User:Wikientry2019/sandbox/coffeehouse effect

[./https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffeehouse Coffeehouse] effect is a trend in which people going to the coffee houses to work and study productively. This new phenomenon is born with millennials and widespread to workers who started joining this movement because of a more flexible work era, working became something fluid, and it is common to go to coffee houses because of the lack of working space.

The diffusion of this phenomenon through young people, like students, is also due to the fact that universities have less space, and students don’t know where to study, and have teamworks. Many consumers note that going to a coffeehouse to study improve productivity, first thanks to the fact of having people around, second it helps to have background sounds. Furthermore many more coffee houses are changing their attitude to pander the phenomenon and the more they provide WiFi and wall outlets the more they will attract consumers.

History and Origins
The tendency of using coffee-shop as a place to study and work for both students and workers has its genesis in the late 20th century and it’s now a global trend. Concerning workers this phenomenon is deeply embedded in the 21th century [./https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-Fordism Post-Fordism] paradigm and in its way of conceiving flexibility as a key feature in modern age organizations. The rise of [./https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information%20technology Information Technology] and the shift from [./https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass%20marketing Mass Marketing] to flexible specialization have softened the boundaries between home life and work life. Companies tend to focus on results and goals leaving the employees free of time or place constraints. “Employees and some employer view the practice (working remotely) as broadly beneficial, saying that remote workers are more productive and that the additional flexibility help to close the gender gap”. On the other hand, students, and especially millennials, often in response to the lack of scholastic or university places to study started to use coffee-shops for studying and or leisure purposes. The development of [./https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet%20caf%C3%A9 internet cafés], providing Internet access to the public under the payment of a time-based fee, and chains such as [./https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starbucks Starbucks] that offers customers with wi-fi connection and places to stay regardless of time has boosted the spread of the coffee-shop effect.

The coffee-shop effect has developed mainly in big European and American cities but is becoming more and more a global trend.

Marketing perspective
The marketing and financial consequences of this expanding trend are bipolar, creating a bifurcation in the coffee shops market. Owners of coffee shops might not always see this trend as a source of income, even though most of them consider this a great idea to improve their cafés and get more people to buy their products, others consider this counterproductive. In today's online-driven world, this might be seen as a risk, mainly because many people, like students or office workers, go to cafés just to have a space to work, occupying a table for many hours a day, provoking a loss for the owner. This means that in the short-run this trend might actually hurt the business of coffee houses, hence it's not well-seen by many café owners.

“We don't want to be an office.” - some café owners are “pulling the plug” on WI-FI in their bars, not only for economic reasons, but also for a problem of atmosphere: they hope to create more of a community in their bars, where people talk instead of typing on their computers for hours.

The other side of the coin concerns the benefits in terms of revenues that this type of coffee shops can have on the the business. Of course, adapting to the new standards of internet cafés, with big tables, wi-fi, and even computers accessible to the public, is an expense for the owners, but the potential profits made thank to this arrangement could be really high. Many cafés are starting to develop a new way on conceiving their bars as a profitable coworking space, implementing areas with couches, internet lounges, wall outlets, and offering office spaces and conference rooms. The marketing strategy can also comprehend packaged deals, which could be a valid solution for those who are afraid of damaging their business with this type of activity. Packaged deals usually include promotions like “buy x time of internet and get free coffee” or to give the possibility of printing, scanning and faxing if you consume something at the bar. These are useful ways to make profits with internet cafés, since this new business can sometimes seem scary for owners.

From the brand point of view, associating work with consumption could potentially be disruptive: people going to cafés to study or work might start thinking of that particular bar as the place where work is done, and not as a relaxing pleasant space. This could affect the brand image of the café, which is going to be considered more like an “office”, which is exactly what many coffee shop owners are trying to avoid, to maintain a certain image of their shop.

That’s the case of the Rose Café in Venice (California), like most cafes, the Rose doesn’t provide electrical outlets, to avoid that consumers stay there, all they long.

Some remote workers have gotten the message and try to do their part. Jocelyn Johnson, who founded VideoInk, relies on remote work sites including the Rose. She has defined a code of conduct: her self-imposed rules include working in one cafe or restaurant no more than three mornings a week, for no more than three hours. She always orders a coffee and pastry, and frequently a lunch to go, to make sure she is not imposing on the chosen café. In an interview for The New York Times, she says that she once tried a weekend brunch there, only to realize that it felt too much like the office.