I met a vegan friend in this café one afternoon. The food is good, the operation of the café is not. The place seats 17-18 people inside. There are two tables that would each seat four people, one of which may seat five at a push. These tables are of the type where there is a booth-style seat attached to the wall, and chairs at the other side. When we arrived, we took one of the high two-seater tables at the wall.
As we sat there, I noticed that one of the four-seater tables was taken up by a teenager who seemed to be studying. The other four-seater was occupied by two individuals with laptops, seemingly having a meeting. They must have been there ten minutes already, as their laptops were set up, they had notebooks out, etc. None of these customers was eating: it was hot beverages, and a traybake for the teenager.
A group of three came in and looked around - there were just nine customers in the place, yet there was nowhere for the trio to sit. They stood awkwardly at the door, presumably hoping that a member of staff would come and advise them of what they should do, or how long they might be waiting. Three staff were behind the counter. All were working, and I clocked them noticing the trio at the door but, given that the staff would have had no solution for the trio, they were ignored. After about a minute of being ignored, the trio left.
Moments later, a foursome came in. Luckily, they were content to take the table outside. I don't imagine this table gets used much, as the weather here is appalling. Two minutes later, another trio arrived, and the scenario of a few minutes earlier was repeated, and they left. Five minutes after that, another group of four arrived and had to leave. In total, I was there for 20 minutes, outside of lunchtime (it was after 2pm) on a weekend, and I saw ten potential customers leave because they couldn't get a seat.
It's always going to be difficult to run somewhere that is tiny, but here's what you do...put a sign up saying 'please wait to be seated'. If one person comes in, you put them at a two-seater table. If two people come in, you do the same. If they request a four-seater table then you politely refuse, and you explain to them that due to the tiny nature of the premises, four-seater tables will only be allocated to groups of three or four. As a result, you might get a few people who leave. Ordinarily I would be of the opinion that you should be able to sit where you want, but if this place keeps losing this level of potential customers, then it's hard to see how it remains open in a year. So you present a customer with their options and, if they wish to leave, so be it.
Had the teenager and the laptop couple been given these options, then they may well have left, but they would have been replaced by at least seven people, and those seven people would not have been sitting there for over an hour, as I'm sure the occupants of the four-seaters would have been.
I was there for 20 minutes at an off-peak time and I reckon the place lost a minimum of £50 in revenue. Extrapolate that throughout the day, and then the week, and even a conservative estimate has to run into five figures over the course of a year. Plus, how many times would it take for you to never return to a place that you walked into and couldn't get a seat? I think I'd try a place twice and if couldn't get a seat when there are only eight or nine customers there, I wouldn't try it again.
Even if the laptop women and the teenager were regulars, they would not be spending nearly enough to compensate for the loss of business from groups of customers who couldn't get a table. (The café also sells some groceries, so you see customers buying those as they leave.)
There is a table at the window which is used to hold flyers and board games. It might be possible to replace this table with one that could have four seats around it (i.e. a table against the window with two seats at the long side, and a seat at either end) but if the space is too tight for that, then at least remove the flyers and put two chairs at the table to create extra seating.
As a café, though, the food is good. The soya sausage rolls are, at £3, over-priced, but they are good, as are the toasted sandwiches. It's particularly annoying that the place doesn't have menus. They have a chalkboard at the till, smaller than an A4 page, and this is their effort at a menu. One tiny menu for the whole place. Pathetic. If you're not going to have menus, then you need to at least have a large display that can be read from anywhere in the room.
If you walk past and the place is empty, I'd recommend calling in and getting something to eat, but if you go out of your way to get here then you definitely need to have a back-up plan, since as little as seven or eight customers means you might not get somewhere to sit. read more