At the beginning of November, this coffee shop opened in the complex across the street from us. I can see the back of coffee shop from our living room. We'd been hoping a coffee shop might open up here because sometimes it's nice not to have to brew your own coffee. [edited to remove link - if you google the name, it's the first result. Their website was updated after the comments about the website were posted]
One afternoon when I was home with my lung infection, Alex decided we needed coffee and that he'd try the new coffee shop out.
Hmmm....
The coffee was good. It was pretty too. There was even latte art under my take out lid.
But it was expensive. They only have one size - 12 oz - which is fine. But their 12 oz cost more than a 16 oz with a flavour shot would at the local-Seattle-based-soccer-mom-mega-coffee-shop. Expensive.
Oh, and they have no flavourings. Which is fine with me, I'll drink it without or with a bit of brown sugar, but Alex really likes flavoured drinks. And with another independent coffee shop less than two blocks away and a local-seattle-based-soccer-mom-mega-coffee-shop about three blocks away, you'd think they'd have flavourings. And more sizes. And better prices.
They make all their baked goods on site which is super. We didn't sample any as I was still wheat-free and they were actually in the process of baking everything when Alex got there.
We haven't been back. I'm not sure if we will go back. Maybe. Who knows, their prices might come down once they get a feel for the market in the area.
How much do you think is too much for a cup of joe? a latte? some other specialty coffee drink?
Based solely on their overly pretenious and completely un-user friendly website, I'd say never go there again.
ReplyDeleteFor a small cup of coffee at my favourite place I pay $2.15, but my willingness to pay for a coffee depends on how it good I think it is and if it's a local company.
Yeah, I kind of figure about $2 ish for a cup of coffee is about right...
ReplyDeleteTheir website is pretty horrible, huh! I think I might have to go back just so I can go in...but that will have to be sometime in February or March...when I can have coffee with milk again!
Thanks for the write up. Really appreciate all the comments.
ReplyDeleteThe website is not perfect and we are working on it to make it more informative and user-friendly.
We would like to respond to some of the points mentioned in the post.
1. flavouring: since each coffee has its unique flavour character, we encourage drinking coffee, especially quality coffee (specialty grade) with as little additive or modification as possible. we do offer muscovado sugar, a natural unrefined brown sugar for those who like a little more sweetness and flavours in their joe.
2. pricing: first off, all prices on our menu include 12% HST so they may seem quite overwhelming at first glance. our 12 oz drip coffee (brewed by the cup) is $2.10 before tax, though not the cheapest in town, is quite reasonable compared to the nearby independent specialty coffee shops.
3. sizes: the specific size for each drink is based on the specific brewing recipes that we think best bring out the flavour of coffee.
4. coffee: our coffee is roasted by Origins Organic Coffee. An artisan coffee roaster on Granville Island (very local). Our selections of coffee changes according to the harvest season and are roasted weekly to maintain freshness and quality.
Hope this helps to clarify some things. Thanks again for the feedbacks. Cheers.
I think the website is neat, but maybe I'm too 'overly pretentious'.
ReplyDeleteThe price argument is bunk, too. Saying that Starbucks is cheaper is like telling someone to go to McDonald's for a meal because it costs less. The beans are transparently sourced (due credit and compensation for farmers), locally roasted by some of the best coffee roasters in Vancouver, if not the West coast, unlike a certain soccer mom chain. Care and attention to detail goes into every cup, so there's no need to mask the taste of bad coffee with flavor shots. In terms of 'feeling the market', the market won't change if every store is a copycat of Starbucks. Wouldn't you rather support a small, locally owned business that puts care into their craft, even if it's a matter of 50 or 75 cents for a better product?
I agree with wheels. You can't cheap out on some of the best product in the world. I will pay more for a product if I am aware that the the people where extensively skilled and knowledgeable. I have certainly experienced this at Innocent.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I don't think it is reasonable to assume you can get Starbucks drinks at non-Starbucks businesses. Why critisize a business for being different than one of the worst (flavour-wise) coffe chains out there?
