports teams, because then you’re bringing in their family who want to see videos of their kids,” DeGrazia said. “That’s what brings the impressions and views, when the friends and family want to look at it, and then they try the drink.”

A video that garnered over 200 reactions on Instagram included Domey, Murphy and Stierle interviewing employees on campus for National Food Service Workers Day. A later video that gained nearly 300 reactions included DeGrazia talking with a campus barista as he tried one of her creations. Stierle said these employee highlights are important.

“I think students definitely recognize them, every day they’re getting different drinks from them,” she said. “When we did the National Food Service Workers Day video, that got a lot of interactions and likes, because they saw people they interact with on everyday basis. This gets their face out there and brings people to that location.”

While starring in videos can be nerve-wracking, the team said it’s easier working together as they’re comfortable with each other.

“My teammates would text me and say, ‘what are you doing?’, but they love the videos and they want to be in them,” DeGrazia said.

“It helps when I have my team with me the whole time,” Domey said. “Seeing the positive reinforcement after posting a reel also makes it all worth it.”

And the positive reinforcement has been pouring in. DeSales Dining Marketing Coordinator Jordan Burden said he has heard great things about the team’s videos from campus groups, professors, dining employees and campus administration.

“It seems the more people we introduce in the videos, the bigger our community gets. This is exactly how you build a supportive following on social media,” Burden said. “It is one thing to follow something because you like the content; it is another thing to follow something because how involved the content is with the people around you.”

When asked what’s next that they’re looking forward to, the team was all smiles thinking about their next video series.

“There’s a new space within our dining hall called O’Connor Commons and it’s similar to a bar,” Stierle said. “Eileen, Jodee and myself will be doing Interns on Tap, serving mocktails of spooky drinks.”

“Promoting it is going to be the most fun part, honestly: getting behind the bar and making mocktails,” Domey said. “We’re also part of the student body so I think people are going to appreciate coming to O’Connor Commons and seeing the three of us try to make mocktails.”

Burden applauded the work the interns and DeGrazia have been doing.

“For this group, everyone brings something different to the table, so I like to see each of them contributing to different areas,” he said. “Everyone has different ways of editing videos, acting in videos, and directing videos so it makes each video unique and brings a different experience as a viewer each time we post. They all are hard workers and understand what students on campus want to see.”