Cafes stopping food before they close

[athomemum1]

I love a cafe stop on a weekend but often find them stopping food or closing before they actually close. Today I went to a cafe that was advertised as closing at 5 at 3.55 we waited for a seat for 5 ish minutes to be told they stop serving food at 4. I can under stand stopping a bit before but a whole hour seems a bit much. Also walked to a cafe last month who closed at 4.30 and at 3.45 ish where told we couldn’t have a drink as they were closing at 4.30.

@quirkychick

You say 4pm is a traditional tea time but things have changed, most people would not be ordering cake so close to a meal time (6pm onwards is fair game for an evening meal even if there's no children especially older adults who are the frequent customers of tea rooms!). Several tea rooms and coffee shops here open as bistros in the evening but close for 2 hours to switch over

You don't read/comprehend very well. I said that I don't care what time they stop serving just that customers be made aware. I don't see that a 'last orders' from a pub is relevant as cafes and the like don't do this, or not the ones that I've been to.

I'm not interested in your definition of 'normal' anymore than I am in a response from you.

Having seen this earlier I checked my local cafe - last orders for hot food is one hour before closing, last orders for drinks and cakes to eat in is 30 mins before closing and take away is available until closing. Seems clear and makes sense

I used to work in a cafe when I was younger.

We stopped serving food an hour earlier to give us time to properly clean and prepare for the next day, otherwise we’d all be there later. Nobody wants to work later then they need to.

If a cafe closes at, say 5 o’clock, but they stopped doing food at 4.30, that’s really pushing it & the customer would probably feel really rushed eating it - not a great experience for anyone.

You clearly do as you keep responding back!

In plenty of smaller touristy towns and villages, most of the tourists have gone by late afternoon as they'll have come on coach trips, so the "peak" for all the businesses will be between the usual arrival time of coaches and the usual departure times. Very few day coach trips will still be at their destination late afternoon.

Alternatively they can serve until 5pm and the staff have to wait for people to eat until they can clean and then finally leave at 6. So you can see why.

@Badbadbunny I agree in smaller touristy towns, but this is a busy city where there are lots of people around at 4pm, a lot of whom go to the chain cafés as many of the independent cafés are closed.

I worked in a cafe, within a bigger shop, as a student. We stopped serving food and drinks an hours or so before shop closing so that we could clean everything ready for the next day and be sure that everyone was finished eating/chatting by actual closing time.

I think a lot of the problem is not being clear about expectations. So many places don't even display their opening hours correctly! I end up googling while I'm actually at the place. As a customer I want to know when you expect me gone. That way I can plan sensibly and not accidently be inconsiderate, or end up not getting my order in in time.

Although I do think 90 minute limit for dinner in a restaurant is a bit cheeky.

It can also be a staffing issue. Many eateries find it very difficult to get staff.

Yes, that's it. Easy to get staff who want to work within school hours, but very hard to get staff to work before 9am and after 3pm. You have to look at a completely different demographic. Daytime isn't even popular with students in Uni towns as they prefer weekends and/or evenings. The bit of day between 3pm and 6pm is notoriously difficult to staff.

I think it's actually 6 hours

Last kitchen I worked in, this was a regular occurrence . Kitchen shut at 9pm, last orders were 8:45 and I could still be cooking at 9:30 because by time they were settled, went through the menu, ordered drinks, which meant me getting finished at midnight, or close to it

But those days were before covid and the COL crises and inflation

The simple fact is, how much is someone willing to pay for what they are buying? Everyone has an idea of what a reasonable price is for a coffee and a toastie , or a steak dinner, and every cafe owner and restauranteur knows what they can charge so they are still getting bums on seats. They are paying double for the raw ingredient , NMW is flying up, they are now being hit with NI rises, they have to pay into pension pots, profit margins are disappearing . Not one can afford to be paying for staff to be there when there are no bums on seats. They are having to keep shifts to 4 hours for staff so no breaks have to be factored in, they have to employ on short hours so that their pension and NI contributions arent crippling them because they can only price a coffee to a certain point, a scone can only be that much and a steak dinner that. Rather like shrink-flation, where as the food producers are shrinking the size because they know they cant sell if they price to what it really should be

You can still buy your bar of chocolate or packet of cheese at a price you find acceptable - the size is a lot smaller

Old fashioned greasy spoon cafes that someone was moaning about shutting at 2pm - they serve mornings - perhaps opening at 5am. Building trade - and its 10 o'clock teabreak - ie dinner time, 2pm and they themselves are winding their day down ( yes I work in hospitality and DH is a builder )

honestly, pp had it right already: if there is a gap in the market, then a business will move in.

All these touristy places and whatever where the tea shops close at 4, do you think that NOBODY has looked at this and done the background work on why that is?

Yup, apparently everyone is an "expert" on small shops and cafes. There've been numerous similar thread on here over the years. If it was so easy to run one, especially if it was "obviously" going to make a small fortune, then someone would already be doing it! I'm never sure why random people who've never run a business before seem to think they know better than people who have! Perhaps it explains why the vast majority of start up businesses fail within the first few years! Lack of research, lack of sound business plans, lack of experience!

