The second cup rule
We designed the café around a single observation: nothing important gets said in the first ten minutes.
We designed the café around a single observation: nothing important gets said in the first ten minutes.
Watch any two people sit down with coffee. The first cup is logistics — how was the drive, how is work, what are you having. The conversation that either of them will remember starts somewhere in the second.
So we stopped optimising for turnover. The tables are deep enough to put a laptop away. There are no power sockets in the window seats, deliberately. The chairs are comfortable for about ninety minutes, which is roughly how long a good conversation runs before it needs a walk.
Some conversations deserve another coffee.
It is not a hospitality strategy so much as an admission. We are not really selling coffee. We are renting ninety quiet minutes, and the coffee is what makes them worth staying for.