To be mad at Starbucks hosting a musical baby morning

[imnotreally]

My local Starbucks is located on the junction of an A road, just outside of town. People go there to work or to take business meetings. It also happens to be near the towns crematorium so a lot of mourners stop there for a coffee. I go because it’s a grown up coffee, away from the kids, I can have peace and quiet and think or work.

This morning I got there and half the seating was reserved. It turned out that a large portion of the seating area was being turned into a mother and baby/toddler group. Ok, fair enough but not really what you expect from a place where professionals meet. Then came the music. Loud kids music which involved clapping and singing along.

Am I being unreasonable to think they picked a totally inappropriate place and Starbucks are crazy to have arranged it?!

Meh. I can’t get worked up about a coffee shop being used by children. If you want an adults only place to relax go to a family-unfriendly pub. Most sell coffee these days.

I am not against children in Starbucks. I am against being forced to listen to adults singing inane songs about body parts and farm animals.

I’ve had three kids. I’ve paid my penance. We are finally past the era of upsey Daisy who won’t share her bed and the weird collector of stones known as macca paca. I’ve watched countless episodes of mr tumble and learnt all the songs including the signs. Fortunately we skipped topsy and Tim and their psycho mother but have only just left peppa pig behind and I’m still forced to endure that awful anthem of ‘paw patrol, paw patrol, we’ll be there on the double’, the crazy chicken carrying mayor and the strange land where dogs can speak but no other animals can, and the emergency services are run by a 12 year old.

I have done my fair share of listening to this waffle. Is it such a crime to ask to drink my coffee in peace without being subjected to more?!

Do you honestly think that Starbucks would have taken the booking if they thought it would be detrimental to their business? They have probably allowed the group to meet there at an off peak time, given them a hire charge/minimum spend that is typical of the trade they experience at that time of day/day of the week.

It is not their responsibility to explain their business decisions to you. If you're not happy about it, go elsewhere.

It is a business not a charity for professionals without offices. Book a meeting room if you want a quiet meeting.

Also, for business meetings, it's more typical to meet in a corporate hotel lounge or actually hire a meeting room in my industry. I would not be impressed if I were invited to a Starbucks for a client meeting for this very reason.

I am against being forced to listen to adults singing inane songs about body parts and farm animals.

I didn't realise they held a gun to your head!!

It's a public coffee shop.
Members of the public can use it, book it as they very well please.
The high handed condescension dripping about the silly frumpy mummies and the oooh professionals is startling.

I would not be impressed if I were invited to a Starbucks for a client meeting for this very reason

I never decide where to meet potential clients. I always let them choose "where's best for you?" Type thing

It's always a Starbucks or similar or a pub

And to the person who talked about taking clients for lunch, that is not something I have time for in my work. Meetings have to be short.

yabvvvvu. You don’t get to dictate who uses Starbucks.
What if a say A group carers and disabled people met there? Would this be a problem aswell?
What a cheek... these rude mothers with their cute kids. Distracting from the professionals and mourners in a public place. How dare they
What if I go to Starbucks on my day off and complain about all of the professional work meetings and mourners impacting on the atmosphere of the cafe on my day off? This is about how ridiculous you sound.
Local cafes are for the local community which believe it or not includes mums and babies.

@sixteenapples. That's fine if you use coffee shops as meeting places. The issue is this poster expects other Starbucks customers to treat it like her office(which it not) and respect her business meetings. If she wants the peace and quiet that she craves-get an office.

I'm a new mum, and a freelancer. Before I had DD I'd occasionally work from a coffee shop; now I'm in them 4 days a week with other mums after some or other baby activity.

Anecdotally, I think the mum crowd spends more. If there are 5/6 of you and all get drinks, with one or two getting a sandwich or soup, and everyone buggering off after two hours max because it's nap time, that is a far higher spend at a higher density than the one-drink table-hogging freelancer.

But - baby events these days are bloody everywhere. I went to baby stand up comedy in the upstairs of a pub last month, and the downstairs became "buggy parking" with two hardened old drinkers nursing their pints among the Bugaboos. So I have plenty of sympathy for people looking for a baby-free daytime space, and not finding one anywhere.

Was this in a Yorkshire town beginning with W by any chance?

Or a welsh town beginning with W? Sounds exactly like my local Starbucks!

YANBU. Sitting and working on a laptop or speaking are normal coffee shop appropriate activities. Singing and using musical instruments are absolutely not, it's the equivalent of someone blasting their music from their phone on the bus. I would have left as soon as I realised. Starbucks just wanna make money and I'd be interested to find out whether they make enough profit from these customers to account for those who would go elsewhere rather than sit while a music group is happening.

I wouldn't be particularly comfortable with going to a business meeting in a coffee shop. What about confidentiality? If there were really no premises available for a face-to-face meeting, I'd just Skype.

It's a very (commenting as an expat here) British thing to decide a coffee shop (etc) is an 'adult space' and children aren't 'meant' to be there.

Sitting and working on a laptop or speaking are normal coffee shop appropriate activities.

Fuck off & hire an office for £12 an hour if you want to appear professional, otherwise get a proper job & let the rest of us enjoy a coffee however the fuck we like!!!

Serves you right for being cheap and trying to do business in a cafe.

I'd it Rhostyllen Starbucks?

I'd be interested to find out whether they make enough profit from these customers to account for those who would go elsewhere rather than sit while a music group is happening.

Owing to its location I highly doubt that the passing trade will disappear all together. That hour a week or so, people will probably reschedule their 'meetings' for an hour earlier/later.
Say they make £250 in that hour from the usual customers (highly doubtful), then there would probably be a hire charge of around £150 with the expectation that the attendees purchase at least 1 drink each and probably a snack/sandwich. Not all the regular customers would find this so abhorrent that they would leave, so at least some of their 'regulars' will still be there taking over tables with their bags, briefcases, Laptops and newspapers. If they find after 1, perhaps 2 weeks of this that their figures were suffering as a result, they'll just stop the class.
Funny but I'm fairly certain that Starbucks would have thought about this before taking the booking.... y'know since they're a world wide brand...

Absolutely nothing to get worked up over.

*I never decide where to meet potential clients. I always let them choose "where's best for you?" Type thing

It's always a Starbucks or similar or a pub* 

Now a pub I could get onboard with

YANBU. Sitting and working on a laptop or speaking are normal coffee shop appropriate activities. Singing and using musical instruments are absolutely not Says who? I'd much rather watch some cute kids having fun than some "professionals" who don't have offices.

It’s fine to have meetings of all kinds in coffee shops, but you can’t expect other meetings to be lesser or more important.

Just because two people are having a meeting about work doesn’t mean a whole group of mums can’t have a meeting with their babies

Both are entitled to be in the coffee shop

My local Starbucks is very large and within a sainsbury and Argos

It’s busy and there are plenty of working meetings taking place alongside mother’s meetings and teenagers - it’s all a mixture and very loud. The loudest noise is the coffee machines

Don’t worry they’ll realise targetting new mums and baby groups doesn’t work (it never has for Starbucks) and will move to something else. My local Starbucks hosted a number of different events targetting a number of different groups of people before deciding professional networking events was the way forward.

YABU its a coffee shop, not a catered office.