Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sounds like a good place to go study abroad...
You'll have to refrain these thoughts. It's a catholic campus ;)
It's in Brazil... even our catholic campuses aren't all that catholic ;)
Ditch Starbucks and work at the library
91–100 of 217 posts
Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library
#92Earlier quoted context omitted.
I came here to post this very thing. When I was working downtown I decided to go to the library during my lunch break. To my surprise there was almost nobody in the library actually reading. However, there were people on every single computer workstation. Glancing over the screens I could see a variety of pornographic images, facebook and myspace pages, and youtube. The library is a great resource, but I was complete…
"but I was completely pissed off that my tax dollars go to support that." People who can't afford a few hundred dollars for their own computer and the monthly bill for internet access? If you're looking at porn in the library, it's because you can't do it anywhere else, not because you're abusing tax dollars. Would I like the poor, the disadvantaged, the isolated to be using the library resources my taxes pay for to…
This is completely and utterly asinine. Not only does this inappropriate use cause a hostile environment for people that legitimately want to use the library, but it lowers the number of available workstations for legitimate use. Just imagine your grandmother or little sister going down to the library to do some research and being uncomfortable in this environment. Think they are going to go back? No, of course they won't. But they will continue to pay tax to fund it. I don't understand how anybody could be 'OK' with this gross misuse of public funds.
Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library
#93I would agree with working at library. But I haven't been able to overcome one notable issue:
Hours: Saturday 10AM - 5PM Sunday 12PM - 4PM
Saturday is a possibility but Sunday is a joke.
Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library
#94Maybe we're lucky in Pittsburgh, but we have the best of both worlds at the main branch of the Carnegie Library. You can take a tour of where I work 2 or 3 days per week: http://www.clpgh.org/locations/main/tours/virtualtour/ It's fantastic. It was built by Andrew Carnegie in 1895 and most of it is original. I get inspiration from the 20 foot ceilings and hand made ornamentation everywhere you look. They simply don't…
Fully agree - we've got great libraries in Pgh. My main complaint is the very limited hours they have. I'd be there 9-9 everyday if I could. I always thought we should bring back the days of libraries as community centers - not just books. For instance, why isn't there a community workshop in or part of the library system - that's a big part of education...
Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
I came here to post this very thing. When I was working downtown I decided to go to the library during my lunch break. To my surprise there was almost nobody in the library actually reading. However, there were people on every single computer workstation. Glancing over the screens I could see a variety of pornographic images, facebook and myspace pages, and youtube. The library is a great resource, but I was complete…
"but I was completely pissed off that my tax dollars go to support that." People who can't afford a few hundred dollars for their own computer and the monthly bill for internet access? If you're looking at porn in the library, it's because you can't do it anywhere else, not because you're abusing tax dollars. Would I like the poor, the disadvantaged, the isolated to be using the library resources my taxes pay for to…
And they're paying into the library too with their taxes, poor or not.
Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library
#96Earlier quoted context omitted.
I see your Slate article quoting a market research report with another Slate article from someone who actually built a coffee shop, and raise you with a question and an observation. First, the article: http://www.slate.com/id/2132576/ Second, the question: does that "10% failure rate" stat include Starbucks, Seattle's Best, Caribou, Peets, or Tully's ? The rest of Mintel's stats do. Finally, the observation: the marg…
I remember reading the Slate article you're citing when it first came out. It's a fairly amusing one, which can be summarized as: "Wealthy person without a lick of business sense opens the 'café' of his dreams, declines to do any work himself, and goes out of business." It's entirely irrelevant to the economics of the average coffee shop. First off, it's not clear to me whether the establishment the author opened was…
That's a caricature of the article. Here are some salient excepts. Which parts of them do you disagree with?
