In his TV show "No Reservations," Anthony Bourdain encourages travelers to eat and drink like the locals do. Some of the settings featured on the show are dirty and dingy, yet they add to the dining experience and make for great television. As an avid traveler, I have eaten and drunk things in places that were sketchy at best, and I agree with Bourdain: It is all part of the traveling experience. And I enjoy it--except when traveling in the United States or Canada.
When traveling in my home country or its northern neighbor, I expect independent food establishments to be clean and well lit, with decor that is reasonably up to date. Unfortunately, no other category of food establishment is more likely to disappoint than my own: the independent coffeehouse. It's as if we fear we will be looked down upon as "corporate" if we are too clean or if our furnishings are up to date. And while the freedom to design our shops is among the great joys of business ownership, we still need to be cognizant of how many people will perceive the basic elements of our establishments.
Your customers will see your windows, doors, floors, counters, equipment and condiment bars before they ever taste your drink offerings. As much as indies wish to be judged upon the merits of their coffee alone, the reality is that many customers will judge a business for its cleanliness, friendliness and product--and often in that very order.
Is your shop as clean as it could be?
If you were a customer coming into your shop for the first time, how would you rate its cleanliness? Very clean, clean or adequate? Or would you label it one of the Dirty D's: dingy, dumpy and disgusting? Here are some potential problem areas:
Walls. Walls are one of those seemingly innocuous areas that owners and employees overlook on a regular basis. Walls near trash receptacles, doors or counters can be especially susceptible to picking up dirt, grime or "coffee splash," often so slowly that it goes unnoticed. Light-colored walls in smoking environments require special attention and may be easier to paint than to clean if they have been left untreated for too long.
Furniture. Wobbly stools and terminally tipsy tables can seriously degrade the coffee lover's experience--fix them or replace them. The same goes for dirty or severely scratched tabletops and counters. Nobody enjoys sitting at a table that has scratches so deep and wide that no amount of scrubbing with a cloth will remove yesterday's (or yesteryear's) vanilla latte spill. Living room furniture placed in a coffeehouse setting requires special monitoring, especially if it's made from a material that is difficult to clean. Spills that sink into a couch or loveseat can turn your funky furniture into a skunky nightmare--and fast. You surely do not want your furniture to remind your customers of their neighbor's garage.
Floors. If there is one area that coffeehouses neglect more than any other, it's the floors. Common sights include coffee spills, coffee grounds, milk, ground coffee near the grinders and whole beans that have been crunched into little pieces. Many cafes seem to think they can just run a broom over the floor at the end of the day--maybe with a little half-hearted spot mopping--and the place will be ready for the next business day. Try renting a buffer occasionally and really going at the floors; your regulars will notice the improvement, and your first timers will come back.
Small wares. Cracked, broken, mismatched or dirty cups and saucers can give the impression that your attention to detail is not so attentive. No one wants to see a crack on the inside of a demitasse as they sip an espresso. Deliberately mismatched cups, saucers and spoons can, in rare instances, be used to create an eclectic atmosphere; circumstantially mismatched smallwares create an atmosphere that can only be called sloppy, no matter how chic the rest of the decor. Also, teach your employees how to properly wash cups and mugs to remove lipstick and coffee rings.
Windows/doors. Handprints on glass doors and windows are a warning flag for incoming customers that whoever is working is either slammed or lazy. If your staff is extremely busy, customers will grant a certain amount of leeway for handprints on doors and windows. If they are not busy, however, tips may be negatively affected as well as future business, no matter how cute the toddler was who left the prints. Built-up road and weather grime on windows can be kept in check by giving them a good squeegee cleaning at least once a week.
squeaky: Keeping your windows free of handprints and weather grime makes your shop more presentable. Signage. Outdoor signage problems can include: missing lights and letters, partially lit neon/electric signs, broken plastic faces, and graffiti. Outdoor signage is what initially attracts people to your store. If the indie or chain down the road has a more attractive, cleaner sign package, you may be losing customers to your competitors. And while I know a few folks who may be attracted to a dive bar by a sign in disrepair, I don't know anyone looking for a dive coffee shop.
Indoor signage. Menu signs with missing or incorrect prices make customers nervous when they are ordering. Dirty bathroom signs, especially state-mandated employee hand-washing signs, are, very simply, disgusting and dirty. Faded and dirty point-of-sale signage discourages purchases, reducing your overall dollar per sale.
Interior lighting. When the same light bulb has been burned out over Table 3 for a month, what does that say about your staff and store?
Condiment bar. Most condiment bars are situated where they can be easily ignored from behind the counter, making this hands down the nastiest place in most coffeehouses, be they chains or independents. Sugar, half-and-half and stir sticks litter all horizontal surfaces while coffee drips down the side of the trash can. What a mess. It is impossible in most coffeehouses to clean and restock the condiment bar without walking out from behind the bar.
shiny: Baristas should step out from behind the counter routinely to clean the oft-messy condiment bar area. Bathrooms. Bathrooms suffer from the same malady as many condiment bars--out of sight, out of mind (rarely seen, rarely clean). Additionally, cracked porcelain, broken toilet seats, leaky faucets and dirty, defaced mirrors can leave a lasting impression of poor maintenance and overall uncleanliness. If this is how you clean and maintain equipment that people are fairly intimate with, how do you treat the equipment they cannot see? Does it suffer the same misuse and abuse?
Equipment. Milk-encrusted steam wands. Enough said. Outside areas/smoking area. California, New York and Florida, three of the four most populous states, have forced smokers outside. Overall, this is a good development for coffeehouses. However, it has created a problem all its own: dirty outside smoking areas, with drenched ashtrays dotted with floating butts, paper napkins blowing in the parking lot and dirty dishes left to fester in the sun. Outside smoking/seating areas can offer some of the best signage opportunities a cafe could ever have, but they can simultaneously be the largest turnoff for customers entering your store. Having to walk past a dirty smoker's lounge to enter an otherwise clean and pleasant cafe, and walking out the same way, can give a first and last impression of filth. Outside areas often have the same limitations that condiment bars and bathrooms have: "If I can't see it, it must be clean." Nothing could be further from the truth.
One Cafe Owner's Makeover
Rocky Roaster of Canoga Park, Calif., recently got a retail makeover for the reality TV show "Peter Perfect." With Rocky's little store looking tired and worn, the crew of "Peter Perfect" redid the location in just three days.
"One of the things I have always wanted to do was have an area that I could run cuppings for my retail clients," says owner Rocky Rhodes. "I got a great setup and a warm environment to do just that. ... The facade work that was done truly turns heads now. We have had customers come in thinking they were coming to 'the new place' only to find out we have been here for nine years!"
Nestled in an older retail district on a main drag, Rocky's store was easy to miss, but the makeover has made it more attention-grabbing. "We have been experts in stealth marketing, where you fly right under the radar of your customer," he says. "But now we have an inviting look, and people are really taking notice of our new exterior. It is amazing what you can do with paint and some furniture to really overhaul a store." Perhaps more importantly to Rocky, "It raised the conversation about coffee again, which is always better for a shop specializing in coffee." Amen to that, brother.
Perhaps it's time to update?
Some time s , despite the best efforts of you and your staff, your place looks dingy even when you know it's not dirty. When your cafe has reached this stage, perhaps it is time to consider a makeover. Tom Palm of Design & Layout Services in Wayzata, Minn., says that most restaurants undergo at least a minor renovation every three to five years. Sometimes renovations are done just to clean the place up and repair or replace nonfunctioning equipment or furnishings. Other times a new atmosphere is created to attract a new consumer base, access or create a new market, signify a change of ownership, or even introduce a new or upgraded product line. Whatever the reasons for updating a store, many independent coffeehouses are long overdue. Below is a list of things that can be done to address many of the concerns above that go beyond mere cleaning and routine maintenance:
homey: Living room-style furnishings must be carefully monitored for cleanliness and wear. Walls. Repaint and change color schemes.
Furniture. Reupholster, repair, repaint or replace. In the case of counters, have them refinished or re-laminated.
Floors. Have the floors professionally refinished. Where possible, replace them with a new or different flooring material.
Smallwares. Replace them, and update patterns, styles and colors.
Windows/doors. There is very little that can be done to change or update windows, besides perhaps changing window coverings and/or window signage.
Signage. Repair, clean or replace, and change the style and color.
Interior lighting. Replace dimmed or burnt-out bulbs. Buy new fixtures, change lighting styles and bulb types. Relight your coffeehouse and rejoice in your newfound profits.
Condiment bar. Change location, reconfigure for greater ease of use and place a cleaning log next to the condiments. (This is how many chains maintain cleanliness at these stations.)
Bathrooms. Replace or fix broken fixtures. Repaint--please, repaint. Especially the men's room--it is often pretty nasty in there.
Equipment. Refinish, repair, repaint or replace.
Outside area/smoking area. Replace ashtrays. Post nice, clean, firm notices about throwing away trash. Encourage people to bus their own tables. If it looks nice and clean, people are more likely to keep it that way.
Coffeehouses occupy a strange and storied niche in the food world. Resting somewhere between alcohol bars and full food establishments, we often struggle to find our identity. It is important, regardless of whether we tend toward the bar scene or toward a quaint breakfast cafe, that we remain vigilant in our quest to raise the level of our stores above that of a Tijuana taco stand.
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