A Fluffier Harvard Experience

Legend has it that Martin Luther had his eureka moment, which sparked the Protestant Reformation, while sitting on the toilet. Here at Harvard, we all aspire to alter history in our own ways, and nearly all of us spend a few minutes a day pondering existence on the john.

This is why students in some Houses have been chafing over the recent switch in toilet paper. In Dunster House, students who had grown accustomed to the soft touch of Kleenex Cottonelle—truly the ivory tower of TP—have been disappointed by the recent loss of this brand. In its place is Scott Surpass (also made by Kimberly-Clark), but the touch resembles that of a porcupine and puts an end to all profound thought.

To some observers, it may seem that the downgrade in TP has come as a result of budget worries, what Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences William C. Kirby has called “a time of serious constraint.” Yet both organizations which supply the Houses with TP denied that rumor. David Lepold, whose company Unicco supplies some of the Houses, said that Dunster’s switch to the Scott brand “must have been a fluke in the ordering.”

Toilet paper distribution for the rest of the Houses is handled by Facilities Maintenance Operations (FMO). According to Robert Wolfreys, a supervisor for FMO who oversees Dorm Crew, Scott is the brand distributed to most of campus. Xpedex, which distributes the toilet paper to most of FMO gets a special price on Scott from the manufacturer because the University buys so much of it. So residents of FMO-supplied Houses have been suffering—to the detriment of their intellectual musings—under the rough touch of Scott for quite some time.

A representative of Xpedex estimated that buying Cottonelle for the non-Unicco Houses would be about one third more expensive, but substantially more if the entire campus did not switch. At the same time, these rolls contain only 400 sheets instead of 500. There are those who would further argue that Cottonelle, which is as soft as a baby rabbit, is less economical and more wasteful because it is thicker and thus gets used more quickly.

These are certainly valid points. But a University that purports to the best in the world should not skimp on such a basic and essential product. Cottonnelle is also not as wasteful as it may seem—its added thickness means it takes fewer sheets to do the job, which easily makes up for the fact that it offers only 400 sheets per roll. And the University wouldn’t necessarily have to go 100 percent Cottonelle—Cabot House offers a good middle ground for the cost and conservation conscious: its superintendent offers both types of paper so that students have a choice.

Seven years ago, Crimson columnist Geoffrey C. Upton ’99 complained that his one-ply toilet paper just wasn’t cutting it. He pointed out that then Dean of the College Harry R. Lewis ’68 didn’t go home and use the scratchy, one-ply stuff. His piece inspired the creation of the Harvard College Toilet Paper Commission, which made the change from one-ply to two-ply after months of deliberation. Today, we ask Dean of the College Benedict H. Gross ’71 if he would want to go home and have his bathroom epiphanies interrupted by the scratchy TP villain that is Scott Surpass. We are pretty sure that the answer would be no.

The University might have to cut fluff from the budget, but it shouldn’t deprive its students of fluff in the bathrooms.