A plague of mermaids

[mirrorshard]

So. The mermaid has come to town. And the good coffeeshop - the small friendly one, with the comfy sofas and the acoustic evenings and CDs by local bands playing all day - has closed down. Vagabonds, it was called - not only did they do good coffee, but most times it was a good, happy crowd of young people, and the local special needs school used to take their students on a trip out there every so often. (The management had offered them all-day happy hour prices.)

Comments

[harald387.livejournal.com]

That's the way it goes, sadly.

Fortunately, Starbuck's will never win out over Tim Horton's in Canada.

Yay!

-K

[dreammonkey.livejournal.com]

Oh we went there on a trip between Toronto and Montreal! They had amazing doughnuts. mmmmmm.

[vashti.livejournal.com]

Shit. I'm sorry to hear that.

You might want to see if there are any other decent coffee shops around the town to visit, before the invader multiplies like pox.

[mirrorshard.livejournal.com]

I'm looking. There's a couple of possibilities, but none with the same sort of atmosphere so far - mostly they seem targeted at shoppers rather than people who want to sit down and hang out. I went into one that looked promising, but it turned out to be rather posh for the sort of place I feel comfortable in, and completely empty on a weekday afternoon with the town full of students and shoppers.

[raggedrags.livejournal.com]

Oh wow. I just got back from Spain and was miserable enough already. I was always quietly proud that we'd resisted Starbucks this long.

Hrumph.

[mirrorshard.livejournal.com]

That was my thought entirely. Welcome back, though!

[mr-kristopher.livejournal.com]

My favorite bar/night club was recently kicked out of a space they were renting in a building that Starbucks bought. I don't blame Starbucks, though. I blame their customers. Without the cash flow, Starbucks would still be lonely coffee shop in Seattle, Washington.

[mirrorshard.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure this was their own space, and it's across town, but I don't know what happened. My guess is that they weren't doing much more than making a living as it was, and when they saw the mermaid signs up (the shop isn't even open yet, or wasn't when I walked past the other day) they knew they wouldn't be able to keep going.

[raggedrags.livejournal.com]

I'm in (vile)Ipswich tomorrow, I'll see if that Vagabonds is closed too. (Did you realise they had one there as well?) I often grab a toasted bagel there when I have to spend time in that horrible town, so I'll ask them about our one, if they haven't suffered the same fate.

[mirrorshard.livejournal.com]

Oh, I didn't! I do hope they're not passed entirely from this earth.

[raggedrags.livejournal.com]

Well, the Ipswich one is still open. It's not as nice as the Colchester one was, it seems to get a much more 'general' stream of traffic. And although it has all the posters up for local bands and is a bit more eclectic in its decor than your average coffee shop, it doesn't have the same atmosphere as ours did. I asked the young girl behind the counter, but she seemed to know nothing about the Colchester one closing.

[mirrorshard.livejournal.com]

I hate to make regional stereotype generalizations, but - that's Ipswich for you!

[imageoficculus.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry to read about this, having gone through very much the same thing with two of my favorite dives in recent months. I'm starting to believe that Starbucks' recursive spawning is a sign of the apocalypse, but as of yet, I've been unable to obtain a research grant to help prove it.

[mirrorshard.livejournal.com]

Well, you know -why- the mermaid has two tails spread wide, and a crown on her head...