Commonfolk South Yarra — Restaurant in Melbourne

If you care about the ethical treatment of staff you will avoid this place like the plague. Since it’s been taken over by Commonfolk it’s become an unethical business hiding under the guise of a “social enterprise.” These new owners have destroyed the legacy of a beautiful local gem overnight. The day they took-over they fired the baristas who locals had been accustomed to and befriended over years and didn’t even allow customers or the baristas themselves time to prepare for the change. We literally rocked up on Monday after seeing them Friday and they were gone without any notice. The new owners then had the audacity to lie to us saying “the baristas chose to leave.” Mate, the only reason I was coming here besides putting up with the terrible quality coffee Commonfolk roasts was because of these two. Literally everyone was complaining about it but we continued supporting your business because of these two baristas. You can’t come into the neighbourhood pretending you care about loyal customers, going as far as to put out a survey of what people want to keep and then get rid of the only thing customers wanted without repercussions. And to lie about it?!! Did you really think customers wouldn’t find out? I would never support a business that treats staff like they’re disposable- absolutely disgusting. How dare you call yourselves a social enterprise giving to the common good when you can’t even treat these humans with any respect....

Unfortunately had to remove my 5 star review from 3 years ago after finding that immediately after changing hands Commonfolk terminated the two amazing baristas we all came to see for the last 4 years. And are deleting all traces of this and client feedback from their Instagram, and telling Christian and Connor’s customers that they “decided to leave” when they were terminated without notice. Absolutely disgusting lack of respect shown to these young fellas and the community. Won’t be going back.

Disappointing response. The ‘court of public perception’ in this case is simply the customer experience. A place you enjoy is changing hands, it’s encouraging to see they’re asking their new client base what we’d like to see kept, and the one consistent response shown (at least via the now deleted Instagram forum) were the only people we interacted with in the business. And the first thing that’s changed is that. Hard to see how our faith or loyalty would remain. Especially when we didn’t even get a chance to give them a send off...

Not so common!

I had a catchyupee with a friend and dropped in for somethig to eat, alas they didnt have that sorta menu BUT offered some toasties - and just so happened, that was perfect for us. FYI - as simple as a toasty is, they still gotta be just right and these were 😀

The service was GREAT. Very friendly and the coffees hit the spot too. We spoiled oursleves with something sweet (and they too were yummy) and as it was towards closing time were give a few extra to take away rather than those being thrown away (don't mind if we do - and thankyou again!).

Very much a Zip (pup) friendly caff - and Zip was treated with as much attention as us (which is always appreciated)

A rather lovel experience all up.

Zippy...