The proposal for Jitters and Bliss to locate in the Martin Luther King Jr. University Union never materialized, leaving the university blaming Jitters and Bliss and Jitters and Bliss pointing the finger at Eastern.

Keith Bliss, owner of Jitters and Bliss, said he feels burned by the university’s practices during negotiations.

Since Bliss worked with Eastern for three years to develop the new coffee shop in the Union, and the university continually approved his proposals, Bliss said he is left wondering why the university dropped the local business from consideration to develop plans of its own.

“They’ve reneged on their promise,” he said. “I always thought there was a hidden agenda.”

But Eastern officials say that a contract was never signed and developments between Jitters and Bliss were not going as smoothly as needed.

Mark Hudson, Housing and Dinning Services director, said the university ultimately decided to go ahead with its own plans because the two sides were unable to come to an agreement since last fall.

“It’s been a long, drawn out process,” Hudson said. “We never seemed to come to an agreement.”

However, Bliss said the only issue remaining was whether his establishment would sell soda. In fact, up until the university decided to go out on their own, Bliss had moved $40,000 of equipment to the Union, he said.

Shirley Stewart, interim vice president for student affairs, said there was never a final agreement.

“[Bliss] made a proposal, but there was never any contract signed or agreed to,” she said.

Bliss said he was asked to meet with the university at the end of this summer and he was told his business no longer had the location.

“That is going to affect me,” Bliss said.

Hudson said the university decided to go it alone, because of the belief that that way they would “capture a large enough percentage.”

“From my experience, this whole thing has been based on financial issues, nothing beyond that,” he said.

Stewart said the university had to consider the cost of labor, utilities, “investment to build the space vs. the amount of money and the split that [Bliss] would give us and what he would keep.”

The goal of the university has been to get the service to students and faculty as soon as possible, but “we didn’t feel we could (do that with Bliss),” Hudson said.

“We tried, tried and tried with Jitters and Bliss…people were just tired of waiting,” Hudson said.

Bliss said he put a lot of time and effort into the location and now “they’re using his research for their own business.”

Stewart pointed out that the university had ideas for a coffee shop before Jitters and Bliss was involved.

“We’ve been offering coffee and baked goods for at least four years…before [Bliss] was even involved in the conversations,” she said.

The university is content in their decision to go out on their own, instead of continuing with Jitters and Bliss, Hudson said.

“I’m confident that the students will like the outcome,” he said.

However, Bliss said he still doubts the university and contends that the university is “staying on even ground.”

“The facts are shady right now because they’re nervous of what I’m going to do,” he said.