Columbia University officials have denied reports claiming that the school's dining halls were losing $5,000 a week due to student pilferage of the popular spread product Nutella. The figure, originally cited in a March 5 story in the Columbia Spectator campus paper, grew legs when it was picked up by the mainstream press, including the New York Times and UPI. The school says in a news release that in the first three to four days after Nutella was added to the dining hall menu, "demand was extraordinarily high, with students enjoying a large amount in that short initial period." However, the actual cost was only around $2,500, and that quickly dropped to $450 a week for three campus dining halls that serve some 3,600 students seven days a week.
