to think that £4.50 is a ridiculous price for a scone?

[emsyj]

I have just been to a new cafe that has opened on my local high street (small town in the north west, not a big city, not central London - just a bog standard local high street).

There were 4 of us and 3 tried to order carrot cake. The waitress returned a few moments after taking the order to say there was no carrot cake left, all they had was Victoria sponge or scones. So without the benefit of the menu in front of us listing the prices, two of us went for the sponge and one for the scone.

When it came time to pay, the person who had the scone was charged £4.50 for the scone and another £2.45 for a black coffee. I thought it must be a mistake so went to ask if it was right and the cafe owner was quite aggressive in saying that yes, it was £4.50 for the scone because they are 'baked fresh every day with locally-sourced ingredients'. I said I thought that £4.50 was a silly price for a scone, even if it were embellished with gold leaf.

So AIBU? Needless to say, we won't be going there again which is a shame as the cafe is seeking to be family-friendly with buggy parking, lots of high chairs, paper and drawing stuff for the older kids etc and we had high hopes for it being a nice weekly meeting place.

YANBU. I have never been charged that much for a scone unless it was part of a cream tea,

"I think sometimes it is easier for people from outside to see the potential problems with a service industry business than it can be for the people running the business."

Yes, a fresh pair of eyes not emotionally involved in the business can oly be good IMHO, even if the intiakl comment is negative. Personnally I do not think OP has been OTT or anything. She DID remark positively on all the things at the disposition of customers :

"the cafe is seeking to be family-friendly with buggy parking, lots of high chairs, paper and drawing stuff for the older kids etc and we had high hopes for it being a nice weekly meeting place."

but had to comment on price which was too high regardless (especially for young families I would imagine).

topspotter, I know it might be hard to swallow at the minute because you probably have invested a lot of money and yourself in this venture, but your cutomers are vital for your enterprise to succede.

I remember reading, on the reception of a camping site we went to, something like " If you did not enjoy your stay let US know but if you did enjoy your stay, let EVERYONE know!" I thought it summed pretty well the importance of feed back to prosper and to "tailor" your buisness to what the customer actually want. I wish you all the best, It cannot be easy but if you pay attention to sensible comments from customers it should help rather than make it harder for you.

I've been in to the cafe twice this week and had a positive experience both times. As a busy and stressed out working mum of four (with no time to comment on sconegate) this cafe is warmly welcomed by the residents of Hoylake and Meols. Liz came and sat with us, topped up my son's hot chocolate with cream and marshmellows, asked us for our feedback and seemed truly appreciative of our comments which were both constructive and positive. The prices are a little high but to find a cafe where I can truly relax and have an uninterrupted conversation with friends/family, I am willing to pay slightly more. My kids and their cousins delighted in the colouring, jigsaws, games and sitting at their own table. Liz has certainly found a niche and I take my hat off to her for having the courage to invest in a new business during a recession. My glass is certainly half full!!
Strongly recommend a flat white in the lovely spotty crockery :)

Having helped small business owners through starting up and troubled times the most common theme is extreme fatigue from the long hours and burden of responsibility (ie making back the invested money). Good customer service is so much harder when you are tired.

Liz - you should update your website ASAP. Would be great to have some pictures of the rooms, a menu, schedule of events (include books being read) and ability to purchase gifts and teddy bears online.

first post fabfour? Interesting that you came straight to this thread! have you met my friend sid?

Lol I was just going to mention Liz's mate fabfour's first post. You do know MNHQ can check ISP addresses to see if posters are posting with two identities don't you? Just sayin'...

Topspotter a businesses Custer service is only as good as it compliants handling. I assume you are not used to customers.

Tobe fair,the website makes it look like a completely lovely idea. But I hope Liz has now realised that she will not find enough people willing to pay over the odds for those facilities to keep her business in profit.

Liz you will need to find another way to improve your profit margins. Overcharging will not work because people simply will not pay the prices in enough quantites to make it work.

