From Catherine Loza de Wilding
Sunday, 6 December 2009

I have always believed that Hebden Bridge is a place that has been considered, among many good things, child friendly. I have been into many restaurants, cafes, stores, etc. and I have always gotten a smile and a comment about my children which always made felt like I was at home even though I am not from the UK.

However, today I had an awful experience at The Good Food Shop (known before as Tasty Bites). It is one of the many little shops that sell food at George Square.

I went in with my husband and my two daughters aged 4 and 1. We asked for three cheese and onion pasties, a Cornish pasty and two coffees to eat there as it was a cold day. The place is small so it does not have high chairs so I sat the youngest one on my lap.

Unfortunately, as she was eating her food, all the crumbs went onto the floor. I tried to pick as many as I could but, if you have little ones, you can imagine how difficult was to keep the floor completely tidy, especially with this kind of food.

At the end, I went to the counter and I asked the "lady" there if she had something so I could clean the crumbs from the floor. She came towards our table and said "This is such a mess, how could you let this happen?” Of course, I was very apologetic and said sorry and offered for the second time to clean and asked if she could give me a brush. Immediately, she said "just get out, I will do it".

You can imagine how I felt. As my husband and daughters were going out and I was getting our things, she even dared to make more remarks like "How did you let this happen? Other babies do not do this, etc" At this point, I replied that she was just one year old and that if she did not want that to happen then she should not allow babies in there.

I was really upset really and I think I could have said even more but I did not want to argue or discuss with a person that obviously was so rude and that evidently could not understand children.

Now, I am writing this with the main purpose of warning other parents, with little children like me, not to go into this place and I will surely try to speak with the owner of this place because it cannot be allowed that customers are treated this way.

I hope The Good Food Shop changes its manners if it does not want to lose more customers. Besides, Hebden Bridge is child friendly and this place should not be there if it does not change its policy for the good name of our town.

From Zilla Brown
Tuesday, 8 December 2009

If this lady has a problem with the food shop I think it would be more fair and reasonable for her to take it up with them rather than slang them off on the Hebden Web.

The suggestion that they should not be there if they dont conform to her ideas is a bit much IMHO and I also think the language used about them is quite insulting eg."lady" in inverted commas etc. No place is perfect, if only all it took was to demand it to be so on this website. There are always two sides to any disagreement.

This seems to me like another local shop assistant, working flat out without enough help and for not much more than minimum pay, who has ended up being frazzled by the number and demands of the customers.

From Jack Hughes
Tuesday, 8 December 2009

The shop in question changed its name a couple of years ago, I believe - it was formerly known as "Tasty Bites". Oddly enough, the rebranding took place shortly after this;

Dodgy diners named

Which is why the place no longer gets my custom.

From Elleigh C
Thursday, 10 December 2009

Golly gosh whatever next? I only hope that nothing worse than this happens to this customer. Who knows what state she will be in if something really serious happened?

I would suggest putting your energy into something more worthwhile. Everyone is entitled to a bad day surely? Sounds like you may be personalising it.

On a last note, perhaps it is not the event itself that is distressing but rather the interpretation that is given to it. Instead of thinking 'How rude', perhaps the thought 'is she OK?'would have been more compassionate. Try asking her next time if she is alright? She may just break down in tears and say what a hard day she is having. Just maybe.....

From Graham Barker
Thursday, 10 December 2009

Good for Catherine. If the shop owner or shop worker want to respond here, they can. Yes, we all have bad days every now and then, but you don’t solve your own problems by dumping them on someone else.

From Sally Hayes
Tuesday, 16 February 2010

I work in Organic House Cafe in Hebden Bridge and we're always having babies and young children in making a right mess all over the floor. What does it matter? You just sweep it up, mop it down and get ready for the next customer. It's what you expect when you have young families in. Believe me I have had hard days myself and there is never any excuse for being rude to customers, especially when they are not at fault!

We are always delighted to see young families in our cafe, we try to make them enjoy their time with us and we clear up after them when they've gone. No big deal. Come to us next time!