The erosion of public financing for higher education, meanwhile, is forcing universities to think harder than ever about how best to keep themselves anchored in the minds of the public and their alumni. Washington State’s higher education system ranked eighth worst in the nation, measured by the depth of financing cuts, down 22.4 percent from 2008 to 2013, according to figures from Illinois State University’s Center for the Study of Education Policy.

“Schools are looking for new ways to generate revenue, but there is more entrepreneurial thinking in colleges and universities than ever before, too,” said Brian Wansink, a professor of consumer behavior at Cornell and the director of the Cornell Food and Brand Lab.

Professor Wansink has studied what he calls “food halos.” That is the aura or glow that a compelling story or some connotation of health, social consciousness or environmentalism can bestow on a product. Colleges, he said, with nostalgic allegiances going back generations and educational missions that go beyond the profit motive, can often grab halos while only half trying.

“Anything like a university brand meat has an incredible halo,” he said.

Then there is the saturation factor. Just how many Notre Dame Fighting Irish throw pillows for example, could a person really want? Dinnertime, by contrast, comes around like clockwork.

At Washington State University, which opened in 1892 as the Washington Agricultural College and School of Science, farming roots run deep. Pictures on the wall at the Beef Center show student judging teams from decades past — year after year of skinny, earnest-looking farm boys who had grown up in the local ranching and agriculture economy.

These days, though, the university’s enrollment is heavily skewed toward the urban and suburban, students from the Seattle area especially. The families sending their sons and daughters here, officials said, are also exactly the kind of consumers looking for premium, locally grown produce and meat. An institution of farmers, they say, has become one of foodies. About half of the first round of W.S.U. Premium Beef orders were from the Seattle area.