Dublin Core
Title
Felipe's 10/10 Dunn Brothers field notes
Description
10/10 observations of Dunn Brothers coffee shop
Date
October 10, 2023
Format
Google Doc
Language
English
Text Item Type Metadata
Text
Felipe Berumen
October 10, 2023
4:45 PM
Dunn Brothers Coffee shop
4:45
I entered the store again at roughly the same time as last week. The reason I did this was that it just so happened to line up with the time that was available to me and then, (with a little bit of waiting in order to get there at the right time) it would also give me a bit of a comparison point as I attempted to do with the initial two observations. Even though I entered the store at 4:45, I was only able to actually order at around 4:50 since there had just been a group of 4 that walked in before me. This is notable for two reasons, the first being that the store would be closing in about an hour, so a large group of people coming in was not expected. The second reason was that none of them stayed in the store after the fact in order to enjoy their beverages. They were all the age of young students so the fact that multiple people showed up and then all left at the same time, around the time which I had gotten out of class, leads me to believe that they were students from one of the surrounding colleges, grabbing their drinks together before potentially parting ways. The amount of people before me did not have any impact on my ordering other than time. What did have an effect was the time that I arrived in general. When I walk in, I usually make note of the baked goods counter so that instead of looking at the the counter when I'm about to order and taking more time than needed, I know what I want so that I can be in and out as quick as possible so that I can focus as much of the hour on observations rather than my own individual actions. What I noticed was that not only was the counter empty of any sort of food but, the trays and any sort of signage indicating the usual “after 3” sale was gone, potentially indicating that the goods had been cleared out from customers, well before I even arrived. Today, the workers behind the counter were a younger, college age girl with a ponytail and nicer clothes including a tight black dress shirt and a red tie along with a much taller male in black pants and a gray button up shirt, around 40 if I had to guess.
4:50-5:00
The next couple minutes were occupied mainly by surveying the customer body of the store at the time. When I arrived at the store, there were a total of 14 people in the store minus the workers. This also included one of my group members, Ben, so we picked opposite sides of the store and got to work. The split of the customer base was an 8-6 male/female split. There were no presenting people of color in the entire store at the time. Because of the decent amount of people at the coffee shop, I again did not end up finding the best spot for observations. My initial spot was at the small tables situated next to the raised seating section because it was the only place where my laptop charger could reach an outlet. Luckily, a couple minutes into the observation and before I had a chance to fully set up my laptop, a man who was drawing on his ipad when I walked in was getting ready to leave so I was able to move to a new spot next to an outlet along the east wall.
5:00
When I finally got set up at the East wall, I was able to take down more concrete observations. The observations started with a woman walking through the front of the store towards the bean counter where she ordered a single bag of beans from the older male worker described initially. This was followed by a larger man in a red checkered shirt and jeans walking in to order a drink. From just within earshot, I hear the woman ask for her beans ground, which is the first time that I noticed that you could get ground beans rather than just whole. In retrospect it makes sense, however it was not a given. Another man in his 40s walks in and follows behind the checkered shirt man to the bean counter as well and orders two bags of beans but in contrast to the woman before him, gets both of his beans whole. When he goes to pay, he is given his card back while being told that it had declined, fortunately for him, a second card worked out. The red checkered shirt man emerges from the front of the store but after quickly looking over the seating area, decides to sit next to the ordering counter, a couple seats away from Ben who was situated next to the window. The man had ordered an iced coffee and proceeds to glance over his phone for a bit. A familiar tall old man in a blue coat enters the store, he was here the past two times I was observing. He quickly orders a hot coffee in a black mug and talks to the older man who was situated in front of Ben along the front window. After the quick discussion, he heads outside and drinks his coffee on the benches outside the shop.
