This bums me out so much. My wife worked there as an undergrad when they first opened, and picking up coffee with my son has become part of our Saturday morning routine (along with hitting BGO). Seriously going to miss them…

Yikes. Just when you think Thayer Street can’t get any worse…

That's a bummer

Sigh.

Sad to hear this, they had the best coffee on Thayer.

It has been a downhill slide for 20 years, getting less and less interesting.

Take my upvote because you are right 😣

What’s really made it worse if I may ask? I don’t pop around there too often.

Not a great coffee shop: sterile interior, mediocre coffee. Nothing interesting about it other than being independent. So… that’s fine. Thayer is long overdue for a great coffee shop. It’s insane that the heart of a great university has such poor options. Best one is ceremony which is pretty niche.

Ceremony is fantastic

The progressive crush of (re)development and rising rent coupled with the rise of the online marketplace.

Ya got a Starbucks and an Aroma Joe’s… what more could you ask for?!

A great non-chain coffee shop like Bolt Coffee, New Harvest, Dave’s, Little Sister, etc. is what you would expect to be adjacent to a 10,000 student university on their main “college town” drag.

First off, Aroma Joes is so ridiculous I can’t even believe that place exists. They call coffee “fuel”, everything is made out of plastic, the food tastes like airplane food. It’s a horrible experience. Even the logo—did they steal it from kid Pix? I’m transported back to 1992 in the worst way. Is this place a front?

Starbucks is fine, it’s Starbucks, but it’s a nondescript national chain coffee shop. My point is that usually great colleges have a coffee shop culture right around them. Thayer is lacking on this front and it’s glaring. The closest thing it had was Blue State, and Blue State was underwhelming.

I have a high bar for “good coffee shop.” That will annoy some of you who think Starbucks is awesome, and others will get it…

I really like it and go there with some regularity. It’s also great for sake and wine. By niche I mean it’s a Japanese tea house first and foremost more than a coffee shop, which I’m also really into—it’s just… very specific.

Bummer. Blue State used to be really good with the original owners. They used to do open mic poetry there too.

There’s great shops in Harvard Square where rents are even higher. Its just terrible tenant selection by Brown and Capstone who own most of the street.

Also, not many young people who aren’t students live around there to be customers of great shops. Why go all the way to Thayer when you can go to Wickenden, Ives, Westminster, Hope, etc, and not feel like you’re intruding on a college party… It is a bummer though—Thayer has a great streetscape.

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Pretty sure that person was being sarcastic

You’re probably right but a lot of people probably genuinely feel that way.

On a happier note I believe Coffee Exchange on Wickendon St is reopening its cafe rather than take out only.