Cafes are no longer pleasant experiences

I don't know the cafe in question but I can't imagine they'd say anything if you are simply reading something.

The issue is noise.

And if they did say something you'd just take your custom elsewhere wouldn't you.

What Not even kindles?

I score study music for orchestra while I have a coffee and cake in cafés. It's on me at all times and I whip it out to test my knowledge of the score - constantly learning. I use an ipad now to play from; all my scores and annotations are there.

So it would only be ok to do that if I brought the paper books in with me? What a shame!

I wouldnt mind they were static screens but so often they cycle through different adverts for their stuff.

"Hi, I think I will have.. oh wait hang on it's gone... two secs... yes just waiting to see your menu again, oh it's gone to another advert this time for you summer special cooler cup no I dont want that, just waiting for the main menu to come back again..."

And grumpy adults

Just ban children and dogs from all cafes and eateries.

Just get some headphones. I recently saw the type that plugged into a USB socket and they ranged between £10 and £20! I don't doubt that they are a bit tinny but they should be ok for the odd phone call that has to be taken in public.

DH's phone still has a proper headphone socket so he really doesn't want to upgrade ;)

No nothing to do with kids at all. My mother reversed at speed into a child slowly and quietly pushing a trolley. Of course she did. And ended up in A&E as a result.

Sigh.

I think it's just finding the right cafe in your area. Near me the Costa is loud and annoying, but the Starbucks (due to it being further out of town) is mostly people on their own working on their laptops, but everyone seems to be great and has earbuds in.

A while back I did see a group sitting outside a cafe, and they had let their small-ish dog actually sit on the table. Grim.

They stay for hours nursing a coffee over the popular meal times and take up seating and table space when other customers want to sit down to eat food they have often purchased at the counter, only to discover there's no where to sit down to eat it.

Some monopolise. seats by the windows for hours. And some even conduct Zoom.or Teams meetings without headphones.

I've had to cancel food and drinks
orders at busy times as there's no space available to eat iti. I feel sorry for small independent cafe owners.

For me it’s the cleanliness almost everywhere we go. Crumbs on the floor and seats, tables not wiped. I don’t know when it declined but it’s been rapid. Why would I want to spend money to eat somewhere less clean than at home? But places still seem busy so I just don’t know.

That's not my experience of cafes round my parts (a large market town in the midlands). There's loads of lovely ones in the area, independents and chains.

People who let their dogs yap and bark are as bad as people who let their kids scream and cry, and do nothing about it.

My son was when a baby was a bit of a bawler. If he started when we were in a cafe, my husband and I would take turns to take him out, wheel him around, and when he quieted, we would bring him back.

We have a lovely cafe near us. I meet a friend there once a week. It's very popular with dog walkers. I've noticed more recently that dogs are running/coming into the cafe on a very long lead and they immediately go up to dogs at different tables and so all the yapping begins. Or people in the queue again not watching what their dog is doing - on a long lead yet again - and off they go right up to other dogs and other tables. I've witnessed another friend who allows her off-lead small dog just to run ahead of her into this same cafe. It's really bad manners plus inconsiderate/dangerous imo. There are people carrying hot drinks around and lots and lots of small children & toddlers milling about too. An accident/incident waiting to happen in my book.

Yep, all that /.

We used to go to a few places in the early evening that provided paper and crayons for the kids, that was always welcome.

Years ago I worked lunchtimes in a country pub, kids were welcome, but some parents were worse than useless. I had no hesitation in asking them to control their kids if they got out of hand. Once two women ignored their little girl so much, she actually walked out the front door, which led onto a busy road; the kid could have been killed. I brought her back and told them to drink up and leave.

I agree, @NovemberMorn - children should be welcome and parents should make sure they behave suitably for wherever they are. I don't think people are expecting perfection - a toddler holding their cup with their pinky finger stuck out, conversing in low tones about the philosophy of In The Night Garden - but a fair attempt at good behaviour, and not letting your child run round under the feet of people carrying scalding drinks.

I also think it is good to practise this sort of behaviour - as previous posters have said, getting children to sit up at the table for meals, and teaching them how to sit and eat nicely is much easier in your own home. When our boys were little, we took them to more child-friendly places rather than posh coffee shops, so that, if their behaviour did slip (and it did slip - they were only human, as were dh and I), it wouldn't be as offensive. So we practised sitting nicely at the table in McDonalds or chain places, and gradually they learned. Now they are 29, 31 and 33 and we can take them pretty much anywhere. Sometimes they even pay!

I should add, even in McDonalds etc, we did do our best to make them behave - no running around etc - it's more that people were more forgiving of children's behaviour in places like that than if we'd been in somewhere posh - if that makes sense.

Unless you let your toddler run riot and annoy other people, why would anyone hate you?

Kids should be welcome in all eateries, and mostly they are, but the responsibility of making sure they are not a nuisance to others, who have paid good money to have a drink and a snack in peace, is always down to the parent/carer.

Can only agree on the expense.
You would probably hate me though as I do occasionally take my toddler to Costa as a treat.

Im on my early 50s and use my speaker because I don't want to hold the phone next to my brain. Not sure if it's definitely harmful but it's a precaution....but of course in public I would hesitate to do this and do put it to my ear

Apart from the prices, I can’t say this has really been my experience of going to cafes, no.

But you can have no battery left. Wired - plug in and play

It's 2026. Even I have Bluetooth ear buds and I'm old!

Independent cafes are the best, especially in quiter areas. I avoid the chains that don't pay tax and serve shit coffee.

I personally think the number of electrical gadgets that don’t have a headphone jack is one of the biggest reasons why people are using loudspeakers.

As with when you left your wired earphones at home, you went into a shop and bought some.

Now the earbuds, headphones that are wireless need charging, pairing up. Plus battery life of many wireless earbuds isn’t long enough. People are switching to loudspeaker instead of having no music

I'm bemused by Elderly on mobile phones with the speaker on so you can hear the other person. I do see/hear this happening a LOT more, along with people playing music or a film on their mobile with full volume and no earbuds or equivalent. But it's so disproportionately people in their early- to mid-20s that my working theory is that people who were to young to go out on their own pre-COVID simply forgot or never learned how to behave in public, and because they missed the part where they'd learn hands on from parents or slightly older friends and siblings they've just gone full-on feral re mobile etiquette and don't even know it's wrong.