MNHQ are welcome to check my identity. First post because I heard about this thread and wanted to write something positive. Hoylake is a small place -news travels fast. I have nothing to hide, met Liz this week and have no other agenda. Not interested in this tittle tattle - scary stuff!!! goodbye

fabfour its not tittle tattle its useful information. MNetters (mums/dads with children) are probably the main users of cafes and coffee shops so its good to hear potential customers views, listen to them and act upon it. No customers no business simple!

I am sure The Queen of Shops would agree

I just been to the Spotty Blue Teapot website and it looks delightful, shame its so far from me I would pay it a visit. It is marketed at children so I guess anyone without kids would go elsewhere. I would not mind paying a bit extra for the ambience, but £4.50 for a scone, I would expect a full cream tea with that not just one scone on its own.

Fabfour are you a shill ?

Shill

So Liz has already lowered her prices. I really like the website and now can see why you are charging so much. Given the description of space your rent and rates must be very high.

To a certain extent, the more you lower prices the more customers you get and depending on your overheads you can end up making more profit. I think you should focus on adding profit through secondary services. How about a community board where you charge 50p a week to put a small notice up? It doesn't sound like much but if you get 20 people advertising for two weeks at a time your profit from that board would be around GBP8 a week. Not bad profit for the amount of time it takes to maintain your board. I have been looking for 2nd (even 3rd) hand baby things and don't like buying from ebay. There are also people who will want to advertise child related services such as babysitting, tutoring etc. A bigger advert by a company commands a higher charge.

cafe in Brighton does a cream tea for £4.50.
"Scone with jam and fresh cornish clotted cream or butter with your choice of tea or coffee. £3.50 without tea/coffee"

I think adding a tea/coffee option , with like a few fresh strawberries, fresh clotted cream, jam, I would pay £4.50, not just a scone even though the cafe is lovely.

Am now feeling both homesick for the Wirral and hungry for a scone!

I will be going up to visit my parents some time this Easter break and am now intrigued by this cafe... but I know if I took my mum out somewhere that charged £4.50 for a scone, even with jam, butter and cream, she would have heart failure - she boycotts the Costa they've stuck in the middle of Liscard because it's 'too dear' , Lord alone knows what she'd make of that!

As an aside I recently made scones for a charity event - big fluffy scones with organic ingredients, proper butter, nice jam, clotted cream and 2 big sliced strawberries in them - we sold them at £2.50 a pop and made a profit, so £4.50 for what the cafe owner is charging seems ridiculous, even if she is in Hoylake. One of the longest-going (and nicest) cafes in my my hometown on the Wirral has just gone out of business and they didn't charge half of that for a scone and cup of tea, so I do hope that the owner of the cafe has some capital behind her to weather this recession...

I really love the humour and the banter you sometimes get on MN I could however do without the snideness and spite.

Come off it lasses she has made a error of judgment on her mark ups and overpriced her scones BIG DEAL she is not the first and she won't be the last. What do you want to do grind her into the ground.

topspotter, the OP has done you a massive favour here and has also enabled you to get lots of feedback from people who fit the demographics of your customer base (even if they don't live in the area).

Because of my profession, I can usually look at a new business establishment (sometimes without going in) and pin point with fairly good accuracy whether a business will survive past its first year and if it doesn't the month in which it will fail. 50% of small businesses fail in the first year and around 90%-95% don't make it to year 6.

If you want your cafe to be around in 6years time, then I would take all the advice that's been offered on the thread in the spirit that it was meant, thank the OP and apologise for your rudeness.

Here's one more piece...... revisit your business model (prices, when you will break even and demographic in particular) and try and work out whether you have it right. It's not people like the OP who cause the vast majority of small businesses fail, in my experience it's because they haven't done their homework properly before launch and they are arrogant and don't take on board feedback they get.

novice of the day

God girl are we in the company of a genius!

I love it when posters tell off others for being snide, and then act that way themselves.

agree that if you make it a cream tea for 4.40, it will have a perceived value, ie it will look cheaper. You've not changed the price, but you've given more value for money.
cream tea = 1 (or 2) scone with jam, butter and cream, and a cup of tea/coffee.

sorry, i meant £4.50.

typos everywhere today...