5:10
Walking in at almost the same time as the blue coat man walks out is a man in some athletic clothing, some shorts, a t-shirt, and a sweater, enters the store in a rush and sits down at the last available seat next to the ordering counter but does not order anything. He has a pad of paper, a pencil, and various other typical pocketable items with him on the table. There were two women sitting together at the raised section who then begin to pack up their things and leave, resulting in one man left in the raised section. A second pair which is situated in the middle of the seating area are talking, they both ordered iced drinks. The girl had finished hers already and the boy only finishes his at this moment, which can be heard from the little bits of liquid trying to go through his straw. The final man who was in the raised section leaves the store soon after. This prompts the attention of the athletically clothed man to get up from his seat next to the counter and go to the raised section to continue his writing on his notepad. I eventually noticed that his shirt had the name of a construction company on it, which I assumed he must have worked for based on his appearance such as dusty shoes and the rest of his clothing. A new man in a gray sweater and cargo jeans emerges from the ordering section, which I must have missed while observing someone else, and leaves the store. I then noticed that one of the tables along the middle wall had no occupants at it but had the markings that someone had been there. There was a plate, a mug, some napkins, and the crumpled remains of a pastry bag, indicating that not only had the person long since left, but arrived much earlier as well if they were able to order a pastry too. One of the two men sitting next to me on the East wall in a yellow sweater walks over to the back of the store where another man comes back with him. At this time I notice that a total of three laptops besides mine and Ben’s are in use while various phones are also in use. This is when a student in an orange macalester sweater gets up from his spot and exits through the back of the store after throwing away his trash. The man in the back along the middle wall fiddles a bit with his Ipad stand during this time before it abruptly falls and knocks over his empty coffee cup. Looking upset due to this, he gets up, brushes his pants down, and throws away his coffee cup in the back garbage. He then proceeds to grab his ipad and make his way to the front door before reconsidering and walking towards the back where he asks the old male worker if the bathrooms are available, to which he replies “yes”. The man then walks back towards them. At this point, the occupancy of the shop is very low, about half of the people who were here when I arrived are here any longer and not many have taken their places. The female of the middle duo announces to the male that she is going to go to the bathroom before going through a similar series of events that the ipad man did. The difference being that she is told that someone is still inside which prompts her to return to her seat. A little later, the ipad man emerges from the bathrooms and leaves through the front. One of the seated individuals in a jean jacket, around middle age, begins to leave when the man sitting next to him bids him farewell.
5:20
Back to the duo in the middle, the male mentions that a person had just left the bathrooms, so after their current conversation had ended, the female gets back up and rushes to the bathroom. A second man in blue who had ordered beans sometime during the observation, orders a drink and replaces the seat that the ipad man had been sitting at. At this point, the store is by far the emptiest I had ever seen it with only 7 total occupants being present other than the employees. A much older male compared to the rest of the store, around 60 or 70, enters from the back entrance and picks up a mobile order before exiting soon after. A matching pair of women enter the store from the front, potentially sisters due to their likeness though not identical twins. They both were similar height, around 5’8”, heavier set though not incredibly so, wearing identical green blouses and jeans. They were both blondes and again middle aged. The only main difference was that one had a pair of glasses. The first green shirt woman to enter orders a drink but the second does not. The second instead browses around the shop, eyeing the seating area and the decorations in the front while the first orders an iced tea before they both leave. The male of the duo at the middle table types away vigorously at his phone while waiting for the female to return. A man in a tri-color jacket who had been getting up and down and going in and out of the store eventually gets up and talks to the man at the small seating section that had been talked to before. He orders a hot drink again before leaving for the final time. This is when a very memorable man walks in. A man in a dress shirt and a twins baseball hat walks into the store and is greeted by the older worker at the bean counter. He orders two pounds of french roast colombian ground beans and gets his frequent buyer card punched. Him being a frequent customer was not a surprise however because the worker began to implore about how the man's recent golf outings had gone. This, along with the fact that he walked in with a full bag of whole foods groceries indicated that he must have had a decent amount of money, along with his attire being relatively formal, including golf shoes. After the conversation, he leaves and starts to talk with the frequent blue jacket man who was still outside. Something odd happened next. A middle aged man in a cowboy hat came from the back entrance and walked around the store for a bit before walking right back out the back. For the first time today a man who did not present as white entered the store. He ordered a very small drink, so potentially some sort of espresso, before leaving. After that another 60-70 year old enters the store with a large hiking backpack and orders a pound of french roast brazilian ground beans and mentions something about a seven. Potentially a grind setting. At the same time, a younger student age girl walks into the store but I lose sight of her.
