HSA Reports Rentals Down As Students Try to Economize

The economic crunch is hitting Harvard Student Agencies (HSA) this fall as the agencies dealing with student services are recording significantly decreased rentals.

"Sales have slowed down noticeably this year," Anne Tait'74, assistant in the refrigerator service, said yesterday. Of the 720 refrigerators available, 150 are unrented resulting in a $6,450 loss over last year.

Tait said that the number of rentals has decreased because rising tuition and difficulty in finding summer jobs have made students economize. In addition, the cost of renting a refrigerator has gone up an average of $4.00 from last year.

The HSA linen service has also been forced to close one of its depots at the Radcliffe Graduate Center because of lack of interest. The customers contracting for this service will receive a refund, Timothy Tully '75, manager of the linen service, said yesterday.

Tully added that he had expected rentals to increase by 3000 over last year's record, adding about $9900 to the HSA coffers. Last year's rentals were down because of a mailing sent out by a dissatisfied HSA customer to incoming freshmen warning them of bad service. Despite no increase in the cost of the service, sales have stayed at the same level of about 17,000. "People are just cutting corners and doing their own wash," Tully said.

Robert Stock '74, manager of the new leasing agency reports that of the 150 typewriters, calculators and televisions available, between 35 and 40 have been rented. Stock attributed the slow sales to the lack of advertisement through summer mailings and to the requirement that the machines be rented for the entire academic year, making it too expensive for many students.

Bradlee T. Howe '63, general manager of HSA, remained confident of HSA's future. Howe said yesterday that the agency plans to diversify to offset the leveling off of business.