Fri 22 Apr 2011
Snobarista
Posted by WillR under Carrboro , ChapelHill , Community , EconomicDevelopment , OrangeCounty[3] Comments
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I’ve got to agree with you about Open Eye. Apparently they’re doing me a favor with they “serve” me coffee or tea. I avoid the place.
So it isn’t just me, my wife or other friends?
I thought at first I’d simply stick with endorsing a few of the places we like to frequent but the change at both Open Eye and Driade has been so disappointing I went ahead and called them out by name.
I really like Driade’s location, it’s quite accessible via our backyard and the Bolin Creek trail. We used to meet fellow families there – sometimes gathering several dozen folks to sit out back with the kids as we bought several rounds of coffee.
We went there for many years – learning to tolerate the growing problems as its level of service and cleanliness declined.
Like I said in my post, there were still a couple baristas there who were friendly and efficient but the trend was set – it was more likely than not you would end up with surly service – grudgingly taking orders, acting as if they were doing us a “favor”.
The final straw happened several years ago when my son got an adulterated coffee milkshake (previously a family favorite). When he started to drink it he found a bunch of solid bits mixed in. My son and wife quickly discovered that one or more wooden stirrers had been ground up into the mix.
When my wife brought it to Driade’s snobarista’s attention his response was “Huh…wonder how it got there?”.
No apology. No offer to fix the problem. Instead he turned to the next customer, pointedly ignoring my wife.
That was it. They finally lost a family of customers (and their friends) who had been going there since it opened.
One place I always enjoy the service is (what is now) Red Bicycle. Under the previous owner, I knew the reason to be because he paid above average wages to reduce turnover. I don’t know if that’s still true, but the service is still much better than some others.