I’m not big into the coffee meta, but I find Luisa’s coffee to be quite nice. their food though is almost as overpriced as Starbucks. Last time I went there with my wife for a breakfast she got a sandwich and we were quite shocked by the price-for-size ratio.
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Not to mention they taste like sweaty jock straps.
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You’ve eaten sweaty jock straps?
Why would you want to do that?
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I wonder if they’re closing the huge one across from NTUT
It’s something I don’t really like to discuss publicly.
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I have no inside info other than what I read in the two articles linked above.
Guy
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I like 85 too when I don’t brew my own.
Mr. Brown is much better than it used to be though. Probably being eaten up by Louisa.
Wait, there are people who haven’t tried eating sweaty jock straps? What is this, the 1850s ??
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Starbucks is closing 20 (one store I know paid 500,000 NT$ in rent and the landlord wanted more this year) and opening 11 or something.
Cama has almost 200 stores, Louisa close to 400 and someone told me Cama and Louisa are family related.
They’re closing a big branch on the Danshui waterfront. A pity - good views from that one. I’m surprised that coffee shop hasn’t succeeded (maybe rent is an issue?): for one of the most over-touristed parts of the Taipei area, Danshui is sorely lacking places to just sit with a drink and enjoy the view.
A drink or two and more would actually sound better as sitting there with a drink enjoying the view wouldn’t pay enough to keep a place running.
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Mr Brown is obviously a super rich company to be able to have those coffeeshops operating at a loss for years and years.
I’m sitting here at another tasteful Louisa for 65ntd , why would I pay double in Mr Brown !
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And their product is not nearly as good.
Guy
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There are now more Louisa cafés in Taiwan than there are Starbucks. Their coffee seems to be the best of the franchises, too. As mentioned, their food isn’t great, but their desserts are OK. Starbucks is still the cleanest and most comfortable of the franchises, though. We could certainly do with fewer Cama and 85°C cafés. I think I’ve been to Dante (are they still around?) and Mr. Brown once each. Can’t recall what they were like, so probably not a point in their favor.
I actually like Cama, but 85°C is pretty rough…always full of creepy chain-smokers, and the desserts are nasty.
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Chain smokers and betel nut chewers can’t tell if a dessert is good or not. But hey, they are on the stock exchange. And that’s the Louisa plan too.
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85 is horrible, can’t believe they are a success story in the US!
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The one in Berkeley is always packed, but customers are almost exclusively Asian tourists and students.
They probably still spread the story about ‘hand’ made pastries by Taiwanese ‘famous’ pastry chefs.
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I’m always going to have a soft spot for Dante because that’s the first place I ate Western food in Taiwan. I was wandering around for days, subsisting on nothing but lunchboxes and stuff from the local supermarket, and then I discovered Dante’s wonderful sandwiches.
Mr. Brown? That’s old school. Gotta love Mr. Brown. Back in the late 90s, before we had any coffee that was really good, we had Mr. Brown.
Would I enjoy the coffee at either place now? No, not really. 
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