Java's Brewing Bakery and Cafe — Restaurant in North Carolina

Let me start with the positive - - Their baked goods are great. Great tasting, and generously sized. Their coffee drinks are decent. Location is very convenient. Fantastic hours.

Now the negatives.. Overall unfriendly vibe. I'm not saying the employees are rude, but for the most part they are typically not very friendly and seem inconvenienced by waiting on you to make a decision, even if you just walked in the door. Not to mention the off putting signs everywhere. "Bathrooms for customers only". Seriously? You're located in a tiny shopping center with a bank and a dance studio, how much foot traffic could you possibly be getting that is going to use your toilet and not buy something?? Just seems tacky and cheap.

My biggest stink is their 40 Cent transaction fee for purchases under 5 dollars. I am familiar with merchant fees charged my Visa, MC, Amex & Discover. Even on a 5 dollar purchase at a merchant charge of 5% of the purchase only comes out to .25 cents (15 Cent surplus). So they are blindly charging a random number and profiting on the rest.(Fees are much closer to 2% and 3%). 3% on 5 dollars is 15 cents. That is a 25 cent profit on every transaction under 5 dollars. A purchase under $5 is pretty easy to do if you just want a coffee or a muffin. Now am I really bothered by a 40 cent charge added to my 5 dollar coffee? No, not really. But the principle of this is wrong. Charging your customers an additional fee for trying to pay? That screams "struggling business". It's the 21st century, Many people don't pay with cash, as paying with a bank card is far more convenient. If you want the business, bite the bullet and pay the transaction fee.

My advice? If a business is in the red over a matter of 40 cents and having people use their water by flushing their toilets, they probably shouldn't be...

My buddy and I stopped at the location. It was early in the morning and stop for coffee and something to drink. My buddy got the strawberry smoothie and I got one of the specialty coffees and a muffin. My friend said the strawberry smoothie had good sweetness and strawberry flavor. As for me, I think I got the cloud nine espresso drink. It was Good balance of sweetness and coffee flavor with the right amount of foam. The our only thing was it was a little cooler than I like for a hot drink but didn't deter. Now the muffins were wonderful, I got a cinnamon muffin and a chocolate chip muffins. Both had wonderful flavor both, the cinnamon had a good balance of sweetness and cinnamon flavor. The chocolate chip muffin had just the right amount of chocolate chips to muffin ratio. Both were really moist with a perfect outer crust. I would highly recommend this place for coffee and muffins. The gentleman behind the counter was nice and polite...

We have regulars here for lunch for a few years. It was sold a while back and we had a bad experience. We waited a few weeks and thought we should give it another chance just to be fair. They have a big sign over the counter with menu and prices. You can build your own sandwich for $10.50. It lists the different sandwich items and breads, one of which is a croissant. The price we were charged was $10.87 per sandwich plus $2.33 each for the croissants. They no longer bake every day so the croissants were not fresh. They also had no diet soft drinks of any kind. Since the old owners left it has gone down considerably. When I asked about the differences in the prices and the additional cost for the croissants I was told that is the way they do it now. No apology of any kind. I have never written a business a bad review of any kind so this cannot be written of to me just being a complainer. I am just the opposite. We will...