Sam Katsin, a UC Berkeley senior, knows the pain of late-night hunger.

"Going out at night is not a great idea," he said. "And people are lazy. We love having stuff delivered to us."

Over the last two years, two delivery services, Nude Sushi and Mrs. Munchies, have come to serve the needs of hungry students like Katsin.

Every night from 5 p.m. to 3 a.m., Nude Sushi delivers Japanese cuisine and Mrs. Munchies sells cookies, brownies, milk and coffee from 8 p.m. until 2 a.m.

Both operate only at night, have no walk-in locations and have found a niche in the college community. Students make up 95 percent of Nude Sushi's customers and 90 percent of Mrs. Munchies'.

Nude Sushi's owners, Hana Chung-who also owns Tako Sushi on Telegraph Avenue-and UC Berkeley graduates Miri Lee and Chris Yun, capitalized on the scarcity of delivery options in Berkeley.

"There was a huge need for something healthy," Lee said.

Chung proposed the idea after customers sought deliveries from Tako Sushi.

"Students want to save time during exams and we want to help," she said.

In February 2007, Nude Sushi

began operating in Tako Sushi's kitchen. The first night, they made $100. Four days later, they took in $1,000. By April, Nude Sushi's popularity had grown such that they had to move to a facility in Oakland with more parking for drivers.

After watching Nude Sushi's success, Katsin encouraged his high school friend, Dylan Fiesel, to pursue a cookie delivery business.

Fiesel, a Marin County native who graduated from Indiana University in 2007, was inspired by the success of Insomnia Cookies, an East Coast delivery service, and pitched a similar model for a class project.

Returning home, he experimented with large-batch cookie recipes and began delivering in January 2008. Fiesel said this is the first service of its kind on the West Coast.

News of Mrs. Munchies spread much as it did for Nude Sushi, through word of mouth, Facebook groups and the Greek system.

"It's the convenience of delivery food combined with missing mother's cooking," Fiesel said.

Mrs. Munchies makes about 30 deliveries a night, often to large groups. Sororities are some of Mrs. Munchies' most regular customers.

Nude Sushi receives about 25 orders per day from fraternities. On football game days, it receives 30 to 40 orders per hour from around the Berkeley area, forcing owners to disable the Web site's ordering mechanism five to six times so cooks can keep up.

"We didn't expect this level of success," Lee said. She attributes Nude Sushi's survival to "hard core fans," some of whom ordered copious amounts of sushi during the opening months.

UC Berkeley junior Kevin Lee Yi, who ordered almost every day during the spring and summer of his freshman year, now has a dish-the YiLee roll-named after him.

Yi, who is familiar with sushi from working at Yoshi's Restaurant in Oakland, said that Nude Sushi delivers "pretty good quality" for the price.

Others express their loyalty differently. On a delivery to a fraternity, Lee said a large, co-ed group danced naked in the street to show their support.

Fiesel said that if Mrs. Munchies were to expand, college students would remain the focal point.

"That's the niche market that works," he said. He said the current economic crisis has not affected their ordering patterns because many of his student customers do not rely on a salary.

Nude Sushi, meanwhile, has not escaped the downturn so cleanly.

"The same people who have ordered five times a week now order twice a week," Lee said.

But difficult economic times will not keep hungry students from their sushi or cookies.

"It's just higher quality than, say, West Coast Pizza would be," said UC Berkeley sophomore Danielle Bass, who lives at Berkeley Bayit, a co-op that orders from both services two to three times a week. "It is the glory that is Mrs. Munchies and Nude Sushi."

Tags: DELIVERY, LATE NIGHT FOOD, MRS. MUNCHIES, NUDE SUSHI