WOW Bakery & Cafe (Royal Oak) — Restaurant in Calgary

Customers beware of Tips scam at this store! With the skyrocketing inflation, grocery prices have been going up like crazy! Wow bakery is no exception, their bakery prices went up fairly much lately. Like shopping grocery else where lin SuperStore, Safeway, Co-op, Costco...etc. Nobody will pay tips when checking out as those were customers self-served practices. There is no reason to tip the cashier! But it happened twice within last 2 weeks when I purchased some bakery stuffs at the Calgary Royal Oak Wow Bakery, the first time when I paid with my credit card, I pushed the "Skip" button as a common practice on their Credit card machine to avoid tipping them for no reason, but after hitting the "Skip" button twice, there was no reaction , the sales lady said you have to hit harder and I did that again, still no reaction, then the lady quickly hit the button for me and it worked, but she didn't give me the receipt until I asked fot it. I did not check the receipt right there and then until I got home. I found there was a few dollars charged as tips on the receipt. Today I bought againt at the same Wow Bakery, and the "Tips Skip" button didn't work again, and the saleslady did the same trick on the Credit card machine, this time I also needed to request to get the receipt before she gave it to me, and found a few dollars again were charged as tips on it. Although she reluctantly refunded the tips amount to me, and loss of just a few dollars is really no big deal, but I think it is a matter of principle that every merchant should run their business in an ethical and honest way. It is quite likely some tricks had been played on the "TIPS Skip" button intentionally in their credit card machine to fool the customers. Just hope Wow Bakery Head quarter will look into this matter before their organization reputation will be ruined by one or two bad...

I’ve been here a few times so far and each time has been a wonderful experience. The staff is very welcoming & kind, also very patient. The baked goods are very good, clearly fresh and made daily. The milk bread loaf is my daughter’s favourite! Also the lemon madeleine’s.

We tried some cake slices and they were okay:

The tiramisu wasn’t a traditional tasting one - no coffee taste at all and instead of the lady fingers they seemed to use chocolate cake instead with a cheesier tasting cream. 1/5

The strawberry cake slice was alright - the whipped cream was light and fluffy with the perfect amount of sweetness, strawberries were fresh, and the cake tasted very airy and not sweet - but it was a bit dry. 3/5

The earl grey chiffon cake wasn’t too sweet and was very delightful to eat. 4/5

The cheesecake was quite good - it’s not a New York style cheesecake, it’s more of a Japanese style cheesecake texture with a basque cheesecake look. 4/5

The macarons are sweeter than I expected, but VERY light, fluffy, and fresh tasting. The cream filling is also extremely creamy yet light - delicious! The salted caramel macaron could probably use some more of the caramel filling as I only tasted the salted caramel flavour on one area only and the rest just tasted like the plain vanilla one. But definitely recommend trying these out!! 4.5/5

The Matcha Latte is also really enjoyable - a bit sweeter than I like it to be but they did let me know it was a mix they use and wouldn’t be able to adjust sugar. It was still very tasty!

Their americano (black) was also very enjoyable - the coffee tastes naturally good and isn’t burnt at all. One of my favourite places to get one!

Always a very nice experience! Looking forward to trying out what else they have to offer - as...

(I've always just used their online cake delivery services for all past cake purchases and the recipients have always been so happy with the quality and taste of their cakes) Great to see that a WOW Bakery location has opened up near me in the NW at Royal Oak. Grabbed an Earl Gray cake for my friend's birthday and a few other pastries. After paying for the cake, I placed it on the sandwich display table (to wait for the WOW coffee). I thought it was glass covered, it wasn't, and the cake toppled over. OOPS! Cake was only slightly damaged, nothing major at all. Chelsey saw my big oopsie and insisted on replacing the cake. That was completely unexpected and over the top, extraordinary WOW Customer Service!! My friend is from England, loves Earl Gray tea and doesn't have a sweet tooth at all. She texted me that night, "I don't normally eat much cake, but I had TWO big slices". The next morning, another text from her, "I did have more cake. Highly recommend'. My friend will definitely be checking WOW Bakery soon!! We are also coffee snobs and my husband and I were very impressed with their WOW Coffee and the 3 other pastries we bought that day. So happy this opened by me, as this will be my go-to bakery...