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Anti-Café
- xg15 5y agoIsn't this more or less a co-working space?
- aloisdg 5y agoIt is somewhere between a co-working place and a café. I stayed for some month at an Anticafé in Paris. It was great. More noisy than a coworking but more alive. It is casual, cozy and chill.
- janandonly 5y agoMore noisy? That would be a BIG, BIG, and i mean BIIIIIG downside for me.
- thih9 5y agoSome people treat this as ambient noise that helps in concentration. > A moderate level of noise enhances creativity compared to both low and high levels of noise. Moderate background noise induces distraction which encourages individuals to think at a higher, abstract level, and consequently exhibit higher creativity. (Quote via https://rainycafe.com https://rainycafe.com )
- jamiethompson 5y agoOne of the things that gets to me while working from home is the lack of ambient noise. Where I live is fairly rural and the silence can be deafening
- TheGigaChad 5y agoNot everyone is an autist.
- aloisdg 5y agoThere is noise and noise. It was more life noise than open space/cubicle noise. I quite liked it.
- pjerem 5y agoWith good coffee ? :)
- CTDOCodebases 5y agoAfter working in a cafe that had to move customers on because it was consistently busy I wondered why places like this don’t exist. In commercial areas there are a large number of people who want a casual space with a nice ambience to have a meeting. They don’t care how much it costs because either their employer is covering it or a positive outcome of the meeting will make the expense of the table insignificant in the broader picture.
- Slix 5y agoWorkshop Cafe (now closed) in San Francisco was an interesting American version of this kind of cafe.
- soapdog 5y agoOh no, I remember having a great time working from there. It used to be a great place.
- kleiba 5y agoWhy would I prefer such a venue over a traditional coffee shop which seems more like a flatrate venue compared to a pay-per-minute place (there's only so much coffee I can drink...)?
- Hamuko 5y agoSo you don't get stink eye from the staff as you spend five hours occupying a table while not ordering anything.
- anyfactor 5y agoI like this idea a lot. Pay per minute for a place to seat. No rush to order. Add no tipping and minimal interaction food ordering[0] or a vending machine. Yeah sounds like the perfect weekend afternoon to me. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgVjXxo-beo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgVjXxo-beo
- kleiba 5y agoThen it boils down to the pricing. I suppose I will at least drink something during those five hours anyway, so then the question is what is more expensive: three/four drinks at the coffee shop or 300 minutes at the anti?
- atemerev 5y agoThis is more like pay-per-hour coworking with free food, not a coffee shop. It works because it takes away the decision what do you need to order and how long you can stay and work without ordering anything.
- kleiba 5y agoI suppose it's also quieter than a coffee shop?
- daniel_iversen 5y agoThis is neat, and seems fairer than the working-at-a-cafe where you have to consider how often to order snacks and drinks to be a worthwhile contributing customer :) Are there any websites that lists good anti-cafes by city?
- bettysdiagnose 5y agoIsn't a key aspect of cafe culture that you buy a coffee and then can stay as long as you like?
- daniel_iversen 5y agoI guess its a hotly debated and controversial topic up there with religion and politics :) But seems like I answered my own question above - here's a pretty cool site to find desks/coworking spaces https://drop-desk.com/near-me https://drop-desk.com/near-me with even some location specific writeups (i.e. Sydney Australia https://drop-desk.com/best-coworking-spaces/sydney https://drop-desk.com/best-coworking-spaces/sydney )
- Cthulhu_ 5y agoLook up co-working spaces as well, that's probably a better source for working spaces for hire. Some have decent catering, too.
- torgian 5y agoThis just... kinda sounds like an Internet cafe. I don’t see the difference, except maybe these “anti” cafes are more expensive
- W0lf 5y agoUnfortunately, the one in Wiesbaden, Germany closed soon after it opened due to low interest.
- andrewshadura 5y agoA similar place in Bratislava first shifted focus and became a mostly regular café, and then closed down during the first wave of the pandemic.
- andrewshadura 5y agoFun fact: I created the initial version of this page.
- thiagocsf 5y agoHow did you first learn about anticafés?
- andrewshadura 5y agoA friend mentioned one, and then I googled and found multiple articles about them, but none in Wikipedia — except in Czech.
- LudwigNagasena 5y agoI don't understand why this type of place is not popular outside of Russia. People go there to play board games or video games together. Another popular type of location for such activities is a hookah lounge. Do young people in big European cities have no problems with finding a place to meet friends?
- Bayart 5y agoFrom a French perspective, I don't really see what it brings besides novelty. Sitting all day long at a café is hardly problematic. Plus at noon you can just switch from coffee to beer or wine and order proper food without moving places ;) Though these half café, half co-working places might be more comfortable if they cater specifically to the laptop crowd.
- elondaits 5y agoThere are many popular Anti-Cafés in Paris. I used them for working many times. Here in Buenos Aires I normally go to Starbucks, where you can stay for hours and hours without a problem… but cafes in Paris are small and crowded (and waiters might not appreciate you staying a couple of hours), and most Starbucks and similar chains are absolutely packed with students (of course with minor exceptions in some areas). Anticafes are a more comfortable option, and a safer one if you want to go to the bathroom or fetch something to eat without having to pick all your things from the table. I’m not the only one that has this opinion because the number of Anticafes in Paris was very quickly growing and they were normally full at peak times.
- Zababa 5y agoWe have a few in France, but I don't thing they are that popular. > Do young people in big European cities have no problems with finding a place to meet friends? It's a mystery to me too how people do this. From what I understand it's mostly through studies and/or work.