5:30
At this point, the smell of cat urine wafts through the air. I text Ben about the odd smell to see if he also noticed it but all he smelled was coffee.The red shirt man from the side table leaves out of the front but leaves his belongings behind on the table while a small petite woman with curly hair walks in and orders a bag of whole beans. This is when the duo at the table in the middle finally begins to get up and leave, as well as the man in glasses along the east wall. At this time, there are only three people left in the store, absolutely the smallest number I’ve seen. Soon after, that number goes up to four as the red shirt man returns from outside before working on his laptop. When the glasses man walks past me, I notice a black duffel bag with a silhouette visible through the vent holes. This is when I realized that he is the old man whose dog was sitting next to him in the bag from the prior week. The man across from Ben, who I dubbed the popular man, returns a pair of scissors which he must have borrowed to the front workers and meanders around the front. He does not talk to anybody the rest of the time he is there besides a short comment and a “thank you”. The tri-color man returns from out front but does not stay long as he leaves through the back. Another man follows him in and orders what I could hear was a “four shot” drink due to the lack of people left in the store. This is when I notice that the time for closing is coming near as the tie worker begins to start sweeping around the back of the bean counter. Another pair of workers which I hadn't noticed were gossiping in front loud enough for me to hear.
5:40
The red shirt man next to Ben leaves for real this time but is blocked but the blue coat man who walks in at the same time. After a quick back and forth, the blue man enters and then the red man leaves. The blue coat man begins to have a short conversation with the popular man before refilling his drink and walking back out front while still conversing with the popular man. This is when the workers begin to clean out the rest of the shop area including the seating area. The popular man gets up after finishing his conversation with blue coat which leaves only 2 people, not including Ben and the workers, left in the store when I leave. However, as I am walking out, a trio of macalester students walk into the store.
October 10, 2023
4:45 PM
Dunn Brothers Coffee shop
4:45
I entered the store again at roughly the same time as last week. The reason I did this was that it just so happened to line up with the time that was available to me and then, (with a little bit of waiting in order to get there at the right time) it would also give me a bit of a comparison point as I attempted to do with the initial two observations. Even though I entered the store at 4:45, I was only able to actually order at around 4:50 since there had just been a group of 4 that walked in before me. This is notable for two reasons, the first being that the store would be closing in about an hour, so a large group of people coming in was not expected. The second reason was that none of them stayed in the store after the fact in order to enjoy their beverages. They were all the age of young students so the fact that multiple people showed up and then all left at the same time, around the time which I had gotten out of class, leads me to believe that they were students from one of the surrounding colleges, grabbing their drinks together before potentially parting ways. The amount of people before me did not have any impact on my ordering other than time. What did have an effect was the time that I arrived in general. When I walk in, I usually make note of the baked goods counter so that instead of looking at the the counter when I'm about to order and taking more time than needed, I know what I want so that I can be in and out as quick as possible so that I can focus as much of the hour on observations rather than my own individual actions. What I noticed was that not only was the counter empty of any sort of food but, the trays and any sort of signage indicating the usual “after 3” sale was gone, potentially indicating that the goods had been cleared out from customers, well before I even arrived. Today, the workers behind the counter were a younger, college age girl with a ponytail and nicer clothes including a tight black dress shirt and a red tie along with a much taller male in black pants and a gray button up shirt, around 40 if I had to guess.
