Who was in the wrong - bakery or me?

[Doijb]

I take my kids to a bakery after swimming. Most of the time they choose sausage rolls or similar. There is a tiny table with two chairs. I plop one of my kids on my lap and we eat our treat. I prefer this as otherwise the flakes would go everywhere.

Anyway, after going every week to this place for a year one of the staff members tells me we’re not really a sit down food place. I inquire about the chairs and she said it’s more for people who wait.

I just found this odd. My kids are brilliantly behaved and I make sure not loud. My oldest will wipe down the table with a serviette.

Who is being weird?

Are businesses also required to provide a customer toilet if people eat in? Either way, no one is being unreasonable here.

Well I guess we shouldn't sit down anywhere as who knows who needs the chair more than we do. Having said that DH is disabled to I suppose he can sit down, I could always sit on his lap.

Why would you be mortified?! It’s a reasonable assumption that if a bakery has a table and chairs you’re allowed to use them unless told otherwise. There is truly no need to be so self-conscious about very normal assumptions!

Where did the serviettes come from?

Maybe some people would assume the table and chairs are some sort of avant-garde sculpture?

You said in your OP that it’s a ‘tiny table’ and two chairs. Did it never occur to you that there would be more tables and chairs if they were meant for people to sit at and eat? I’d feel really self conscious plonking myself at the only table in a place while others came in and out and took their food away.

Anyway, it’s been explained to you by the bakery now, so you know that’s not what they’re there for, and you’ll have to either find a new place to get your flaky sausage rolls - which I’m sure do still make a mess on the floor for the bakery staff to clean up - or buy them at the same bakery and take them away to eat as you’re supposed to.

But she's been doing it for a YEAR and they didn't mention it.
This place sells food and has a table and chairs, and when people sit there to eat the food there say nothing, for a year! Of course it's weird to suddenly say you can't do that, that's not what the table and chairs are for.

Vat or whatever makes perfect sense, but waiting a year does not. Some of these replies are so odd!!

The bakery definitely should have said something sooner, or put a sign up. Or just not put a table in at all. It is perfectly reasonable to assume that the tables are for paying customers eating food. What kind of maniac would assume they are for waiting customers (what are they waiting for anyway? It’s baked goods, not a cooked Sunday lunch).

Sometimes at my local bakery there’s a queue out of the door and they take orders and then prepare them. Plus they also do takeaway coffee so I could absolutely see why they’d think a table was necessary.

Also wouldn’t it have been a clue that there is only ONE table? If they provided eat-in why not have more tables?

@pictoosh People here will aim and fire over anything. It's them not you.

This could probably do with being pinned to the top of every post, particularly in AIBU 😂.

I don't think anyone is right or wrong, but now it's been made clear that the chairs are for people who may need to sit whilst their order is being prepared (I also don't see a need for a table, it has obviously caused confusion) you have the choice to take your food with you, or shop elsewhere.
On a sliding scale of lifes problems, this one is scarcely a niggle. 😀

I'm pretty sure there's some VAT rules about eat in/take away so they are not selling at 'eat in' prices and the table is intended for waiting / just making the place a bit nicer. They're probably okay with an occasional sitter but getting jittery about a regular and don't want it to become a thing/ other people to catch on to the idea.
Don't stress about it OP - they probably found it awkward to say and once you were in the habit you've probably just normalised it and haven't realised nobody else uses it that way - eg it sounds like it's always available, so nobody else is using it to eat from.
Not a biggie :)

No further answers required really...

Just sounds like a misunderstanding.

If it was just chairs, fair enough, I would assume they were for waiting. But to have a table there too - I would have assumed also you could eat at the table.

Not big deal though, just buy them and find a bench or take them to the park to eat them.

No one is being weird or 'odd'. You made a mistake, it was pointed out to you so that's that.

You're obviously riled by it or you wouldn't have created the thread, but it's really not a big deal.

God, I really need want a sausage roll now.

that genuinely made me laugh.

A couple of chairs - somewhere to sit if there’s a queue. Adding a table changes the dynamic entirely - no wonder the op thought she could sit and eat her baked goods there. And the shop is B doubly U because they made no comment for a year.

youre notin te wrong op

maybe they just ha a visit from the tax man who said make sur epeople dont sit down an eat at that table

anyone remember years ago when maccies used to charge more to sit in?

100% this.
In no way is it weird to assume a table and seating in a bakery is for eating! Who wouldn't assume this??

Also If OP has been going there for a year and sitting there and eating they are unreasonable for not mentioning it before now!

This thread is peak MN.

But now they have.

Again, not really a big deal.

It's not a judgement on your children's behaviour. It's not a restaurant or cafe and they're not geared up for a family sitting down to eat.

Yep. VAT. That's why you pay more eating in.

This is why I wonder how some MNers ever go outside…

OP - it sounds like a simple misunderstanding that, now corrected, doesn’t need to be an issue again. The only odd bit is that you’re trying to make it about your children’s behaviour, when there’s no suggestion that has ever been a problem.