At The Nook Café, paying customers can pay it forward to others, by purchasing a button for $3 when settling up their bill.
One button represents a free coffee and a day-old pastry. The paid-for buttons are kept in a jar next to the till, and can be used by anyone.
“It’s common when you work in a café for people to come in and put a pile of change, and you have to count it, and you say ‘Sorry, you’re short’,” co-owner Lynsae Moon said. “This way they just come, they take a button. No one even has to know.”
The café opened on 97 Street at 101 Avenue in July, and the program has been in place since the beginning. She said it took a while for the idea to gain steam.
“Now I’d say on average we give about five a day on the regular,” Moon said. “When it’s really cold…our button jar depleted in a few days.”
Moon said she was inspired to start it here from a coffee shop in Vancouver, the Moon says the owners have made every effort to make the space accessible to everyone.
“We’re not necessarily a play café, but I just want the space to be accessible to all people from little to big, from privileged to poor,” Moon said.
With files from Nicole Weisberg
