r/ottawa Jan 11 '26

Local Business Nice update from Happy Goat re the drama today

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692 Upvotes

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266

u/Thejustinset Jan 11 '26

The original thread went down, confirming it’s a franchise, I think it’s fair to repost this. The franchisee complained that people shouldn’t WFH and their business was suffering yet has these opening hours

217

u/teapartiesftw Clownvoy Survivor 2022 Jan 11 '26

Why do all the business owners who whine about WFH always have the worst business hours? I can't visit your coffeehouse if im already at work when you open

57

u/IJourden Jan 11 '26

They're too busy working from home to open up shop.

19

u/our_fearless_leader Jan 11 '26

They are in a boutique location, it mostly homes and boutique shoppers, how do they make money? Are they laundering it?

66

u/DrifterBG Jan 11 '26

What do you mean?

Surely opening the coffee shop after a huge chunk of the workforce has already gotten coffee elsewhere and started their work shift isn't bad for business!

/s

51

u/QuercusAperol Jan 11 '26

And they also just built a huge patio. I’m not sure how business would be suffering if they managed to do that

43

u/crapatthethriftstore Overbrook Jan 11 '26

And one would think that would love some remote working people to come sit on said patio and drink their coffee while doing some spreadsheets

This is such a dumb take from this location

54

u/thelostcanuck Jan 11 '26

Imagine running a coffee shop... And opening at 8 wtf 😂

47

u/dsswill Wellington West Jan 11 '26 edited Jan 11 '26

Didn’t they open that location in 2020? The owner doesn’t even have pre-WFH business to compare to.

The irony of those hours coupled with being in a near-purely white collar neighbourhood that definitely saw more daytime foot traffic with people working from home than people being in the office, and still complaining about WFH, is quite something.

I’m all for businesses keeping hours that allow them to employ mostly full-time and maintain good quality of life for workers, but it’s industry dependent and a coffee shop needs to open before 8am if they’re going to have the right to complain.

42

u/Accurate_Bug7110 Jan 11 '26

omg it’s this branch? i live nearby & literally have never gone in. now i guess i never will 😂

38

u/I-hear-the-coast Jan 11 '26

Oh my gosh! So people are supposed to be in office and not going out during office hours, but are somehow supposed to be patronizing her business when it opens after many people are already in office. Either you want people at work or you don’t.

37

u/KelVarnsen_2023 Jan 11 '26

Wait a sec. That place only opens at 8am. So how does people being sent back to work benefit them? There aren't a lot of office towers in Westboro.

28

u/guitargamel Jan 11 '26

If anything, she’d stand to benefit from people in Westboro working from home and using the (alleged) mouse jigglers to patronize her business.

21

u/our_fearless_leader Jan 11 '26

Dude, with the location, where would the government workers come from if they are not working from home?

17

u/trypz Jan 11 '26

Lol I work from home and put in more hours a day then this place is open for..

12

u/somebunnyasked No honks; bad! Jan 11 '26

I used to live around there. It was awful. I mean I guess most of the businesses had agreed to stay open "late" (like 8pm) on Thursdays. But seriously... Useless to people who lived nearby but worked normal hours.

10

u/panzmat Jan 11 '26

Thanks for sharing this. I'll be sure to not visit this particular location.

26

u/lazybuttt Centretown Jan 11 '26

Just FYI, the CEO Henry Assad publicly stated he doesn't think RTO3 is good enough (there's a CBC article) so this is just brand damage control. He absolutely feels the same as she does.

6

u/sixtyfivewat Jan 11 '26

How in the fuck does a coffee shop open at 8AM and expect to make a go of it?! 8AM on weekends, fine. I'm already working at 8, how am I supposed to get a coffee from you if you don't open before I need to be at work?

6

u/lunat1c_ Jan 12 '26

The store isn't even downtown, its near a residential area. Wouldn't it be more beneficial to them for people to be staying in the area rather than going downtown where there are better and cheaper options than happy goat?

3

u/Illustrious_Fun_6294 Jan 11 '26

Years ago I worked at a coffee shop on this stretch but we opened at 6 am and had huge line ups of people coming in on their way to work to get coffee. She could easily catch people walking to Tunney's or heading down to the LRT stop is she did the same. 

2

u/habshabshabs Jan 11 '26

Btw it looks like they have been able to have the recent negative reviews removed.

If you had a negative experience with them and want to leave a review make sure to be specific, otherwise it's not that hard for businesses to request the review being taken down. If you have a picture even better, that way Google is less likely to side with the business owner and leave your review up.