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Post by Roadsterstu on Jun 29, 2020 12:43:13 GMT
Don't Maccy D's give the emergency services free coffee or have I made that up? Some do, some don't. I presume it is up to the franchisee. Thankfully the one on my patch does give free hot drinks to the emergency services. I collect the little stickers, too, so they build up for use elsewhere. It is genuinely very good coffee. |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2020 13:00:45 GMT
I'd say it was below average myself. Better than the tax dodgers from Seattle, but only just. I've had some great coffee recently. Colonna and Small in Bath does excellent coffee and there's a great cafe in Glastonbury called Hundred Monkeys that make a mean flat white.
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Post by Roadrunner on Jun 29, 2020 13:46:19 GMT
I'd say it was below average myself. Better than the tax dodgers from Seattle, but only just. I've had some great coffee recently. Colonna and Small in Bath does excellent coffee and there's a great cafe in Glastonbury called Hundred Monkeys that make a mean flat white. Hundred Monkeys is superb. We always try to call in when in the area. |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2020 14:44:43 GMT
Pete's eats in Lanberis, amazing for tea/coffee/food. Hits the spot when a bit of hiking or a trip up Snowdon is in the offing and the the less inclined, not far from the train to the top either. www.petes-eats.co.uk/ |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2020 15:47:47 GMT
I'd say it was below average myself. Better than the tax dodgers from Seattle, but only just. I've had some great coffee recently. Colonna and Small in Bath does excellent coffee and there's a great cafe in Glastonbury called Hundred Monkeys that make a mean flat white. Hundred Monkeys is superb. We always try to call in when in the area. When we went to Glasto the other week there were lots of people walking about with coffee cups so I walked in the direction they were coming from. The locals know their stuff! |
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Post by Roadrunner on Jun 29, 2020 16:30:14 GMT
Pete's eats in Lanberis, amazing for tea/coffee/food. Hits the spot when a bit of hiking or a trip up Snowdon is in the offing and the the less inclined, not far from the train to the top either. www.petes-eats.co.uk/Pete's Eats has quite a cult following and no trip to Snwodonia is complete without calling in. I enjoyed their humungous, greedy bastard mixed grill last August while it monsooned outside. |
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Post by Roadsterstu on Jun 30, 2020 6:55:39 GMT
I'd say it was below average myself. Better than the tax dodgers from Seattle, but only just. I've had some great coffee recently. Colonna and Small in Bath does excellent coffee and there's a great cafe in Glastonbury called Hundred Monkeys that make a mean flat white. Perhaps it is below average when compared to a really decent coffee shop but in terms of value for quality it is extremely good. I'd seek out a McDonald's coffee before a Starbucks on a car trip somewhere and waaaay before a Costa coffee out of a machine. |
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Post by Bob Sacamano v2.0 on Jun 30, 2020 7:32:57 GMT
I'm not sure the model of "buying pods and disposing of them in landfills is OK as they are a more energy efficient way of making a cup of coffee" is the way to go. |
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Post by LandieMark on Jun 30, 2020 7:41:52 GMT
I'd say it was below average myself. Better than the tax dodgers from Seattle, but only just. I've had some great coffee recently. Colonna and Small in Bath does excellent coffee and there's a great cafe in Glastonbury called Hundred Monkeys that make a mean flat white. Perhaps it is below average when compared to a really decent coffee shop but in terms of value for quality it is extremely good. I'd seek out a McDonald's coffee before a Starbucks on a car trip somewhere and waaaay before a Costa coffee out of a machine. I think McDonald's coffee is weak garbage (have only had it a couple of times so may have had a bad experience) and will only drink it as a last resort. I think Starbucks coffee is bitter and will try and avoid that too. Cafe Nero, Costa or an independent is my choice when out and about. |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 30, 2020 11:23:01 GMT
A two second tip to make instant coffee much better. Take out the bloody camomile tea bag FIRST.......
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Post by ChrisM on Jun 30, 2020 20:47:51 GMT
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Post by Bob Sacamano v2.0 on Jul 1, 2020 6:28:04 GMT
They always over rated their shirts. |
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Post by ChrisM on Jul 1, 2020 6:47:52 GMT
I don't buy their shirts, but it's about another 600 people who have lost their jobs
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Post by PetrolEd on Jul 1, 2020 9:13:34 GMT
Wow, will there be anything left of the high street in a couple of years.
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Post by ChrisM on Jul 1, 2020 10:27:31 GMT
^
Very little at the current rate of "progress"..... maybe just Primark, unless they start internet sales
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Post by Bob Sacamano v2.0 on Jul 1, 2020 11:10:45 GMT
Wow, will there be anything left of the high street in a couple of years. Most UK high streets are shit - full of generic, identikit chains. Pedestrianise the whole town centres and add cycleways. Re-purpose buildings or bulldoze whole areas to make habitable neighbourhoods. Our town centres are generally dead after the shops close, or full of drinks spilling out of pubs. Create affordable housing for especially young people and you'll see the whole concept of what people want in a town centre change. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 1, 2020 11:12:06 GMT
Careful Bob, you know it makes far too much sense to ever work......