4:50-5:00
The next couple minutes were occupied mainly by surveying the customer body of the store at the time. When I arrived at the store, there were a total of 14 people in the store minus the workers. This also included one of my group members, Ben, so we picked opposite sides of the store and got to work. The split of the customer base was an 8-6 male/female split. There were no presenting people of color in the entire store at the time. Because of the decent amount of people at the coffee shop, I again did not end up finding the best spot for observations. My initial spot was at the small tables situated next to the raised seating section because it was the only place where my laptop charger could reach an outlet. Luckily, a couple minutes into the observation and before I had a chance to fully set up my laptop, a man who was drawing on his ipad when I walked in was getting ready to leave so I was able to move to a new spot next to an outlet along the east wall.
5:00
When I finally got set up at the East wall, I was able to take down more concrete observations. The observations started with a woman walking through the front of the store towards the bean counter where she ordered a single bag of beans from the older male worker described initially. This was followed by a larger man in a red checkered shirt and jeans walking in to order a drink. From just within earshot, I hear the woman ask for her beans ground, which is the first time that I noticed that you could get ground beans rather than just whole. In retrospect it makes sense, however it was not a given. Another man in his 40s walks in and follows behind the checkered shirt man to the bean counter as well and orders two bags of beans but in contrast to the woman before him, gets both of his beans whole. When he goes to pay, he is given his card back while being told that it had declined, fortunately for him, a second card worked out. The red checkered shirt man emerges from the front of the store but after quickly looking over the seating area, decides to sit next to the ordering counter, a couple seats away from Ben who was situated next to the window. The man had ordered an iced coffee and proceeds to glance over his phone for a bit. A familiar tall old man in a blue coat enters the store, he was here the past two times I was observing. He quickly orders a hot coffee in a black mug and talks to the older man who was situated in front of Ben along the front window. After the quick discussion, he heads outside and drinks his coffee on the benches outside the shop.
5:10
Walking in at almost the same time as the blue coat man walks out is a man in some athletic clothing, some shorts, a t-shirt, and a sweater, enters the store in a rush and sits down at the last available seat next to the ordering counter but does not order anything. He has a pad of paper, a pencil, and various other typical pocketable items with him on the table. There were two women sitting together at the raised section who then begin to pack up their things and leave, resulting in one man left in the raised section. A second pair which is situated in the middle of the seating area are talking, they both ordered iced drinks. The girl had finished hers already and the boy only finishes his at this moment, which can be heard from the little bits of liquid trying to go through his straw. The final man who was in the raised section leaves the store soon after. This prompts the attention of the athletically clothed man to get up from his seat next to the counter and go to the raised section to continue his writing on his notepad. I eventually noticed that his shirt had the name of a construction company on it, which I assumed he must have worked for based on his appearance such as dusty shoes and the rest of his clothing. A new man in a gray sweater and cargo jeans emerges from the ordering section, which I must have missed while observing someone else, and leaves the store. I then noticed that one of the tables along the middle wall had no occupants at it but had the markings that someone had been there. There was a plate, a mug, some napkins, and the crumpled remains of a pastry bag, indicating that not only had the person long since left, but arrived much earlier as well if they were able to order a pastry too. One of the two men sitting next to me on the East wall in a yellow sweater walks over to the back of the store where another man comes back with him. At this time I notice that a total of three laptops besides mine and Ben’s are in use while various phones are also in use. This is when a student in an orange macalester sweater gets up from his spot and exits through the back of the store after throwing away his trash. The man in the back along the middle wall fiddles a bit with his Ipad stand during this time before it abruptly falls and knocks over his empty coffee cup. Looking upset due to this, he gets up, brushes his pants down, and throws away his coffee cup in the back garbage. He then proceeds to grab his ipad and make his way to the front door before reconsidering and walking towards the back where he asks the old male worker if the bathrooms are available, to which he replies “yes”. The man then walks back towards them. At this point, the occupancy of the shop is very low, about half of the people who were here when I arrived are here any longer and not many have taken their places. The female of the middle duo announces to the male that she is going to go to the bathroom before going through a similar series of events that the ipad man did. The difference being that she is told that someone is still inside which prompts her to return to her seat. A little later, the ipad man emerges from the bathrooms and leaves through the front. One of the seated individuals in a jean jacket, around middle age, begins to leave when the man sitting next to him bids him farewell.
