Starbucks = 1 Star
Stairs = 5 Stars (minus one for dodgy WiFi and no stem ginger muffins)
So was there some sort of breeding incentive in Scotland/UK in the last few years? One for the parents, one for the grandparents and one of the country? A baby bonus perhaps?
Since I arrived back in Edinburgh in September 2010, the main thing I have notice is all the mothers pushing babies around. And is not just one baby, it's a couple, side by side in big "armoured car sized" strollers. I could go on and on about the obnoxiousness of these strollers on the sometimes narrow footpaths here, but lets stay on topic...
Not so much in the city centre, but every cafe of decent size (with no stairs) in or near a residential area invariably has half of it taken over by some sort of mother/baby/dragged-along-hubby group, taking over the space with themselves, their offspring and their prams.
Here's how they operate... One of the group members will come to a cafe 20+ minutes early and snag one of the couches or the biggest table ("Why does that one woman and her baby need that big table to herself?" you always asked). If you are sitting nearby and you see this happening, now is the time to look out for an open table at the opposite end of the cafe, or you will soon be be hemmed in by at least half a dozen mums and at least 1.5 times their number in kids, be they in prams or crawling under your table, looking for that purple elephant toy that they have thrown under there 3 or 4 times already.
So, the Stockbridge Starbucks review. Well, its a Starbucks in the UK, which is better than a Starbucks in the US, as the tea seems to be better. Don't drink coffee, so can't comment on the difference there. Its clean. Toilets are usually clean. Staff seem friendly. The WiFi is a bit dodgy (it will work on our Mac, but not on the PC) and they don't seem to have the stem ginger muffins that I have seen at other branches.
But the big plus over the nearby Costa and Nero is its stairs. I can sit down and not worry about screaming kids or being blocked in by gargantuan strollers etc...
In the end, I would prefer not to go to a Starbucks/Costa/Nero, but the independent cafes in Stockbridge are small and not really conducive to sitting down and pulling out a laptop (and I guess they would be taken over by the baby brigade, if they were any larger).
Now if I was to do a review on the Princes St. Starbucks, which is large AND upstairs, I would be whinging about too many students taking over the place with their laptops. Yes, I see the irony. read more