Real Business: No Customers Need Apply

By Megan McArdle

Every so often, you come across a business that is real, and amazing. That is, it's amazing that it's a real business, one that some blithe soul expects to make money off of. Readers are, of course, encouraged to submit their own examples.

Today I give you: The Sufi Coffee Shop.

Yesterday, a friend dragged me to a place called Sufi Coffee Shop in Mountain View (El Camino just north of Castro). The coffee was actually quite good -- it had better be quite good, the cheapest cup of drip -- of drip was $3.50. (The most expensive was $6.75. Admittedly, it was Blue Mountain.)
But the attitude. Wow, the attitude. The place is covered from wall-to-wall with angry signs admonishing the customers for various sorts of misbehavior. I took a photo of the first one, and the owner turned around, sternly instructed me "no photos!," and then demanded, as an implicit condition of selling me any coffee, that I delete the one I had taken.
Fortunately, the owner isn't terribly iphone-literate, and so, well, suffice it to say that not only did I not delete the first photo, but I took numerous more besides.

That's just the teaser. You really need to click through and gawk at the pictures.

Study Question: Is the Sufi Coffee Shop primarily selling coffee, or abuse?

This article available online at:

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2009/04/real-business-no-customers-need-apply/13130/