Some quick disclaimers:
ReplyDeleteI'm a friend of Ya Wei and Jerome's, the owners of Innocent Coffee.
Found this post through innocent coffee's twitter.
I run a coffee bar with my family in West Vancouver.
I'm mostly in agreement with what 'wheels' said above -albeit in a slightly different tone.
I think the comparison of Innocent Coffee to some other larger chains or even independents attempting to emulate those chains is a little unfair.
There's a great article I read the other day on manufactured vs. crafted beer and I think the basic idea is very applicable to the coffee industry. Judging by the quantity of your posts on food and cooking I'll assume you probably know what I'm referring to but, just to set the stage…
http://tinyurl.com/2aceb42
There are many differences of course between beer and coffee and in reality I think wine is a much better comparison, but if you think of the coffee industry in a commodity vs craft mentality you'll discover a fairly large division between a shop like innocent coffee and starbucks (or even other independents trying to emulate starbucks).
So in this mindset as with other industries you'll find that these types of coffee shops often want to control the experience to serve what they believe (obviously subjective) is the best possible coffee they can. In coffee, that can often mean:
- Specific sizes to offer what the owner personally thinks is the best ratio of espresso to milk. Carrying only well produced, well roasted coffees even if it costs them and the consumer more. Adding nothing to the coffee and simply doing their best to showcase it's inherent flavours and origin (often the reason you see no sweeteners, flavours, sugar, milk, etc). And many, many more things..
I believe Innocent Coffee falls into somewhere into the category of craft coffee shops.
If you're not completely turned off by the idea of 'craft coffee', I'd recommend a few other places in town in addition to Innocent: 49th Parallel, Elysian Coffee, and Cafe Crema (my family's cafe).
Cheers, and cool blog :)
Thanks for the write up. Really appreciate all the comments.
ReplyDeleteThe website is not perfect and we are working on it to make it more informative and user-friendly.
We would like to respond to some of the points mentioned in the post.
1. flavouring: since each coffee has its unique flavour character, we encourage drinking coffee, especially quality coffee (specialty grade) with as little additive or modification as possible. we do offer muscovado sugar, a natural unrefined brown sugar for those who like a little more sweetness and flavours in their joe.
2. pricing: first off, all prices on our menu include 12% HST so they may seem quite overwhelming at first glance. our 12 oz drip coffee (brewed by the cup) is $2.10 before tax, though not the cheapest in town, is quite reasonable compared to the nearby independent specialty coffee shops.
3. sizes: the specific size for each drink is based on the specific brewing recipes that we think best bring out the flavour of coffee.
4. coffee: our coffee is roasted by Origins Organic Coffee. An artisan coffee roaster on Granville Island (very local). Our selections of coffee changes according to the harvest season and are roasted weekly to maintain freshness and quality.
Hope this helps to clarify some things.
I really like the photo that you took of this cafe. I think the most I would pay depends on what's offered. There are a lot of ways to save money on coffee, but most of them come at the expense of quality. Like last three people, I'm willing to pay for quality.
ReplyDeleteInnocent coffee is part of what some people call "third-wave coffee." The first would be something like diner coffee: cheap and old, but warm and comforting. The second is huge chain stores like Starbucks, which have espresso but don't pay that much attention to quality, and overshadow the coffee with other stuff like 20oz of milk or flavor shots. Third wave is all about the quality. I guess you can also call it artisan coffee. So: in my opinion, unfair comparison.
It's a bit like what http://meatandbread.ca/ has dome with their (fantastic) sandwiches.
I hope you give these places a chance. I wish I lived close enough to Innocent to go there more often. And thanks for the debate :)
For some reason this comment won't publish to the blog (even though it's been posted twice, so I'm publishing it manually. It should be showing up as the third comment.
ReplyDelete-s
innocent coffee has left a new comment on your post "Innocent Coffee":
Thanks for the write up. Really appreciate all the comments.
The website is not perfect and we are working on it to make it more informative and user-friendly.
We would like to respond to some of the points mentioned in the post.
