this post was submitted on 16 Jan 2024
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I will offer an alternate explanation:
Restaurants (and by extension, coffee shop) are inherently very risky businesses to start and operation, I think over 90 percent of them fail in the first year. So, to increase the chances of survival, you have to make sure your business is ran as efficiently as possible, things like rent and location is outside of your control, so you always want to maximize the value of every dollar you spend.
The first people notice when they go into a new restaurant is cleanliness, nobody wants to eat at a new place that looks dirty, you can only get away from that if you are a decades old local hole in the wall. Ease of cleaning, therefore, is the number 1 priority over everything else.
So, why the "industrial" concrete/tiled floor and metal chair? Because you can just hose them down at the end of the day. Same thing with big open wooden tables and sparce renovations, ease of cleaning.
The second thing is you have to avoid major renovations, make the with the space you have and maximize the amount of interesting decorations for the minimum money/work.
Why put subway tiles on white walls for decorations? Because you don't have to hire painters, and subway tiles are cheap and interesting looking.
Why use big open windows and only dim Edison bulbs for lighting? Because hiring electricians to rewire the place you rent for lighting is a lot more expensive than using the big windows you already have.
Why avocado toast? Because coffee is your main focus, the food is important but secondary, and a piece of fruit on a piece of bread pretty much doesn't require any cooking.
It's really the operation efficiency, rather than some trend following "Instagram" asthetics that led to all these coffee shop looking the same, I think this is a better explanation than what this article proposes.
I've begun a new job at a ✨cool✨ (legitimately) local coffee shop. Not my first career choice, but I've moved countries and I value people over money. Anyway, that's a different story.
Ex-fuckin'-actly. We prepare high-quality coffee and for a small team sourcing from farmers halfway across the world ensuring that it stays high-quality is the main focus. There are 3 bakeries within a short walking distance if you want food.
Besides that, it's the familiarity that drives coffee shops to look like coffee shops. You wouldn't expect a black metal album cover to look like a jazz record album for the most part unless you're deliberately playing a trick.
That said I do enjoy it when people twist formulas, but obviously, it's a risk for business. In my case, the cafe that I work in could be found all over Europe, but locally it remains a twist on what the locals usually do. And I think that's where the feeling of uniqueness comes from.
The article points out a valid critique that I've mulled over in my own head:
And goes to interesting places recounting the history of instagrammability, the tyranny of the algorithm and the experiences of the owners of the coffeeshops. Overall a good read.
It is happening in my industry as well. A lot of our part suppliers are converging. Our systems look and act like our competition. It is a losing battle, I try to keep pushing but the problem is bigger than I am. Eventually all the value adds all the uniqueness gets removed and it becomes a race to the bottom. Who can make the same that hit the platonic form and do it for the least amount of money.