- jeltz 5y agoI would say it is the same in Sweden we have a few of these places here too but most people make friends through studies or work.
- mjfl 5y agoare there any in the us? Is it a sustainable business?
- qwerty456127 5y agoA bloody awesome concept. I enjoyed it so much. And a great (instantly profitable if you do everything right) small business idea by the way.
- dergachev 5y agoThere are two great ones in downtown Montreal, apparently owned by some cool Russian people. https://www.anticafe.org/ https://www.anticafe.org/ They are often the place of Russian language and culture events, which is how I heard of them. I love the concept, but personally having to sign in to track time seems less "streamlined" to me than just buying a drink, so I didn't have a reason to go back, but maybe if the first hour was free in exchange for installing an app, it would be worth it. (I also don't hang out in cafes or coworking spaces much these days).
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- rozab 5y agoIt seems like it could be made very streamlined. Sit down at a table and press a button on it, then just tap your card when you leave. Of course in real life you'd have to install an app, make an account, and get spammed with requests to fill in surveys because we've completely lost track of what good user experience looks like.
- mahoro 5y agoThe first Anti-Café was created by Ivan Mitin. He is known (at least in Russia) for creating projects which look utopian at first glance but have a good business model inside. His current project is a village in Georgia where you can buy a share in a house, so you can visit it for some amount of days per year, proportional to share size. https://chateauchapiteau.com/en https://chateauchapiteau.com/en
- eloisius 5y agoSo, a timeshare?
- Grumbledour 5y agoI like the idea of a mix between working and cafe, in the sense that I would expect such a place to be nicer to work in than any random coffee shop while still having the same amenities. But I do wonder if this is not more expensive in the end. And just as some people may get anxious because they feel they would have to order something again at a normal coffee shop, I would get really anxious there just by time passing.
- villasv 5y agoUnless the price per hour is very cheap, I’d rather pay for the coffee. There are a few work cafés around me that really don’t care if you stay 6 hours and only purchase a granola bar.
- p2t2p 5y agoThis is the thing I miss the most after leaving Russia. Coworking is too official and too committed this is basically like a coworking space with very casual atmospere and attendance.
- wink 5y agoDefinitely sounds better for people like me who kinda feel bad occupying a table in a full cafe after having finished my coffee/meal/drink.
- gverrilla 5y agoPay by the minute will never work: it gets people anxious, looking at the time all the time [ :) ]. Also the way it mixes fun and work ain't consistent imo.
- rich_sasha 5y agoI like working in cafes every now and then. I'm quite conscious that there's an expectation to keep buying coffee / cakes. How much is enough? Also after a while, I don't want another coffee, just want to sit in peace in the environment - but that's not an option really. I could just buy a coffee and sit next to it, but that seems wasteful and bizarre.
- gverrilla 5y agoit depends on the culture, the particular place, if the place is crowded and other factors: where I live it's perfectly ok to spend 2 hours in a table and consume one single expresso or something - because it's never full, so a win-win relation.
- isp 5y agoI'd never heard the word "Anti-Café" before, but I used to hang out in one in Dublin [1] that called itself a "Time House". This exact concept: pay-per-minute space, like a shared space living room (though also with included tea, biscuits, and popcorn). [1] "The Clockwork Door" in Temple Bar, Dublin. Hasn't been open since Covid. https://www.clockworkdoor.ie/ https://www.clockworkdoor.ie/
- satvikpendem 5y agoWhy not just use WeWork or similar? They often have drinks and an espresso bar (no food usually though) but the massive benefit is the dependability of things needed for work, such as a strong wifi connection, desk space, ergonomic chairs etc. IMO anti cafés seem to be the worst of both worlds, not necessarily dependable enough to work in while also seeming to be more expensive to work in compared to a regular café where you'd just get a drink or two for several hours.
- tedmiston 5y agoI think WeWork vs anti-cafés is comparing apples to oranges. I can't speak for other countries but you definitely can't dip into most (any?) WeWorks or the typical coworking space for a few bucks per hour on the fly. It looks like the cheapest WeWork on Demand is $29/day, and I have no idea what city that's in. I don't doubt the rate in major US cities is $75-100+/day.
- satvikpendem 5y agoWeWork has day passes like you say, it's 29 per day even in cities like NYC and SF, that's what I used recently in those cities.
- tedmiston 5y agoWow, maybe this is a newer thing. I haven't been to a WeWork in a few years, but I don't ever recall being able to just walk in and get a day pass that cheap in a big city. What I saw was much more expensive, that is when day passes were even offered.
- Octplane 5y agoIn Paris, I've spent quite some time in these cafés pre-Covid and the experience had been good and bad, depending on when. I used to go there with a friend of mine to work on various things we could do with a computer and a cup of coffee Sometimes, it's very quiet and you can work there with no problem at all, others time, it's very crowded and you lack the quiet comfort of an actual office. In the most extreme setup, all seats are taken and you can't really find a place. The price was pretty cheap (3-4€/hour) which made it both cheap if you were drinking one hot beverage and a cookie every hour, but definitely expensive if you were just planning on staying for an hour and get an espresso. Cheaper and less crowded than a Starbucks still. The fact that the snacks were unlimited was also pretty cool. Over time, I've slowly switched to regular cafés which are sometimes not really busy outside lunch and dinner time and where you can have ample place to sit, work, while enjoying your hot beverages. I'm sure it's popular amongst student as the overall scenery is slightly more concentration focused than a Starbucks. Also, cheap food.
- tedmiston 5y agoI've also enjoyed visiting regular cafés (or really coffee shops in the states), mostly to have a beverage and work quietly from a laptop or read, at their off-peak or "anti-hours".