[...] The logistics of a food establishment that seats between 20 and 25 people (which roughly corresponds to the definition of "cozy") are such that the place will stay afloat—barely—as long as its owners spend all of their time on the job. There is a golden rule, long cherished by restaurateurs, for determining whether a business is viable. Rent should take up no more than 25 percent of your revenue, another 25 percent should go toward payroll, and 35 percent should go toward the product. The remaining 15 percent is what you take home. There's an even more elegant version of that rule: Make your rent in four days to be profitable, a week to break even. If you haven't hit the latter mark in a month, close.
A place that seats 25 will have to employ at least two people for every shift: someone to work the front and someone for the kitchen [...] Budgeting $15 for the payroll for every hour your charming cafe is open (let's say 10 hours a day) relieves you of $4,500 a month. That gives you another $4,500 a month for rent and $6,300 to stock up on product. It also means that to come up with the total needed $18K of revenue per month, you will need to sell that product at an average of a 300 percent markup.
[...]
[...] the coffee [ed: with its acknowledged killer margins] needed to account for all of our profit. We needed to sell roughly $500 of it a day. This kind of money is only achievable through solid foot traffic, but, of course, our cafe was too cozy and charming to pop in for a cup to go. The average coffee-to-stay customer nursed his mocha (i.e., his $5 ticket) for upward of 30 minutes. [...].
Since the article both starts and ends with the observation you've tried to damn it with (that the owner of this coffee shop didn't know what he was getting into), I don't think that alone is a compelling response.
Finally, your analysis assumes that the coffee shop market is divided between "Starbucks" and "Independents". It is not. Other chain coffee shops account for nearly 30% again as many shops as Starbucks does.
PS: Respectfully, I'm not sure the guy who starts a thread with "coffee shops are pretty much the opposite of money losers" and "coffee shops have a 10% failure rate" gets to write smugly when his own revised math reveals his numbers to be wildly off, or his primary data point about coffee shops to be a single study from an industry marketing organization that included Starbucks in its numbers.
Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library
#97For the introverted moonlighting hacker who doesn't get out much except for the coffee shop, libraries are great for getting a ton of stuff done.
However, for social interaction and meeting people once in a while the coffee shop is a good change and/or alternative. Taking breaks more often works and being strict with your time management works well, but you have to be strict when your in the coffee ship from my experience. Meet lots of new interesting people too.
I like both, it will depend on my mood too. I say use both if you can. Where I live the coffee shop (not a big chain), is much more convenient though and mostly filled with students from the local university.
Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library
#98Earlier quoted context omitted.
You'll have to refrain these thoughts. It's a catholic campus ;)
It's a George Carlin pun: "Johnson sends Humphrey a broad (abroad). Details, along with some wild films, after these messages." "Broad" is an old-fashion slang reference for woman in the US- much like "chick" became later. People who used the term "broad" non-perjoratively are well into their seventies now.
I was under the impression that the only way to use "broad" non-pejoratively is in reference to the actual breadth of something.
That being said, sometimes it's safer to study abroad from afar.
Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library
#99Maybe we're lucky in Pittsburgh, but we have the best of both worlds at the main branch of the Carnegie Library. You can take a tour of where I work 2 or 3 days per week: http://www.clpgh.org/locations/main/tours/virtualtour/ It's fantastic. It was built by Andrew Carnegie in 1895 and most of it is original. I get inspiration from the 20 foot ceilings and hand made ornamentation everywhere you look. They simply don't…
vow, another pittsburgher. I once used the North hills library and it was really productive. Will have to check out the moon library.
Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library
#100My wife actually works at and for the library. Trust me when I say, you definitely don't want to work there. The amount of riff raff that hangs around that joint is just not worth it. People get trespassed, throw fits, steal DVDs, look at all manner of inappropriate material, and even straight up make scenes. The bathrooms are often vandalized with bodily excrement and the couches, as comfy as they may be, are also c…
That'll vary a lot by library and surrounding community. I've been in central libraries that were clean and didn't have anything worse happening than children being told to shush.
It'd probably worth visiting and checking one's local library out if you need a remote place to work. Spend a couple of hours - leisurely find some books, read a magazine or two - and see whether you're comfortable there. If so, then try coming in with your laptop.