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Coffee Time

Its going to be a Coffee Time kiosk. The reason the reopened CT is called a kiosk is that it's only half the present location. The other half is a Popeyes Chicken and Biscuits franchise.

So now you can now buy coffee, drugs, illegal smokes and a heart attack all at once.
 
Coffee Time at St. Clair and Vaughan seems to have shut down. Some might claim it's a victim of the ROW but others might call it a victim of gentrification.
 
ShonTron said:
Coffee Times also kept the enclosed smoking areas right to the end, and the stench and smoke would pour through the whole store anyway (remembering the last time I was at a Coffee Time about three years ago).

Tim Horton's was the first chain to go either smoke-free or install the ventilated areas long before it was mandatory (and most of those smoking areas were gone before they were later banned). I thought it might suffer at the time, but they've kept getting busier.

So I'd argue whether smoking in coffee shops was good for business. It only further marginalized Coffee Times as Tim Horton's, then Country Style, went the other way.
Click to expand...

The one on Broadview/Danforth was dreadful.
 
Noticed today that the CT on Bloor E of Dufferin's closed--across from the recently opened Tim's...
 
Vaughn/St. Clair CT

I used to live near the CT and Vaughn/St. Clair. It never, and I mean never, in all the times I visted, had donuts. Lots of patties, sandwiches, etc... but no donuts.

Weird.
 
BTW when I say I do get coffee (but nothing else) on occasion at Coffee Time, keep in mind that I take my coffee black. Like, you think I'd trust CT with milky substances...
 
Upchuck.

42
 
The Bay and Elm location was one of the worst for health violations - the bottom of the heap of the bottom of the heap, so to speak. Though it did pass the last two inspections.
 
Kinda like the house restaurant for the Bay Street Hotel across the street.

Even when open, it always *seemed* closed, because the neon was so often out...
 
adma said:
Noticed today that the Bay & Elm Coffee Time's closed for renos...
Click to expand...

Hopefully they clean the windows this decade as part of the reno.
 
I was checking out the City of Toronto DineSafe site tonight--while thinking about this recurring thread-- and it occurred to compare the frequency of "conditional pass" results for all the popular coffee chains in Toronto.

For each, I just compared the total number of locations returned on a search for the company name against the number of results for that company that have received "conditional pass" inspection results. Then I calculated a rough Percentage of Conditionals, basically the percentage of locations that have had conditional passes. Higher is bad.

Of course this is not scientific, and is based only on the results I happened to get today (Aug 4 2008 around 8pm) dating back as far as the results go, which seems to be mid 2006. Keep in mind that "conditional" violations can be for a number of things, some quite minor (sink a few inches too far from food prep area, couldn't find required paperwork, etc) and some more alarming (infestations, refrigerators too warm, unclean equipment and surfaces, food stored on floor, etc.) In general these issues seem to be corrected within a day or so and the stores remain open. Most have received several clean passes since.

The results are interesting, though not particularly shocking based on my personal expectations and the anecdotal stories I've read in this thread and elsewhere. Here they are, "best" to "worst"....

STARBUCK'S
Total Locations: 100
Conditional Passes: 3
Percentage of Conditionals: 3.0%

TIM HORTONS
Total Locations: 233
Conditional Passes: 17
Percentage of Conditionals: 7.3%

TIMOTHY'S
Total Locations: 54
Conditional Passes: 8
Percentage of Conditionals: 14.8%

COUNTRY STYLE
Total Locations: 58
Conditional Passes: 12
Percentage of Conditionals: 20.7%

SECOND CUP
Total Locations: 97
Conditional Passes: 22
Percentage of Conditionals: 22.7%

COFFEE TIME
Total Locations: 104
Conditional Passes: 31
Percentage of Conditionals: 29.8%

So, the bottom line in relation to this thread? If you visit a Coffee Time in Toronto at random, you have a just under 1 in 3 chance that it has (temporarily) failed a health inspection over the past couple years, which is substantially worse than your odds at nearly any other chain.

The big shock? Second Cup... as a "higher end" chain I view more in comparison to Starbuck's, their results are surprisingly poor.

The no brainer? Tim Horton's. They seem clean, and they are, apparently.
 
Also consider that Tim Horton's sells processed meats and "bakes" on-site, while Starbucks just makes coffees and drinks and has only fully-prepared foods onsite. Timmy's likely does well because the bar for entry (a high franchise entry cost and a high demand amongst potential franchisees) is so high. Second Cup is a surprise, as they don't deal with much more than Starbucks food-wise, even Timothy's is high. Perhaps it is the tight, corporate-owned nature of Starbucks that keeps it so low?
 
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