why does anyone feel the desperate need to have a cup of coffee in the middle of a town or city?

Blame the generation brought up watching “Friends”.

My Sister & BiL seem incapable of going anywhere without ending up in a coffee shop. Weirdos. 😀

My wife can make much better coffee & cake than Starbucks and the rest of those grotty little places.

Starbucks is where you progress to once you’ve out-grown McDonalds.

Halfords.

Pubs serving coffee is just plain wrong. There’s nothing worse than being at a busy bar and the person next to you ordering a decaffe latte, 2 mochachino’s, and a caramel Mocha

So back to original question – all pubs serving coffee deserve to go bust!

Anywhere I don’t shop at deserves to go bust.

No real logic to that, other than they’re superfluous to my requirements so may as well not exist.

There are too many businesses to list that should ge bust in this country, consdiering that the prevailing idea of customer service here is along the lines of “what can we do for you? not much I hope”, and too often customers seem to be a necessarily evil to be tolerated.

DF effin’ S. At least we’d be rid of their adverts!

I have to say, this “The best thing for a coffee lover in Starbucks is the range of filter coffees” is very true.

It means you can get a proper black coffee not just a pithy espresso topped up with 500ml of hot water.

Having said that all the chain coffee shops deserve to fail along with fast food places for what they’re currently doing to the nations health and waist-lines.

Sorry molgrips, I don’t want to have a go at you, but why does anyone feel the desperate need to have a cup of coffee in the middle of a town or city?

It’s a load of old bollocks! We are a very well developed nation, with oodles of history and tradition and drinking coffee while wandering about the place is not an important part of that culture. It’s bullshit, designed to take your money in return for a drink of something warm.

Stop it and they will go away; it adds nothing of any value at all to the country.

Ahem:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lloyd%27s_Coffee_House

are so some of the money goes on the broadcast hardware, I’m happy to chip in if I choose to have a telly. As far as some of the money going to actual broadcasters I’d prefer to choose who I spend with and not be dictated to who is the broadcaster that has a right to my money.

Now as the BBC seems to the the highest quality supplier of telly programmes and radio, then there will be loads of support for public subscription or even pay as you go. They could keep all the money, no need to make any money other than in the way they already do now by selling there quality programmes around the world. They could still keep the profit driven publishing arm they have.

Andy, have you tried Coffee Cali top of Yorkshire street, or Macaroon on Bury Road, Bamford?

Macaroon FTW. Eagerly awaiting the reopening of the the Norden Arms as it’s <10 min walk from my house.

Andy

I’m with crikey

Flippin coffee shops. I mean Baristas?! Had to come up with a stupid name for someone who just makes coffee. It’s not Flippin hard!

People going in about the new red cups in Starbucks like they’re lusting after the new igadget! FFs

People who can’t go anywhere without calling in to get a coffee, people spending over £30 a week on the crappy stuff! Wonder how many folk out there buy it as they think it looks cool?

Went in to a cafe in Brum this week, all the muppets in there sat around their MacBooks, trying to look hipster. FFs, the looks of scorn I got for sitting amidst them with a pot of tea and a chunk of cake!

Oh and don’t get me started on the whole roadie/coffee thing

Nob ‘eds

Raaarrrrrrrr

Being a car paper-boy isn’t hard either but they made a name for it.. you are the nob ed in this scenario for thinking it’s all some big fashion statement instead of simply a tasty beverage.

I don’t even drink coffee but quite like Starbucks / Costa etc. Quite often use them for lunch and a chance to catch up on mail when working in London.

Only the yoof of today would think that drinking coffee had anything to do with an American TV series.

The “Tech-guys”

Nah, sorry folks, but I just don’t get it at all. If you feel the need to sit and drink coffee in towns and cities go right ahead, fill yer boots.

I don’t, and I see it as an amazing waste of money with a complex back story of social status and keeping-up-with-the-Joneses.

I work with doctors who buy a coffee from Costa on the way to work, and with cleaners who have a cup of tea when they get up. I get a cup of coffee when I get up and sometimes one in the middle of the morning, both instant, both drunk stood up.

It’s a class and status signifier, not just a warm drink. There’s nothing wrong with it, but don’t give me that shite about lovely tastey comfy homey bollocks…

Went in to a cafe in Brum this week, all the muppets in there sat around their MacBooks, trying to look hipster. FFs, the looks of scorn I got for sitting amidst them with a pot of tea and a chunk of cake!

I think you’re imagining the looks of scorn tbh. Also, don’t you collect ridiculously expensive and mostly daft looking ‘fashionable’ sunglasses?

Blimey, crikey’s on a roll tonight. 😯

I agree, get shot of these so called ‘coffee shops’ with their crap over-priced poncy coffee.

Gawd, it’s just so so pretentious. 🙄

Get shot of all fast food outlets, they’re gross.

That’ll do for now. 🙂

Hey CG 😀

Evening crikey. 😀

Oh yeah, let’s tell ’em where to shove their ‘cafe chic culture’. FFS. 🙄

It’s a class and status signifier, not just a warm drink.

