Salt Lake City Coffee Shops Banning WiFi And Laptops To Discourage Remote Workers – CoffeeTalk

Salt Lake City coffee shops are implementing measures to prevent remote workers from taking over, such as nixing Wi-Fi and limiting laptops. This is due to the increasing number of work-from-home campers who are posting up for hours on video calls as they search for a “third space” that isn’t their home office, causing overcrowding, hurting sales, and detracting from a community feel. Remote work numbers are still higher now than they were pre-pandemic, according to the Census.

The execution of these measures varies, with some coffee shop owners implementing no internet or laptops at all, others limiting their use to specific time stretches or days of the week, or simply taped over outlets. Erica O’Brien, one of the first to not offer Wi-Fi at her coffee shop, opened The Rose Establishment in 2010 to foster a safe and comfortable environment that encouraged human connection. However, her unique model led to some customers storming out or writing bad reviews online, insisting her business would fail.

Nick Price operates two coffee shops in town: Three Pines Coffee on Main Street, which lacks Wi-Fi, and Holy Water, which offers it because it’s close to the University of Utah and has less foot traffic. Price doesn’t provide internet at Three Pines because the space offers only 12 seats. He has looked into ways to impose a limit on how long a customer can use the internet, but the technology is expensive.

Price encourages customers to be considerate when planning to camp out to get work or studying done, stating that the revenue needs to continue flowing for the business to operate.

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