Café setup guide: share your tips for making a great cafeteria in Critter Café!

Design wise its mostly personal preference how you want it to look. The most important tip is to not obstruct yourself to your patrons. That means leaving ample room to run around and easily access all areas. This may include not putting tables close up to sofas and what not. As you can see in the video the most efficient way I have found is to simply seat everyone on sofas directly in front of the work stations that way I can get up to 9 patrons in one service.

Bonus tips in case you don't already know
1. You can layer carpets upon carpets making one huge covering as much as you want!
IMPORTANT: Do your carpets before placing furniture.
(Beware clipping with some carpets, you'll figure it out)
2. You can use boxes to make a sort of bar counters
3. You can stack boxes on top of each other.

Before taking on the customer service challenge, I did a lot of testing on how to get the most seating with the least amount of getting accidentally blocked while trying to get to the customers. I landed on liking the smallest round tables with stools around on the lower level of the cafe for quick XP grinding early in the game.

After a while when I had gotten the hang of quickly getting and fulfilling orders on the lower level, I moved to the upper level with some sofas in an L shape and four comfy chairs in a reading nook. Adding that extra bit of navigation on top of the dialed in lower area muscle memory wasn't too much of a feat!

As far as design goes, don't fret if you feel like there isn't anything very "you" when first starting out. As you run the cafe shifts and do critter parties, you unlock more furniture, decorations and wallpapers/flooring! What I would suggest is before you go full tilt on a certain aesthetic or design, grind out some levels and check out your new inventory to spark design ideas.

Ultimately, there is no currency aspect of the game, so you can place anything in your inventory as much as you want. Creativity and taste is all on you!

I went very gothic with black/red colorways :)

The core thing in this game is your cafe. That is the heart and soul so it's super important to make it look aesthetically and functional. Below are some tips to help you get the most out of your space.

1. Café Customisation & Design

Focus on a theme! Whether you want rustic and cosy or modern and sleek, the consistency of style will make your café feel more intentional. For my cafe, I've picked brown and pink as my theme, so it can even be something as simple as colour or even an object that can determine what vibe you want your cafe to be.

Play with lighting: warm tones invite people into a space, while cooler tones can make a space feel cool and relaxed. For my cafe, I've placed salt-style lamps on tables and walls, I've also kept the same style of lighting for consistency with the addition of a few neon lights in 1 or 2 spots.

Display only a few decorative elements. Small touches, like potted plants or wall art, elevate the space without clutter. I took inspo from another creator here and created a gaming station but also a study section focusing on objects associated with that near those areas.

2. Set Up Café For Maximum Efficiency

Keep an open route around between the kitchen and tables so you don't bump into furniture running to and forth from delivering orders. Space the tables out just enough that you can navigate among the customers. I learned this the hard way when I have a rush of customers but can't get to them because of how I've placed the table in front of them.

3. Take & Deliver Orders Efficiently

Save time by prioritising orders for groups instead of continuing to run back and forth for single drinks. I take everyone's orders first and focus on the quick wins. so the coffee pouring is what I try and bash out first then if there's a cake cutting I usually save that and latte art at the end.

4. Making the Most of Your Space & Experience

Move things around often! Your café will change as you unlock new furniture and features, so don't be afraid to mix it up. Honestly, every time I think I am settled with the layout, I unlock new sofas and have to redecorate but it's all part of the fun.

Interact with your customers. Happy customers mean more rewards and a happy café. I wasn't aware of this until I accidentally clicked on a person and noticed my after-cafe summary was very positive and my critters had also levelled up a lot.

With these tips, I hope you’ll have a beautifully designed and efficiently run café in no time. Let me know if you’d like any tweaks or additions!?

Happy Cafe-ing ☕✨

I'll try to make a guide based on what was specifically asked for in the bounty:

- Café customization and design: This part, in my opinion, is extremely personal. If you like your café pink, blue or black, that's fine. The type of chair and table you choose also matters very little. I think this is important to mention, even though it may seem obvious, because it can happen that someone limits their creativity in the game for fear of damaging their gameplay. Focus on the fun, now take into account a few points that I'll discuss below;

- Café layout and how best to set up your tables and chairs: Here we can't just take personal choice into account. Your Café needs to be organized in such a way that no place is unreachable or that it takes a lot of effort and turns to get to a distant location. Imagine in real life a restaurant with all the tables together. Wouldn't that be nice? In the Critter Café, it's the same thing. