Upselling at Caffe Nero

[CoffeeQuery]

Went to buy a coffee at a station this week. The server took my order and said very casually "Brazilian?"

I automatically agreed, then as she walked away realised they had a promotion on and it was an extra 40p. I said, in mock surprise "Did you just upsell me?" and she looked a bit weary and said "It's in my job description".

She was very happy to change it and I didn't at all want to make her job harder, but am I unreasonable to feel slightly pissed off with Caffe Nero? Station prices are quite high enough without randomly wacking another 40p on.

Or is this just standard practice now and I should get out more?

They do it everywhere and you have to be really careful! What you hoped would be a £3 small coffee ends up being a massive bowl of super special bean blended, chocolate topped, palpitation inducing beverage that sets you back £18!

Haven’t had it in cafes but if I order a half in a pub I have to watch carefully to make sure I don’t get a pint.

YABU it's common knowledge that any specific blends / syrups / variations of coffee cost more.

Ah, that great phrase “common knowledge”

If it was so obvious, why was the server embarrassed when OP double checked, rather than thinking OP was a right silly one?

Why do you assume she was embarrassed? Chances are she didn't care at all

OP said she looked weary - and yes, of course, she would, because all of this is a non-issue and she's just doing her job

It is annoying, but I still prefer Nero coffee and service (central London, take away coffee, no food) to most of the other chains. They don’t pay UK tax, of the main chains think Pret is the main one that does.

But how does the customer know that Brazilian is a special bean/blend?

If they just ask "Brazilian?" it would make me think it's the default, like if I asked for tea and they asked "English breakfast?"

I got done at a local independent coffee shop last week....30p not a huge amount but it was the piss take attitude that got me. Thankfully there are 6 other places to buy coffee within 100 yards!

I had this last weekend, the barista offered me house blend or Brazilian with no mention of a difference in cost. I had no idea that there would be a price difference until I read this thread!

Sainsbury's: Do you need any stamps?
Superdrug: Would you like a bottle of body wash for 99p?
Mountain Warehouse: Would you like some socks for £5?
Costa: Medium or Large? (I say small, because that's what I want, but it's never given as an option when the barista asks

These are just some examples of upselling I've experienced, so it's neither new nor something that is specific to Caffe Nero. None of them were pushy though.

You just need to say no, because it's not what you wanted. I don't agree with it, but it's hardly worth getting outraged over.

From the OP:

am I unreasonable to feel slightly pissed off with Caffè Nero

Phew! You can rest easy, cos OP wasn’t outraged, but slightly pissed off!

I think it's cheeky the way they do it. Going by the number of people it seems to catch out at my local one I'd say the additional charge isn't clear

I think the difference is, it wasn't clear that I was being offered an extra rather than an alternative.

It's very clear now, but I hadn't come across it before so it caught me off guard.

I wasn't outraged but it left me feeling negative about Caffe Nero and would put me off buying there again. Clearly some - but far from all - posters feel the same way.

I also do remember being similarly "slightly pissed off" the first time I said yes to the Costa medium I'd been offered which I assumed was a standard sized coffee but again was covert upselling.

We might have to live in a world of manipulative marketing but we don't have to like it!

Oh, I'm resting, thanks. However, also from the OP in their second post:

Yes, I had no issue with her, and felt a bit bad about reacting in mock outrage - but I really did feel a bit outraged, though not at her obviously

Ok, maybe I was outraged!

@CoffeeQuery I guess this time you caught them out.

No one likes being manipulated, and businesses will use whatever means to hoodwink their customers into paying more or convince them they're getting a good deal.

We just learn to become more discerning consumers.

This is standard practice at coffee shops. I just always say no. It wouldn't annoy me.

I worked in retail for 20 years.
You are mystery shopped constantly, managers putting pressure on you for store cards, upselling at every opportunity, talk to the customer to get a relationship going so they want to come back as x gave them brilliant service.
All because some little twerp in head office who has no clue HOW to work with customers has had a brainwave and thinks how can we squeeze more out of customers without them noticing and get them to come back.
That's why we are told to offer all the crap you hate. We KNOW you hate it, don't want another piece of plastic in your purse,make small talk about what you are purchasing etc and we hate having to do it every single time but, as it was pointed out in an earlier post, the minimum wage workers get the shit from the top down so please complain to Head Office as they don't listen to the people at the bottom.

That's actually a good point, I see what you mean
Caffe Nero is my go to chain so I'm very aware they do seasonal blends but otherwise I might not have realised that. Fair enough to the OP then

We used to have to do this in Spoons as well (not really surprising!). I got told off for saying "single or double" instead of "double?" I used to just do it anyway if the manager wasn't next to me.

And if people didn't specify which brand of gin etc they wanted, or say "house..." we were supposed to put in the expensive one. I also didn't follow this!

Hairdressers are terrible for this...got caught out a few years ago in a hairdressers I'd not used before, as the girl was washing my hair she said "Conditioning treatment ?"..thinking this was just another way of saying "Conditioner" I agreed, it wasn't till I came to pay and realised they'd slapped an extra £20 on my bill, I complained and the manager deducted it, another hairdressers I used some years later was forever trying to sell stupidly priced hair care products, their attempts became so high pressured and persistent I stopped going after one particularly annoying episode, it's happened so often now that as soon as I sit in a stylist's chair after a hair wash I always say, "oh I don't need any products today thank you"...

I worked in Malaysia for two years. Starbucks was a nightmare as their corporate upselling culture is very ingrained into the staff. You would go to grab a quick coffee with a mate and they would insist on the whole excruciating pantomime in their best English, which was better than my Malay but that's as far as it goes.

"One medium cappuccino and one americano, please".

"OK. (brings out laminated menu and holds it up for inspection) Wood. Yoo. Laike. To. Have. The. Lunch"

"No thank you, it's 10.30 in the morning"

"Wee. Have. The. Salad. Or. The. Cheese. With. The. Tomato. Plate." (continues for several minutes, increasingly difficult to understand).

When you finally got the staff to accept a no, you had to spell out your name for the cup while they sweetly and with great sincerity got it completely wrong very slowly.