5:20
Back to the duo in the middle, the male mentions that a person had just left the bathrooms, so after their current conversation had ended, the female gets back up and rushes to the bathroom. A second man in blue who had ordered beans sometime during the observation, orders a drink and replaces the seat that the ipad man had been sitting at. At this point, the store is by far the emptiest I had ever seen it with only 7 total occupants being present other than the employees. A much older male compared to the rest of the store, around 60 or 70, enters from the back entrance and picks up a mobile order before exiting soon after. A matching pair of women enter the store from the front, potentially sisters due to their likeness though not identical twins. They both were similar height, around 5’8”, heavier set though not incredibly so, wearing identical green blouses and jeans. They were both blondes and again middle aged. The only main difference was that one had a pair of glasses. The first green shirt woman to enter orders a drink but the second does not. The second instead browses around the shop, eyeing the seating area and the decorations in the front while the first orders an iced tea before they both leave. The male of the duo at the middle table types away vigorously at his phone while waiting for the female to return. A man in a tri-color jacket who had been getting up and down and going in and out of the store eventually gets up and talks to the man at the small seating section that had been talked to before. He orders a hot drink again before leaving for the final time. This is when a very memorable man walks in. A man in a dress shirt and a twins baseball hat walks into the store and is greeted by the older worker at the bean counter. He orders two pounds of french roast colombian ground beans and gets his frequent buyer card punched. Him being a frequent customer was not a surprise however because the worker began to implore about how the man's recent golf outings had gone. This, along with the fact that he walked in with a full bag of whole foods groceries indicated that he must have had a decent amount of money, along with his attire being relatively formal, including golf shoes. After the conversation, he leaves and starts to talk with the frequent blue jacket man who was still outside. Something odd happened next. A middle aged man in a cowboy hat came from the back entrance and walked around the store for a bit before walking right back out the back. For the first time today a man who did not present as white entered the store. He ordered a very small drink, so potentially some sort of espresso, before leaving. After that another 60-70 year old enters the store with a large hiking backpack and orders a pound of french roast brazilian ground beans and mentions something about a seven. Potentially a grind setting. At the same time, a younger student age girl walks into the store but I lose sight of her.
5:30
At this point, the smell of cat urine wafts through the air. I text Ben about the odd smell to see if he also noticed it but all he smelled was coffee.The red shirt man from the side table leaves out of the front but leaves his belongings behind on the table while a small petite woman with curly hair walks in and orders a bag of whole beans. This is when the duo at the table in the middle finally begins to get up and leave, as well as the man in glasses along the east wall. At this time, there are only three people left in the store, absolutely the smallest number I’ve seen. Soon after, that number goes up to four as the red shirt man returns from outside before working on his laptop. When the glasses man walks past me, I notice a black duffel bag with a silhouette visible through the vent holes. This is when I realized that he is the old man whose dog was sitting next to him in the bag from the prior week. The man across from Ben, who I dubbed the popular man, returns a pair of scissors which he must have borrowed to the front workers and meanders around the front. He does not talk to anybody the rest of the time he is there besides a short comment and a “thank you”. The tri-color man returns from out front but does not stay long as he leaves through the back. Another man follows him in and orders what I could hear was a “four shot” drink due to the lack of people left in the store. This is when I notice that the time for closing is coming near as the tie worker begins to start sweeping around the back of the bean counter. Another pair of workers which I hadn't noticed were gossiping in front loud enough for me to hear.
5:40
The red shirt man next to Ben leaves for real this time but is blocked but the blue coat man who walks in at the same time. After a quick back and forth, the blue man enters and then the red man leaves. The blue coat man begins to have a short conversation with the popular man before refilling his drink and walking back out front while still conversing with the popular man. This is when the workers begin to clean out the rest of the shop area including the seating area. The popular man gets up after finishing his conversation with blue coat which leaves only 2 people, not including Ben and the workers, left in the store when I leave. However, as I am walking out, a trio of macalester students walk into the store.
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