COMMENTARY, July 25 — "No outside food or drinks allowed.”

More often than not, you would see such a sign or placard placed near the entrance of a café or restaurant. It is, to my mind, an ugly decorative feature but a necessary one, alas.

For uglier than a sign reminding customers that no outside food or drinks are allowed is the sheer fact such a sign is even required in the first place.

"No outside food or drinks allowed” — Shouldn’t this be common sense and commonplace?

Instead, the audacity of some customers can be staggering. Restaurateurs and café owners might recognise the following exchanges:

SCENARIO 1:

SERVER: Excuse me, sir/madam, please note that no outside food or drinks are allowed.

CUSTOMER: Really? You didn’t say also.

SERVER: We have a sign stating exactly that at our shop entrance.

CUSTOMER: Aiya, I didn’t see.

SERVER: No problem. Perhaps you would like to put away your chicken floss bun and [name of coffee shop franchise] latte, and order from our menu instead?

CUSTOMER: Actually ya, since I’m already eating it, let me finish first lah.

SERVER: ...

SCENARIO 2:

SERVER: Excuse me, sir/madam, please note that no outside food or drinks are allowed.

CUSTOMER: Why cannot?

And so on.

The F&B (food and beverage) entrepreneurs are expected to defend themselves to customers, particularly those who enjoy leaving lopsided Google Reviews, that they have overheads — electricity, water, rental, WiFi, disinfectant, etc. — and that they are a small business. Staff expect their salaries to be paid, and so on.

Yet isn’t it ludicrous that they even have to rationalise why customers ought not bring outside food and drinks in the first place? Surely these customers have heard of simple manners?

There are those that begin posing for pictures for their social media before they even peruse the menu. Look pretty posing for pictures; be tasteful by ordering first and respecting the house rules.

The more genial of food operators try to work their way around such customers and their penchant for bringing food and drinks bought elsewhere into their establishments... with mixed results, one must say.

Some of you might have heard of corkage, a nominal fee charged to guests who wish to open their own bottle of wine at a restaurant. Well, certain enterprising cafés have come up with their own version of this — a "cakeage”.

That’s right: should you choose not to purchase a cake — whole or sliced — at a café or restaurant, but elect to bring your own cake, likely bought elsewhere where there are no tables or beverage menus, some establishments will be happy to keep your gateau chilled in their chiller and bring it out for you after you’re done with your meal... for a small price, of course.

Whilst this still reeks of being somewhat disrespectful of the eatery in question (why not just purchase a cake on site and support them?), at least customers would be compensating the café or restaurant for the loss of sales.

And even here, with such a generous compromise, customers might still balk and demand to know why they have to "pay for bringing their own cake” — as though they were doing the shop owner a favour.

I don’t know, perhaps the customers could ask the kitchen crew how they feel about washing dirty plates and cutlery for a food item that wasn’t even purchased in their shop?

Then there are the One Drink Gangs. Worse than weapon-wielding mafia, these. Instead of machetes and firearms, they would saunter into a café carrying only an unworldly sense of numbers: "Yes, we’d like a table for five but only one of us wants to order a drink. Okay, right?”

What’s the problem here, you ask? They aren’t bringing outside food or drinks in this scenario, after all; surely the F&B operators and the nagging author of this commentary ought to be pleased?

Let’s see: the shop owner might prefer to have those extra, non-paying seats reallocated to other customers waiting outside who do want to order a drink each (perhaps more), thereby filling the shop’s nearly bare coffers with some much appreciated cash.

Hard to imagine but some F&B businesses would actually like to do.... business?

Again, the more enterprising ones (or perhaps simply frustrated and fed up) impose a minimum drink order: one beverage per person. Cue customers (typically not the regulars) railing against this capitalist decree.

You have to wonder which is sadder, the fact a food operator even has to put this in writing (sometimes plastered inelegantly at every table, just so no customer could insist they didn’t see the announcement plastered on the door as they entered the premises) or the fact some customers feel it’s perfectly fine to just grab a chair and join their dining companions.

With the latter, often the thought process goes like this: Shouldn’t you be happy we are even ordering a drink? It’s not as though your shop is busy after all. At least we are filling up the space and making it look lively.

Dear readers, such customers leave me speechless. (And the shop owners, likely seething.)

Inform such customers that such practices — tiny cards listing rules such as no outside food and minimum orders — are common in other countries such as Japan or Taiwan, and they will retort that this is Malaysia, we are not other countries.

Indeed we are not. One would hope we, as a country, can do better — and not even need these ungainly and ugly signs, that we could be well behaved and thoughtful customers instead, that we wouldn’t even need reminding of proper dining etiquette.

Some might argue restaurants and cafés don’t have the right to impose rules and regulations on customers. Yet we follow such directives without question (or nearly so) when attending school, or confronted by a security guard when visiting friends and relatives at their homes, or using the gym.

Do such policies matter less when our mouths are full with food and drink we may or may not have purchased on the premises?

Reconsider the old adage "The customer is always right.” Perhaps not so. Not when the customer in question is unable to abide by the rules and regulations of the eatery they wish to visit — or worse, callously unwilling to.

Leave your outside purchases in your bags or baskets. Ask for the menu, politely. Have fun deciding what to order. Appreciate the hard work and craft put into making your food and drinks.

Be considerate. It’s basic F&B etiquette: Don’t bring outside food or drinks in, please. Thank you.

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