Don’t plug in at the Waterstone’s Costa Coffee in Brighton: the most geek-unfriendly cafe in Brighton?
Getting told off for using the electricity at the Costa Coffee in the Brighton Waterstone's is fun.
For the past six months or so, I've been mostly working out of the Costa in the Waterstone's in Brighton. It's usually quiet (was even more so before Borders UK shut down, taking the popular Starbucks in its Churchill Square branch with it) and the staff are lovely.
The Don’t plug in at the Waterstone’s Costa Coffee in Brighton: the most geek-unfriendly cafe in Brighton? article by Aral Balkan, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 UK: England License.
Unfortunately, I can't say the same thing for the staff at the Waterstone's itself.
This afternoon, I was sipping my cappuccino and working away on my latest iPhone app when one of the Waterstone's staff approached my table and proceeded to tell me off for having my notebook plugged in. Yes, you read that right: a Waterstone's staff entered the Costa and proceeded to publicly reprimand a Costa customer (I can only assume that someone at Costa will be talking to someone at Waterstone's about that little breach of protocol, if nothing else).
She proceeded to tell me that I was using "their electricity" and had I "asked permission" and did I see anything wrong with what I was doing? I politely informed her that, yes, I was aware that I was plugged in and that, in this day and age, I would assume that I could plug my notebook in at a cafe. I've done so many times at other Costas and Starbucks and never had any issues. Nor would I expect to have any.
She left to ask her supervisor and, a few moments later, I was approached by another young lady from Waterstone's who confirmed that yes, indeed, I was not allowed to use their electricity. She proceeded to tell me about their electricity usage targets and how they were having trouble meeting them (no doubt due to my daily patronage of the Costa – a transgression which I will work doubly hard to avoid in the future).
So, today, Costa got my custom for the last time and tomorrow I'm probably going to pop into my local Starbucks because – evil or not – I've never had anyone hassle me there.
I do hope that someone from Costa reads this and has a stern talk with the Waterstone's folks. Of course, I have no idea what their arrangement is but I would be very suprised indeed if it allowed Waterstone's staff to harass Costa's customers, whatever the reason. At the very least it reflects poorly on Costa's brand and, in this case, lost them a regular customer. The correct thing to do would have been for the Waterstone's staff to take the subject up with the Costa staff who could then have relayed the information to me.
Also, since the policy at the Waterstone's Costa in Brighton is that the plugs are off-limits, I expect to see a sign informing customers of this. It might also be an idea to actually cover the plugs up to make this archaic policy even more evident so that future patrons are not hassled for behaving like they actually live in the 21st century.
Finally, since the Waterstone's Costa also doesn't have any WiFi, this probably makes it the most geek-unfriendly place in Brighton. If you have a notebook and want a coffee, look elsewhere.
The Don’t plug in at the Waterstone’s Costa Coffee in Brighton: the most geek-unfriendly cafe in Brighton? article by Aral Balkan, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 UK: England License.
As much as I understand that this is really annoying whenever you want to go to a cafe and do some work I also see the point of Waterstone’s Costa Coffee. It’s the same as I probably wouldn’t like if someone would come for a visit and charge his electric car (once we will get these :) ) without asking me.
The problem though is that it seems like there is no official policy or at least it hasn’t been communicated to their customers. A few years ago businesses like Costa didn’t have to bother about that and their plugs usually were only used by the cleaner or for private function if the venue got hired or something.
I usually just ask if it’s ok to use a venue’s plugs. I hope that it will become natural to these companies as it did with wireless in recent years.
There are some amazing super- friendly, independent cafes in Brighton with free wi-fi and all the plug-in-able electric you can use… Try upstairs in Cafe Delice at the cross of Kensington Gardens & North Rd (great coffee, fab baguettes), the superb Marwood cafe at the corner of Ship St & Duke St… Or what about up in Kemp Town, the Red Roaster, Tin Drum, Here – all of them working hard to keep going – offering a genuinely independent choice and none of them would give you a hard time for plugging in & geeking out!
