Comment by rich_sasha
1 day ago
Cafes provide two distinct products, usually bundled into one: seat rental and food/drink.
How about charge separately for each? I get that it would be awkward to try, but why not.
1 day ago
Cafes provide two distinct products, usually bundled into one: seat rental and food/drink.
How about charge separately for each? I get that it would be awkward to try, but why not.
Or have actual public places? The Cafe's are there to serve coffee, it's just courtesy as business model to let you hang around in the premises and when the business model starts to fail in some way they adjust it.
After university, the most I miss is the actual places that are mine to use and are made for hanging around or working and not necessarily consuming anything.
> After university, the most I miss is the actual places that are mine to use and are made for hanging around or working and not necessarily consuming anything.
You just pre-paid for the consumption in your tuition fees.
outside of USA, i do not think that's true,
given the OP nickname is mrtksn, I presume he is a Turkish person. There are many public (ie. govt. funded) universities in Turkey. Except various touristic places in Istanbul, it would also be possible to "hangout" for an hour in many of smaller cities. Obviously this is degrading as the cities are getting more crowded. Although, most shopping malls having food-court with a "public" area. (ie. An area that belongs to none of the food places, but the shopping mall itself) You could just coast there from 10am in the morning until 10pm in the evening, with free-wifi and no drinks.
Similarly, in Europe, some coffee shops kind of span to the street benches or the window-side seating. For the window-side (outside), you may not be able to sit there for an hour or so, but definitely coastable about 30 minutes. (ie waiting for someone). Meanwhile, public areas are always free-for-all, if the WIFI works, then for sure you can coast all day...
Well, then it was a great deal. Significantly better than what I'm getting for renting a table with a coffee for hour or two for $5.
3 replies →
> The Cafe's are there to serve coffee, it's just courtesy as business model to let you hang around
Traditionally it's the other way around, the drink is a by-product of a public house where people can gather. Could you imagine a bar where people are just supposed to drink and leave?
How does this work? Were these public houses literally owned by the public and someone noticed that they may sell something there? AFAIK it's more like people opening their premises to outsiders to hang around and sell them stuff.
2 replies →
> can you imagine a bar where people are just supposed to drink and leave?
That is what a "bar" was invented to do. In the old public house, patrons would remain seated and the alcohol was brought to them. A heavy drinker would drink until they couldnt walk, but would still occupy a chair. Then the "bar" was invented. Patrons now come to the alcohol and will generally depart before becoming legless. A single bartender can now dish out far more alcohol per hour than any table server. That didnt exist as a concept until a couple hundred years ago.
Proper sushi "bars" follow the same pattern. You eat solo, often with curtains between individual patrons. You eat fast. Then you leave. You dont hang around for a chat.
> Could you imagine a bar where people are just supposed to drink and leave?
Yes.
Local Library?
Japanese Manga Cafes / Internet Cafes give you all you can drink coffee and tea for hourly pricing, and usually comes with a PC and a private booth. I'm not sure how much of a thing they still are though, but they were big in the 2000s and early 10s
This is what we had all over the world (...) when Internet Cafes were a thing. Perhaps they should come back?
The "Santander Work Cafes" (https://www.santanderbank.com/workcafe/cafe) are an excellent implementation of this.
Most developers could not really do their own thing on a PC/laptop that is not theirs.
Are they supposed to set up their development environment each time?
6 replies →
How interesting - so the other extreme. 0 cost on drinks, 100% time in seat cost.
Newer Coworking places generally seem to have some Starbucks-vibes, but AFAIK they are not doing to well.
Maybe the price of a coffee is exactly what people are willing to pay for a seat, a small table, and wifi for some hours.
I haven't seen a coworking place that isn't insanely overpriced compared to a coffee shop so it's no surprise they're not doing well.
In my experience price isn't the only issue. One of the (smaller) coworking spaces I can have access to locally, closes at 6pm while a coffee shop at around 9-10PM and it's also open on weekends.
But then again, I find working in coffee shops too distracting, so work from home and randomly popping into a coworking space now and then.
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Yeah, but isn't the question whether the co-working place is overpriced or if the coffee shop is underpriced or maybe both?
I tried wework. The seats were unbelievably uncomfortable. For the low-low price of $500 usd to get a hot seat, it's just much worse than coffeeshops.
Coworking spaces need to colocate with services. Starbucks, Fedex Kinkos, massage chairs....
Imagine if a little critical thinking like this had been allowed to enter the minds of WeWork investors.
Companies pay more than coffee prices for offices
Last week's submission is a company created to do this, too: https://badgeapp.co.