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Thursday, 15 December 2005 |
by Steven Krolak
Fresh Cup Magazine
Not long ago, I walked into my favorite coffeehouse, which I
shall refer to as Cafe XYZ. I was looking forward to a
pristine machiatto and possibly more, as it was raining and I was a
little hungry. Cafe XYZ is rather large by neighborhood
coffeehouse standards, and can seat 75 people comfortably. For
events, such as films and live music nights, they can pack in
double that number. But on this particular day, at 11 a.m., the
place was packed—with about 20 people. Packed? That’s right,
every four-top table was occupied, by a single person. And each
and every one of these people was working on a laptop computer.
I drank my machiatto standing up, and then I left, without
eating, without reading a newspaper, without chatting with other
people. In fact, I was almost afraid to chat with the owner, lest
I break the furrowed-brow solemnity of people concentrating so hard on
their emails, spreadsheets, term papers, novels, haiku poems, or
internet shopping binges.
I
ate lunch somewhere else, and caught up with the news on the
radio and later, at home, on my own computer. So my needs
were eventually satisfied, but the experience jarred me. Here was
a cafe full of people, each encased in his or her electronic cocoon,
interacting with other people who had one thing in common: they were
not in the cafe. It was weird, and it continued to bother me into the
next day, when I returned. Luckily, this time, I got my coffee AND a
place to sit and enjoy it. I also got a chance to chat with the owner,
and I mentioned the events of the previous day, and how the whole thing
had, to put it bluntly, harshed my mellow.
He nodded understandingly. Since he had begun offering free
wi-fi, he said, the cafe had become a magnet for a whole new customer
base. That was the good news. The bad news was that these customers
tended to like wi-fi and table space more than coffee and panini. The
result was what I had witnessed the previous day: a cafe full of
campers, many of whom had been nursing a single coffee drink through
several e-chats. The owner told me of one customer who had stayed in
the cafe for six hours. During that entire sojourn, he had only ordered
one beverage. I wondered if a homeless person who had happened to
scrape together enough coinage for a coffee would have been allowed to
hang out that long.
Clearly, the situation was out of hand. The mood of the place was
changing, and business was suffering. My mind raced to possible
solutions, like employing bouncers or installing ejector seats,
but the owner had several of his own ideas he was eager to try,
and one of them showed up soon after: it was a little sign
that encouraged wi-fi users to give up their seats to new
arrivals during peak rush periods
It was ingenious. Did it work? Well, sort of. On a recent visit,
there was only one laptop in evidence, and the place was buzzing
with conversation. But one of the baristi told me, “The
sign gives us some leverage, but it [computer camping] is still a
problem—a big problem.”
This story is repeating itself at cafes all over the country,
where the wired freelance workforce now spends a good part of its
day
We are all familiar with the concept of the “third place.” One
of the keys to any coffeehouse’s success is its ability to fill a
widespread need for a gathering place.
But at times it seems that the third place is just the same old
first and second places, with better coffee. That’s fine, as long
as the coffeehouse owner doesn’t mind. But let us understand that
the wired cafe is a different animal. It looks and sounds
different from a traditional cafe. And it feels different. For
example, just up the street from Cafe XYZ is another coffeehouse
we shall call Cafe ABC, which has three tables and is not wired.
People come and go like cars at a Jiffy-Lube. The place
reminds me of Cheers. They really do know your name and they really are
glad you came—and left, coffee in hand. After all, the owner of
Cafe ABC is not running a library or a Christian Science Reading
Room. He’s running a business that requires a certain amount of
turnover. He’s not inhospitable, and people do spend time reading
entire articles in The New York Times or Harpers. Some stay and
chat in cushy chairs. But eventually, they leave, without having
to be hinted out the door.
But the villain in the piece isn’t the coffeehouse owner,
it’s wi-fi. Or more precisely, the problem is that we have not
yet found the optimal way to integrate wi-fi into the
coffeehouse setting. Is the solution technological or managerial?
Is it up to the company offering the service, or the coffeehouse
owner to figure this out? It’s a hard call, but I’d say that the
coffeehouse owner has enough on her or his place just trying to
master the art of coffee expertise. Wi-fi providers should
be thinking through the set of challenges implicit in their
machinery, and working with coffeehouse owners to tailor
packages that benefit both parties.
 Freelance Writer Steven Krolak, the former editor of Fresh Cup Magazine, lives in Portland, Oregon. |
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