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11th Feb 2018

Mum asked to leave café because her baby was crying

Cathy Donohue

Mum asked to leave café

A mother was asked to leave a cafe in South London because her three-month-old baby was crying.

According to reports, the woman was asked to leave Brick House Bakery in East Dulwich, south London earlier this week because her child was upset.

The incident led to a row on social media and since then the cafe has shared a statement via Instagram in relation to the matter.

A debate broke out on the below post and there were almost 300 comments at the time of writing.

Remains of the day… #naturallyleavened #realbread #sourdough

A post shared by Brick House ED (@brickhousebread) on

One Instagram user said that the café’s attitude towards babies stinks and the reply was as follows:

“Hi there. If you have been to our cafe you would know that out attitude to babies does not stink. At any given time, there are a number of babies in the cafe. We provide high chairs, changing facilities, happily warm bottles and make babycinos and have no problem with breastfeeding. But, we are a cafe not a crèche, and we have been getting an increasing number of complaints from (paying) customers about babies crying”.

The comment went on to say that it was the responsibility of staff at the cafe to keep the majority of their customers happy.

“People come to us for a treat, to relax and enjoy the food an atmosphere, and if something happens to disrupt that experience, be it a loud adult, child or dog, it’s our responsibility to address. It’s not something we relish or enjoy, quite to opposite in fact [sic], but our goal is always to keep the majority of our customers happy and protect our business”.

According to The Daily Mail, Jennie Hall, a friend of the mother, said that it’s a fact of life that a three-month-old would cry and had the woman been a first-time mum, she would have been left in tears.

Jennie acknowledged that a crying baby could annoy some customers but said that she and her friend weren’t even offered takeaway bags for the food they had purchased.