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Post by Tim on Jul 1, 2020 11:47:15 GMT
Wow, will there be anything left of the high street in a couple of years. Most UK high streets are shit - full of generic, identikit chains. Pedestrianise the whole town centres and add cycleways. Re-purpose buildings or bulldoze whole areas to make habitable neighbourhoods. Our town centres are generally dead after the shops close, or full of drinks spilling out of pubs. Create affordable housing for especially young people and you'll see the whole concept of what people want in a town centre change. That's way too sensible but something similar occurred to me a while back walking through Perth. Once you get away from the main high street the number of older shops that are just closed is pretty high, meanwhile there a plenty of people wanting to move there from smaller towns and villages but the only housing expansion is swathes of edge of town new-builds that are all quite expensive. I reckon there'd be a ready market for low priced converted ex-shops. They'd just have to electrify the doorways to stop folk pissing in them on a Saturday night. |
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Post by Big Blue on Jul 1, 2020 12:37:57 GMT
The issue with the high street is understanding its change of identity. I've just listed the shops on our Central Road and to be fair it could be described as thriving for a local high street in terms of open shops but it's still tainted by closed banks, closed charity shops and the like. Waitrose sits behind the high street and the car park is good middle ground between the two. One thing that is definitely missing though is clothes shops: no one wants to buy clothes locally it seems as general requirement casual clothing is online or TK Maxx territory and fancier stuff is for visits to the West End / Kingston / Epsom / Sutton / Wimbledon.
The main problem with most small-centre high streets are the rates set by councils who set their business rates at a level whereby the small independent trader is better off going online and working from a shed. Local councils have become so bloated and inefficient amidst a society that expects someone else to do something for them and their family that they think year on year increases in rates will carry on paying for their existence rather than look at what's required to make themselvs deliver services efficiently.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 1, 2020 12:53:17 GMT
I personally think online clothes retailing should be banned. I almost never shop online for anything, least of all clothes.
Think about it.
It has to be delivered house by house, thus creating pollution and congestion.
Then,you can't try the bloody things on, so most of what you order is going to be returned because either it doesn't fit or you don't like it once you see it on you, thus creating more pollution and congestion.
And you the customer are back where you started without the bloody clothes you needed in the first place.
And in the meantime, high streets and emptied and jobs are lost.
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Post by Bob Sacamano v2.0 on Jul 1, 2020 12:55:54 GMT
The issue with the high street is understanding its change of identity. I've just listed the shops on our Central Road and to be fair it could be described as thriving for a local high street in terms of open shops but it's still tainted by closed banks, closed charity shops and the like. Waitrose sits behind the high street and the car park is good middle ground between the two. One thing that is definitely missing though is clothes shops: no one wants to buy clothes locally it seems as general requirement casual clothing is online or TK Maxx territory and fancier stuff is for visits to the West End / Kingston / Epsom / Sutton / Wimbledon. And there's another opportunity - these higher end retailers can have smaller click and collect units outside the West End with on-site alteration services while you wait, style advisors etc - saving the slog into the City. |
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Post by PG on Jul 1, 2020 12:59:50 GMT
The main problem with most small-centre high streets are the rates set by councils who set their business rates at a level whereby the small independent trader is better off going online and working from a shed. Local councils have become so bloated and inefficient amidst a society that expects someone else to do something for them and their family that they think year on year increases in rates will carry on paying for their existence rather than look at what's required to make themselvs deliver services efficiently. I have thought for a long time that business rates of any kind (not just on shops) are a stupid way to raise money and a daft tax looked at from any direction. Like road tax, they are a tax on existence. They may as well tax breathing. Business rates do not tax activity (like VAT) or income / profits (like Income or Corporation tax). |
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Post by Bob Sacamano v2.0 on Jul 1, 2020 13:24:24 GMT
The main problem with most small-centre high streets are the rates set by councils who set their business rates at a level whereby the small independent trader is better off going online and working from a shed. Local councils have become so bloated and inefficient amidst a society that expects someone else to do something for them and their family that they think year on year increases in rates will carry on paying for their existence rather than look at what's required to make themselvs deliver services efficiently. I have thought for a long time that business rates of any kind (not just on shops) are a stupid way to raise money and a daft tax looked at from any direction. Like road tax, they are a tax on existence. They may as well tax breathing. Business rates do not tax activity (like VAT) or income / profits (like Income or Corporation tax). If shops were taxed on turnover it would be an incentive to councils to make the shopping centres a thriving and inviting place to go. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 1, 2020 13:31:12 GMT
Bob, I think you need to give local councils some of what you've been imbibing but it's still far to sensible.
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Post by Martin on Jul 1, 2020 14:04:38 GMT
The issue with the high street is understanding its change of identity. I've just listed the shops on our Central Road and to be fair it could be described as thriving for a local high street in terms of open shops but it's still tainted by closed banks, closed charity shops and the like. Waitrose sits behind the high street and the car park is good middle ground between the two. One thing that is definitely missing though is clothes shops: no one wants to buy clothes locally it seems as general requirement casual clothing is online or TK Maxx territory and fancier stuff is for visits to the West End / Kingston / Epsom / Sutton / Wimbledon. And there's another opportunity - these higher end retailers can have smaller click and collect units outside the West End with on-site alteration services while you wait, style advisors etc - saving the slog into the City. Speaking of higher end retailers, a mate of mine runs the warehouses for Harrods and they're taking over an old Debenhams store in Westfield and calling it 'Harrods Outlet', it opens this weekend. Doesn't sound very Harrods, but despite their online sales flying they've a lot of Spring/Summer clothing that they need to clear. It's not the first new thing they've tried, in addition to the shops in the airports (which do surprisingly well), they opened a cafe in Henley and use that as a click and collect location. Their plan was to open more, but that's on hold for now. We bought our pram from Harrods, because thanks to a Rewards members weekend it ended up being the cheapest place in the UK to buy the one in the spec we wanted. Fantastic level of packing and now we get a quarterly magazine from them, but I've not yet seen anything in it that I would want to buy (even if i could afford it). |
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Post by Bob Sacamano v2.0 on Jul 1, 2020 14:23:26 GMT
We bought our pram from Harrods, because thanks to a Rewards members weekend it ended up being the cheapest place in the UK to buy the one in the spec we wanted. Fantastic level of packing and now we get a quarterly magazine from them, but I've not yet seen anything in it that I would want to buy (even if i could afford it). I really want to know that spec...  |
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Post by Martin on Jul 1, 2020 14:48:28 GMT
We bought our pram from Harrods, because thanks to a Rewards members weekend it ended up being the cheapest place in the UK to buy the one in the spec we wanted. Fantastic level of packing and now we get a quarterly magazine from them, but I've not yet seen anything in it that I would want to buy (even if i could afford it). I really want to know that spec... The technical spec is good, but you can choose between black and aluminium frames, upgrade the materials, choose different colours for each element and add 'style packs', so there's a fair bit of customisation allowed. That's fine if you're buying direct from the manufacturer, but not everyone stocks all the options. We've just bought a super compact pushchair that folds down to within cabin baggage limits, no customisation on that but we did have a choice of colour and the one we went for does have brown leather(ette) handles.... Decent quality stuff isn't cheap (easy to get well into 4 figures), but they do have decent residual value, so that helps. We have two car seats and they have covers with merino wool, they're nicer than any fabric car seat I've sat on. And look good too of course.... |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 1, 2020 14:55:47 GMT
I personally think online clothes retailing should be banned. I almost never shop online for anything, least of all clothes. Think about it. It has to be delivered house by house, thus creating pollution and congestion. Then,you can't try the bloody things on, so most of what you order is going to be returned because either it doesn't fit or you don't like it once you see it on you, thus creating more pollution and congestion. And you the customer are back where you started without the bloody clothes you needed in the first place. And in the meantime, high streets and emptied and jobs are lost. Seconded. Another thing that boils my piss is when they make you pay the postage to return stuff. You've been given the privilege of trying the stuff on in your own house and without having to go out, but now you have to go out anyway to queue up with the old biddies at the post office. Then there's always some fucker who's been selling his old shit on eBay and has 400 parcels to send all over the world in front of you! |
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Post by Tim on Jul 1, 2020 15:41:49 GMT
I have thought for a long time that business rates of any kind (not just on shops) are a stupid way to raise money and a daft tax looked at from any direction. Like road tax, they are a tax on existence. They may as well tax breathing. Business rates do not tax activity (like VAT) or income / profits (like Income or Corporation tax). If shops were taxed on turnover it would be an incentive to councils to make the shopping centres a thriving and inviting place to go. Easy enough to do - a restaurant I know in Edinburgh that traded out of a council owned property was charged rent as a % of turnover subject to a minimum amount. It'd give the accountants a bit more work/guaranteed income |
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Post by Roadsterstu on Jul 1, 2020 22:25:48 GMT
I really want to know that spec... The technical spec is good, but you can choose between black and aluminium frames, upgrade the materials, choose different colours for each element and add 'style packs', so there's a fair bit of customisation allowed. That's fine if you're buying direct from the manufacturer, but not everyone stocks all the options. We've just bought a super compact pushchair that folds down to within cabin baggage limits, no customisation on that but we did have a choice of colour and the one we went for does have brown leather(ette) handles.... Decent quality stuff isn't cheap (easy to get well into 4 figures), but they do have decent residual value, so that helps. We have two car seats and they have covers with merino wool, they're nicer than any fabric car seat I've sat on. And look good too of course.... I genuinely laugh out loud at Martin-spec stuff 😂. |
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