You could argue that about just about anything that people buy though, including mountain bikes. Except you are exempt from that of course. 😉

I kind of get where you are coming from but it’s a bit of a weird thing to get so het up about. Maybe some people do just like the taste?

Oh yeah, let’s tell ’em where to shove their ‘cafe chic culture’. FFS.

Would you and crikey like a nice hot drink to go with the massive chips on your shoulders? Coffee maybe? As long as it’s crap instant, drunk standing up of course.

You’re right grum, it’s an argument that applies to many things and perhaps very well to mountain bikes, maybe even more to roadbiking these days.

I’m not het up about it, I am trying to get a point across without being all working class hero; an insult I once aimed at my Dad and which I am forced to relive… 🙂

I just don’t see how ‘having a cup of coffee’ is an important thing; it obviously is, given the profits involved…. I do see it as one of those subtle signifiers, those little badges that we wear to mark us out as one of us, not one of them…

It’s interesting from a sociological point of view..

Molly – cortado from Costa FTW 🙂

Can you tell me who “us” and “them” are?

Can you tell me who “us” and “them” are?

Not exactly, because you are being needlessly obtuse…

Naughty druidh!

I just don’t see how ‘having a cup of coffee’ is an important thing; it obviously is, given the profits involved…. I do see it as one of those subtle signifiers, those little badges that we wear to mark us out as one of us, not one of them…

How do you feel about people drinking in pubs then, out of interest? Same or even greater waste of money, some do it to ‘fit in’, but fine because you don’t perceive it to be a trendy middle-class thing?

Drinking in pubs is just fine.

As I say, I think it is interesting from a sociological point of view, and I’m part of that sociology.

Pubs are attended/visited by just about every social class. Chain coffee shops in towns and cities? In my experience they are frequented by a narrower range of social classes*

* I don’t go in, so I only see the folk through the window, with their ipads and lovely clothes.

What I dont get is people who sit or seem to live in a cafe for hours. Dont they have a life or a boyfriend? Surely they arent drinking 10 Lattes a day. Some of them are quite tidy too…..hmmm maybe coffee houses are the bath houses of the modern era..

Sky.

I saw a brilliant documentary about Chas and Dave the other day – and they didn’t do any songs about coffee.

Just saying.

Chain coffee shops in towns and cities? In my experience they are frequented by a narrower range of social classes

Not where I live.

I do see it as one of those subtle signifiers, those little badges that we wear to mark us out as one of us, not one of them..

Again, not where I live. You might be seeing evidence of the social profile of where you live, rather than coffee house patrons in general.

I just don’t see how ‘having a cup of coffee’ is an important thing

It’s a treat. A nice thing. I think for me it goes back to when I was a kid. We didn’t have a lot of money, but we had enough to occasionally have a cup of tea in a cafe when we were in town. I loved this to bits, it felt like a real treat, and I guess it still does. Plus I really like coffee, even with sweet stuff and cakes etc.

Back then it was the cafe in the shopping centre or M&S or whatever, not Starbucks. I don’t really care which cafe it is, it’s just that out of the big chains I prefer Starbucks’s coffee and cakes.

In Cardiff town centre ones are full of over-dressed and over-made-up bimbos tottering about with designer shopping bags; teenagers; or middle aged MDLs. Not a macbook in sight, apart from the one closest to the uni which has lonely foreign students working on them.

In Cardiff town centre ones are full of over-dressed and over-made-up bimbos tottering about with designer shopping bags

Oddly enough, the last time I had a coffee out and about was in Cardiff Costa about a month ago.

Seems to me that people that get really het up about coffee shops probably drink too much of the stuff.

IME they’re teetotallers who really should let their hair down and have a beer.

Live a little caffeine addicts. It might be help you see the world more clearly.

Pubs are attended/visited by just about every social class. Chain coffee shops in towns and cities? In my experience they are frequented by a narrower range of social classes*

* I don’t go in, so I only see the folk through the window, with their ipads and lovely clothes.

This isn’t really my experience TBH, and I do go in to Costa on occasion – seems to be a range of normal people in there. There’s quite often business people in there for meetings – I’ve used it myself for that on occasion (though now I use a local independent).

Never seen a Macbook I don’t think, but I do take my iPad sometimes. 😉

TBH I think the idea that drinking coffee is a sort of bourgeois affectation reveals more about you than it does about the people who go to coffee shops.

Have a beer? I just went to a coffee shop at 9.30am whilst waiting for another shop to open, with my kids. Not sure having a beer would have been appropriate 🙂

BT for not actually being British or having Britain or any of its residents in its best interests.

I was in Amsterdam earlier this week and found that their coffee shops smell funny and nobody seems to mind what coffee they drink 🙂

Does molgrips live in Amsterdam? Do they have Starbucks in the ‘Dam?

TBH I think the idea that drinking coffee is a sort of bourgeois affectation reveals more about you than it does about the people who go to coffee shops.

I think your use of the phrase ‘bourgeois affectation’ might be considered along similar lines. 😉

Pubs are attended/visited by just about every social class. Chain coffee shops in towns and cities? In my experience they are frequented by a narrower range of social classes*

Those I see in the local Costa indicate the above statement to be bollx