1. flavouring: since each coffee has its unique flavour character, we encourage drinking coffee, especially quality coffee (specialty grade) with as little additive or modification as possible. we do offer muscovado sugar, a natural unrefined brown sugar for those who like a little more sweetness and flavours in their joe.
2. pricing: first off, all prices on our menu include 12% HST so they may seem quite overwhelming at first glance. our 12 oz drip coffee (brewed by the cup) is $2.10 before tax, though not the cheapest in town, is quite reasonable compared to the nearby independent specialty coffee shops.
3. sizes: the specific size for each drink is based on the specific brewing recipes that we think best bring out the flavour of coffee.
4. coffee: our coffee is roasted by Origins Organic Coffee. An artisan coffee roaster on Granville Island (very local). Our selections of coffee changes according to the harvest season and are roasted weekly to maintain freshness and quality.
Hope this helps to clarify some things.
I've been away for a few days and came back to all of your comments...I just wanted to address a few of them
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, I do want to point out that I did like my coffee. My main complaint wasn't the coffee, but the price - my latte was 25% more for 25% less coffee than if I'd purchased a latte at the local-Seattle-based-soccer-mom-mega-coffee-shop, which is expensive. We often buy our coffee at another independent coffee shop in the same neighbourhood (in fact we definitely prefer that to the local-Seattle-based-soccer-mom-mega-coffee-shop) and it costs more than the local-Seattle-based-soccer-mom-mega-coffee-shop, but it's much less than the lattes we purchased at Innocent Coffee. In fact, it was about 17% more for 25% less coffee...
When we do buy our coffee, we do try to visit local coffee shops, rather than the local-Seattle-based-soccer-mom-mega-coffee-shop or other large chains. We certainly recognize the quality of local shops tends to be much higher than of the chains and that because of a million factors, including volume, the coffee is often more expensive.
@innocent coffee - I appreciate the time you took to respond...just to be clear, I was happy with my coffee...and we might come back. As I mentioned, I didn't come into the shop, just my husband did and he ordered take out. I also recognize that you are a new business and that you are still working on things, but I found your website very difficult to navigate and I completely missed the reference to Origins Coffee. We did really like that all of your baked goods are made on site, but unfortunately we didn't time it quite right to try any the day we got our coffees.
@wheels - I am more than prepared to pay more, but the price seemed so much higher to me than either the local chains or independents coffee shops we often go to.
@anonymous - I'm prepared to pay more for a better product too, but the difference in price just felt so much higher, especially when compared to another similar local company in the same neighbourhood. I definitely wasn't trying to criticize them for NOT being Starbucks. If I wanted Starbucks, it's not that hard to find!
@John Giannakos - thank you for your thoughtful comments. I checked out your link and I definitely agree that the quality of the ingredients plays a huge part in the quality of a final product, that ingredients produced in mass quantity are often of a lower quality than those produced in small quantities, and that items created by craftspeople (hobbyists or trained) are often higher quality. As I said above, we do prefer to give our business to local companies whenever possible (and that's quite easy to do living in Vancouver). We have not been to 49th Parallel or Cafe Crema, but we do like Elysian.
you are right about our 12oz latte being more expensive (though with the bigger size you don't get more coffee, you just get more milk) than our worthy rivalries. however, everyone's pricing strategies are different. you might notice some have different prices for the different region coffee they are offering because in fact the cost for each one varies. we have one set price for all the different region coffee we are offering. that's all i have to say about the pricing.
ReplyDeletejust to let you in on a little money saving secret: since by health code we are only allowed to do single disposable service (paper cups and plates), many of our customers bring their own cups, which often are larger than 12oz (most travel mugs are 16oz). With their cups filled to the top their 16oz drinks are charged as 12oz and they get a small discount for bringing their own cups. cheers.
thanks for the tip!
ReplyDeleteCool! I'm a big Elysian fan myself :)
ReplyDeleteIf you're ever in West Van for a coffee let me know via twitter @jtgi, it's on me.
Happy Holidays
@John - thanks! If I'm over there in the next little while, I will let you know!
ReplyDelete