I have to ask – don’t go to starbucks. They suck. Try an independent cafe instead – you’ll love it.
Waterstones are still in business?
Methinks maybe the staff have been told to save money everywhere or say byebye.
Still I agree, no wifi or electricity is very poor service. You can get better facilities on some trains!
Not having a geek-friendly bookstore/cafe in Brighton is really depressing. With their poor programming book selection and (now) lack of accommodating cafe, Waterstone’s just can’t replace Borders for me. As me and you have discussed before Aral, a geek targeted cafe in central Brighton seems to be a business opportunity. There has to be a bunch of us who enjoy working out and about. If it does have to be Starbucks, the Palmeira Sq. one has a nice desk area, and upstairs in the one across the road from Churchill Sq is quiet during the daytime. I’ll definitely check out the cafes Nikki suggested as well though.
Hey Nikki, I’m writing this from upstairs at Cafe Delice… and it _is_ really nice. :) Not sure why I dismissed it initially (I’d been once before). I specifically asked if using the power was OK and they were like “of course, go right ahead!” So cafe Delice got my £5 this morning :) Extra WIN: it’s just around the corner from where I live. (And you’re right, I shouldn’t revert to Starbucks.)
You’re right, Peter. If only days had more than 24 hours. I would really love to be involved in such an effort but currently devoting all my resources to development + my talks + the upcoming iPhone training.
Stop stealing our electricity, indeed.
Next they’ll be complaining because you are stealing their air having bought an expensive coffee from them.
I agree about the programming books too. Borders actually had some good programming books, but Waterstones in Brighton is a joke. In fact the only Waterstones I know that has a decent selection of programming books is the one on Gower Street in London, but that’s because it’s their “academic” branch.
This is why I tend to use libraries when I need to work from somewhere else.
What horrendous customer service. The amount they make on your coffee far surpasses the cost incurred from you having your notebook plugged in, _especially_ one of Apple’s. The new MacBook Pros are some of the greenest notebooks on the planet.
You would think that they would want more Apple notebooks in their cafe so that it would appear a trendy place to sit and have a coffee. Craziness. Starbucks is indeed evil, I’m glad you found another place to code in peace.
p.s. Did you design the layout for your blog? So clean.
I dug around and answered my own question about the site design =) Nice customization of it. Tons of plugins too.
I just stumbled on your blog about 2 weeks ago. Wish I could tell you how I found it, it would be good for marketing purposes. Anyway, I love it and look forward to reading more. Renaissance geekism at its best.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12JTDp6xm18&feature=youtube_gdata
Thank god you got a blog wher you can vent, eh :-P
This place sounds medieval. No WiFi and complaining about electricity usage. Maybe it’s their way of saying: we don’t want fancy developers in our coffee hut.
I wonder if the money they saved on electricity is worth the loss of clients. I really hope it does.
Slightly off subject but here in Colchester there is an affiliation between Costa and Odeon Cinema. When you obtain a till receipt for your coffee it is headed in the Odeon brand. Perhaps Costa is some sort of franchising package when “in-store” ? Still, as I too am a Coffee Office dude (http://bit.ly/dszGlh) I sympathise. Welcome to the DevBucks gang.
Shogo
Hilarious! I had a very similar experience a while back. I had some lunch at a Bistro in Stellenbosch in South Africa, and afterwards plugged in my laptop to do some work. When the bill came, there was an additional item on my bill for “Corkage”. Obviously quite strange, I queried this and was told it was for the electricity. Quite flabbergasted, as this happens nowhere, I asked to see the manager, who must be one of the world’s worst human beings and proceeded to scream and shout at me when I made a point of the fact that I had just spent a whole bunch of money there and didn’t really think it fair to pay for the little bit of electricity, particularly considering this is completely out of the norm and as you say, there were no signs.
Anyway, suffice it to say that I have never been back, and also interestingly, the place closed a few months later – perhaps due to some dodgy management ;)