To no longer enjoy going to starbucks, costa or cafe nero?

[slownova]

I was in town early this morning as I was at the Gym and then had to pick up on item from a shop that wasn't open until 9.30am. Years ago I used to love popping into starbucks or costa for tea and a bit of cake but I had a look in both and the cakes just looked a bit grim to me. In the end I just wondered round till the shop I wanted opened and then I went up the road to have a nice pot of tea and a homemade scone.

I still enjoy going to a nicer café with home baking and good quality tea but the appeal of places like starbucks, Nero and Costa as totally evaporated for me. I used to love getting some seasonal pumpkin loaf or ginger bread with thick buttercream icing or some kind of gingerbread / black cherry / peppermint hot chocolate but I just don't like it anymore. I also can no longer stomach hot chocolate and a cake and would have tea and cake or a hot chocolate preferably a dark chocolate one on it's own.

I do still sometimes go to costa etc if I'm meeting a friend or with my niece and there isn't anywhere else to go and sit but all the glamour it gone.

Why is that? Am I just getting old? My teenage niece still loves to go to Starbucks. I find it so expensive for what you get and the cakes aren't nice and I can make much nicer at home myself and I have better loose leaf tea which I can break out if I want a treat.

Totally agree, especially Costa because the coffee there is undrinkable, lukewarm and slimy. I don't understand how they are so popular.
A good independent is always better.
If forced into a Costa (eg at a railway station), I'll have a bottle of water or a mint tea.

I’m old enough to remember when Costa first opened and it was trendy to go there. Then they spread everywhere and quality dived. There must be a tipping point when chains can’t grow - too many places get it wrong. Leon is the one I’m sad about - it was amazing when it first opened and now is burger and screen grimness

I don't like them either and only go on the motorway - usually Costa as I prefer their coffee (and cakes).

But I also find independents better. I don't think Gails is all that and I think there's a massive gap in the UK market for a German/Danish style bakery chain that sells decent coffee and pastries. There are a few in places like Guildford and London but there need to be more.

There's a chain with Cornish in the title that seems to be growing (they have branches in Totnes, York and Dorchester among other places), I like their cherry almond pastries but I don't like their coffee.

We live where three aren't really any actual coffee chains, but we do sometimes go when in bigger cities. TBH I do think a lot of the stuff in there is overpriced crap, Starbucks especially.

That's another question for a thread too. Why are most motorway service areas so grim? Why can't we have decent coffee and eating places and why do they have to have tacky vending/gaming machines?

Our local town has a Costa next door to an independent bakery/coffee shop that regularly wins national awards. I only go into Costa if meeting people before school as the only place only opens at 9. I’d be mystified by the continued success of Costa if not for the fact that it’s big and full of people who spend all day working in there. They know the staff well and they have a community going really. They’re not there for the food and drink as much as a co-working space. Meanwhile next door does wonderful coffee, sandwiches, pastries and cakes, but has very limited seating and no plugs!

Agree, my daughter works part time in one of these type of coffee chain stores and after hearing some of their practices I will never be in one again. Home made coffee and food is safer and nicer. Although I did pop into a eco friendly shop recently, that do their own bakes and coffee and how they make it was there for all to see and tasted lovely, just like home made.

I used travel for work a lot so would use a chain place as I could reliably get a plant based food option and a dairy free milk. Weirdly independents seem to have gotten much better at offering these while the chains have gotten worse. I’m often stung with surcharges on already pricey drinks though which is irritating as I genuinely can’t drink cow’s milk.

I get a weekly £1 drink at Nero with my phone contract so will use that. The coffee is alright. Haven’t had Costa for ages. Starbucks is barely a coffee shop these days, most of their drinks are sugary water. I’d be interested in what percentage of the drinks they sell actually contain espresso.

I‘m the same. I was reading today Costa is likely to be sold as people are walking away .
The food has always been unappealing to me and the cost now is ridiculous.
I think independents will become more coming in future

Gail’s is another one that was good when only had a few branches

Because money.

(Try Tebay or Gloucester.)

Not a coffee drinker, but Prets are few and far between here (nearest is 80 miles away!) so although their hot chocolate is the best, I'm usually in Starbucks.

My local ones know me so well that they start making it as soon as they see me!

I was shocked yesterday that a tall frapuccino is nearly 6 quid! I was treating my daughter after a blood test

Nero almond croissants are superb.

Really? I looked at the syrups in Starbucks and they all had artificial sweeteners and potassium sorbate.

I went in one very recently and they kindly let me read the ingredients on the packaging, nothing in that one.

Perhaps it depends on the individual store which ones they use?

Yes, maybe. I agree that artificial sweeteners are revolting.

National Trust cafes are often really good, they’re great at flat whites now and all seem very individual with interesting menus and cakes, everything often with decent ingredients. Even my young adults like them.

But yes I just want more independents. Good ones with better quality ingredients, everything prepared to a really good standard with interesting menus including good veggie options. I’d rather go no out less and have the above when I do.

We are lucky to have 4 independent coffee places at the end of our road as well as Starbucks. Always support the independents.

I think this is the crux of it. Starbucks is for children, especially with all their brightly coloured sugar-waters With all these chains, it's not actually about the coffee - whilst they pretend to be, they're really not in the coffee business, they're in the property business, and they're just slinging out crap drinks as a sideline.

I haven't bought a coffee in Costa or Starbucks for years, and would only go to Nero when I was with Octopus and would get a free coffee each week, and even then only if I was passing.

I'll take an independent coffee shop any day of the week, their coffee is always better and although they'll have a smaller range of food in most cases, it's higher quality.

You'll often find an independent is a few pence cheaper as well. Why anybody would go to a chain coffee place and spend their own money mystifies me.

So: OP, no, it's not unreasonable that you don't enjoy going somewhere uninspiring and drinking something shit.

Hate Starbucks & Costa but I don’t mind Caffè Nero - their coffee is much better and they have more locally produced goods, less sugary crap in their drinks too.

I'll have a chai latte if push comes to shove but prefer a cup of Nescafé Gold to any other coffee. Barbaric, apparently.

They’re minging and full of scruffs where I live. Independent is the way to go

It’s because they are all so filthy now. All chains are. . I would rather not bother.

Yabu to write wondered when you meant wandered. (Sorry, but it keeps cropping up everywhere.) But of course yanbu to dislike them. You like what you like and that's fine.