Reception Study of Jitters Coffee Bar

The weather outside was dreary and the smell of freshly brewed coffee and oven-hot pizza compelled me to warm up and observe the patrons of Jitters Coffee Bar. I expected other people would have similar motives but only seven people, four students and three staff members, were scattered throughout the coffee bar deep in their own thoughts. Jitters is a new establishment that has seemingly been well received by NDSU students, faculty, and staff for its spacious set-up, caffeinated beverages, non-institutionalized yet convenient atmosphere, and continuous stimuli. As with most public places in 2008, large-screen, plasma televisions (three of them to be exact) hung on the wall among local art, but only two of them were tuned in to a daytime television show. The television in the back of the coffee bar flashed nothing but an out of place “HDTV” emblem over the screen like a computer screen-saver. The other televisions were host to MTV’s “Parental Control” and the Ellen DeGeneres show, true to characteristics of today’s college student; the guilty pleasures of reality TV and daytime talk shows. While the screens emitted bright lights in the dim coffee bar atmosphere, the sound was muted and only subtitles could tell us what was being said.

While typical television viewing would have allowed us to hear the insults parents and paramours hurled at one another on “Parental Control” or the song Ellen chose to dance through the aisles to today, this was not the reason we were gathered there. Today, the televisions were obsolete, just another stimulus in the room with less appeal than the sounds provided by the grinding of the coffee grinder, the screech of the espresso machine, or the classic rock playing moderately through the speakers; with less appeal than the smell of coffee and pizza and with less appeal than the sound of our own thoughts forming in our heads with specific tasks at hand. In Jitters, nobody spoke, nobody stretched, and nobody gave the television more than a passing glance.

After getting myself a large, light roast coffee I nestled in to an easy chair in the corner of the coffee bar where I could see everyone and their interactions with each other and the media that surrounded them. A young woman sat cross-legged in an easy chair, identical to my own, adjacent from me. She had flashcards spread on the coffee table and her book was wide open on her lap. As is common with women who are concentrating, she was playing with her hair as she reviewed her material intensely, no control over or cares about what was going on around her. Continuing around the coffee bar in a clockwise direction, a man was sitting with his back to the center of the café. A television hung almost directly above him but he sat there not to see the TV, but to be able to plug his computer in. His attention went back and forth from the text book and notes sitting to his left, to his computer screen, and to give a passing glance to people walking in and out of the coffee bar. His head paid no attention to the television, but lightly bobbed to the music streaming out of his headphones. Continuing, three employees sat underneath the flashing “HDTV” screen pouring parmesan cheese on their pizza and talking about their ‘to do’ lists. On the other wall, a man was at the computer in an almost identical position to the other man at the computer; his back was to the center of the coffee shop and he was almost directly underneath the television showing “Ellen.” He focused intently on the computer in front of him but paid no attention to anything going on around him. Finally, in the middle of the coffee shop was a young man sitting at a table. Of all of the people in Jitters today, he was the only one who paid attention to the televisions. He seemed uneasy and looked sporadically around the café and back and forth to both TVs. It’s possible he was a first-timer to the establishment and was not quite sure how it all works. Even though he watched “Parental Control” for a few minutes, he showed no signs of being engaged and quickly stood up, looked around, and then gathered his things and left the building.

As I looked around the coffee bar, particularly at those studying, I realized that those of us who study at coffee shops do so for the soothing level of distraction they offer, not to engage in the television shows or sing along with the lyrics of the radio. For many of these students, silence and sterile atmospheres are not the ingredient for productivity and sound thinking, but the anti-thesis of it. The use of the televisions at Jitters Coffee Bar today was not to entertain, but to stimulate thoughts and encourage efficiency by discouraging the wandering mind. As I watched each of the patrons I observed pack up their things and leave Jitters, not shaky and in a panic but calmly and with a satisfied step, the media that surrounded them did just what they needed it to.