I've done, literally, hundreds (maybe even thousands) of business plans for new businesses (start ups and purchases of existing businesses) over the past 40 years I've been an accountant. Sad to say the vast majority havn't a hope in hell's chance of succeeding, usually because the prospective owner hasn't a clue and just bases an entire business plan on "fingers in the air" guesses as to revenue and costs. I can do the number crunching side of things and the presentation of the financials in my sleep, but actually getting any real data of the prospective owners is like pulling teeth. Most of the time I spend basically teaching them about business and business finances, and then they whinge I've spent x number of hours when they've googled that crunching the numbers on a spreadsheet only takes y number of hours - completely missing the point that most of my time was teaching them and not the number crunching! They don't want to pay for the time, so there's no time left (in their budget) for business planning advice, tax planning advice, finance raising advice, etc. (not that much of that matters because they either pull out when the financials show no profit, or they go ahead anyway and end up loss making, so things like tax planning are redundant!). Most seem surprised that they have things like employers NIC to pay (at least Rachel's budget has increased public awareness) and employers pension contributions, business rates, the fact they have to pay VAT if their SALES not profit are over £90k, etc! VAT alone is often a killer for a small business that wants to grow and often why the likes of cafes restrict their opening hours so they don't breach the threshold!

By contrast, the ones I do for experienced business owners are a breeze and I love doing them. The people who've either previously owned a business and have sold it to buy/start a new/different one, of serial business owners who already have one or more businesses and want to start another. They come to me with actual facts and figures, they know what they're doing and what they're talking about. Their numbers make sense from the outset, so putting them together into formal forecasts and business plans is really interesting work, and I can add a lot of added value to the process, such as tax planning, finance raising options, group structures, etc.

The reality of small independent shops and cafes is that most, at best, they make minimum wage for the owners given the hours they work. Some don't even make that. We saw it vividly with covid when such small businesses were banned from opening in the lockdowns and restrictions. I had a couple of dozen clients who had small shops & cafes or small guest houses, and they had to take other jobs just to survive, typically working in supermarkets, delivery driving, or in the covid testing stations, mostly earning minimum wage or maybe a little more. Most quickly realised they were earning more than they did from their business and lots simply never re-opened their businesses and to this day are still working for supermarkets or doing delivery driving! From the top of my mind, that's 2 guest houses in a seaside resort (still closed), a village pie shop/bakery (now sold and converted to a house), a gift shop in the Lake District (lease expired and they chose not to renew), and a cafe in a picturesque village in the Yorkshire Moors (still owned, but moth balled). All the owners of those businesses are working in supermarkets or driving!

I disagree, it doesn't make sense at all to me. If they are taking orders for takeaways until the actual closing time, then the kitchen must be open to cook those takeaways. So why not serve people eating in?
I have worked in hospitality for many years, and I can confidently say that it does not take an hour or anything near it to clean the front of house at the end of the day, as you do it while you are going along. Once the closed sign is up, you start doing what you need to around customers still there, who tend to get the hint and leave fairly soon after. Then you just have to sweep and wash the floor.
The kitchen takes longer, but again, you can start doing it before the place actually closes, so that even if you have to cook a meal in the last few minutes, the rest of it is clean and ready to go.
In most places, there are fewer customers towards closing time.
The issue is business owners not wanting to pay the staff for cleaning up time.
This closing a kitchen early is a fairly new thing, I never came across it until the last 10 years or so. Pub kitchens are a different thing, but they usually publicise when they are open.

As a chef I will explain how it is from my perspective.
I've worked in family run pubs where the regulars know the food times and there is general consensus get to the pub or book as last orders is 9.
Then I worked for a chain that took over.
All food available from 12 to 10 pm.
Always was some one who ordered steaks really late because they could.!!
Couldn't clean grill or close potwash and had to wait for desserts.
Now I work for a really posh cafe tea room.
When hot food is gone we have a range of sandwiches or delicious cakes that can be bought until 1/2 an HR before close.
Customers must realise the time it takes to clean down and prep to the standards required to get a 5 star scores on the doors.
Also chefs already work 7 to 4 in cafes so get up 530 am or 10 until 11 pm or later in pubs often short staffed as not many people want to do these hours.
the fryers and ovens are using resources that need to be turned off asap than hope someone might want something beyond a set time.
Everything is time versus profit with food costs and gas so expensive.

my DH is a chef. I can't count the times he's left at least an hour after his usual finishing time - and if you think chefs and other staff get paid for those extra hours while you linger over your food, think again - and it is enraging.

And it seems to me very clear that you go in a cafe, they say almost as the first thing "we're closing in an hour, drinks only" or whatever, that IS them telling you. If you want 24 hour food, go to McDonalds (other fast food places are available)

Yes, but somebody buying a takeaway is not going to sit in the shop, potentially for up to an hour.

Most places will do the bulk of the clean down when they are closed, but it really does make sense to have the closing time an hour after the last food order to allow time for the the food to be cooked, then served, and then eaten in a relaxed manner.

I've worked in cafes 30 odd years ago and they worked the same sort of rules then.

Yes, I got proper snarked at for having the temerity to try and check a book out 2 minutes before closing at the library the other day 🙄

all those complaining about libraries and cafés etc - you must KNOW that the owners etc are not paying for one second over the contracted hours.

So the staff have no other option than to do the tidying, cleaning, getting ready for next day, during their working hours. So all the whining about it is really "but they should give their time for free for my convenience..."

That is not true at all.

I agree OP, opening hours around here are terrible too. There are cafes and shops I would like to visit with DD after school some days but they close at 4 so I can't really get there comfortably on time.

I don't think anyone's suggesting staff work unpaid but surely closing at 5 is customer closing time, business owners should then factor in additional clean up time for the staff. Staff having to leave for nursery/school collections etc doesn't really apply because you can say that about any job (I work in HR and believe me people do try it, feel free to find a job with more suitable hours for your personal life 🤷)

Well, the businesses who move in are the big chains that can actually cater to customers then everyone moans about killing off small business etc

so support the smaller businesses then - given them a use case to stay open longer and use them.

I don't think anyone's suggesting staff work unpaid but surely closing at 5 is customer closing time, business owners should then factor in additional clean up time for the staff.

have you ever actually met a business owner? They don't do that