02/02/09

LOUSY COFFEE, HORRIFIC SERVICE: AVOID

by SamLander

This place has mediocre coffee (especially the espresso, YECH!), but it also has:

1) The loudest music, all day, and late into the night (hope you like what they like!)

2) The most vagrants, who will come up and breathe on you if you're a woman

3) The most cigarette smoke, at the doors, mostly, from all the smokers outside

4) The most limited seating and electrical outlets,

5) Lousy food: they can barely toast a bagel, AND

5) The most aggressively rude waitstaff anywere I've ever been in the world, including France. One barista there, some guy named Mack, will confront you and shout at you if he thinks you don't tip enough. He drives lots of business away, for which other coffee shops are grateful.

Not worth the aggravation. Not for their coffee anyway.

• Pros: OPEN 24 HOURS
• Cons: EVERYTHING ELSE

07/01/08

For mourners of Mojo's

by ErynJ

Word on the street is that this place is owned by the men who originally owned Mojo's Daily Grind, which used to be on Guadalupe. This was my college haunt, where I drank far too many Iced Mojos and penned some god-awful poetry about post-adolescent crushes. So it's safe to say I miss it dearly. When I walked into Epoch, I recognized the mutated Starbuck's sign, the wacky steel sculptures and the portrait of Mama Mojo, and the place smelled like strong coffee brewing, and they were playing Iggy Pop. I liked it instantly. The bathroom has epic graffiti with a Hell theme, the baristas are as nice as one can reasonably expect baristas to be, and they still have Iced Mojo on the menu. It was also surprisingly spacious- on the inside. The patio was pretty crammed. Advice for people thinking about opening a coffeehouse in Austin: anytime you put a cafe 10 minutes from UT and style it to attract hippies and art kids, expect smokers and plan accordingly; put in a large patio, and expect to have to put space heaters in that puppy come December. All in all, it was a very comfortable, pleasant experience, and I anticipate many happy returns.

• Pros: Great coffee, hipsters to gawk at, interesting art for sale, decent tunes the staff will change if requested
• Cons: cramped patio, sketchy location

06/23/08

Horrendous customer service, really bad coffee... don't waste your time.

by Omnipeace

I really dig their location and their choice of decor, but everything else about this place is just lacking or deserves a description full of four letter words.

You walk in and immediately you notice there are no prices listed any where, no price board, no signs, no priced menu.

If this was some sort of high-society establishment located downtown I could maybe see the point in not listing prices, but let's be honest, their coffee is horrible... bad... disgusting even...

Do not waste your time on a complicated order, this place can't get the basics right.

Their smoothies come out of a paper carton and the pastries are few in number and of very poor quality, they look like something a school cafeteria would order from Sysco foods.

So, hey, you know, despite all of this, if they had friendly staff it would be a fun place to go, well, unfortunately for Epoch that's not the case.

The impression I got over the 4 or 5 times I visited was that if you're not part of their "in-crowd" you're pretty much a second class citizen. So unless you're there alone on a laptop and/or smelling of BO, it's not really the kind of place to waste your time/money.

• Pros: Great location
• Cons: Everything else