In defence of the smug Cereal Café owners – and the mugs who eat there

There is a great deal of excitement around today about an interview that Channel 4 News did yesterday with some quite smug chaps who have set up something called a ‘Cereal Café’ in Brick Lane and are charging customers £3.20 for a bowl of Lucky Charms. To be honest, if I’d worked out a similar method of persuading mugs to give me their money, I’d be pretty smug, too. In fact, I suspect this is how the founders of Pret feel every time a fool like me spends £2.35 on a pot of porridge on the way into work, as I did this morning. Baroness Jenkin would be so disappointed.

The interview focused on why the Cereal Killer Café was charging so much for cereal when the surrounding borough is the poorest in London. A question that the interviewee took exception to, as he’d clearly been hoping for something along the lines of ‘how is your beard so great?’ or ‘are Lucky Charms or Golden Grahams your most popular delicacy?’.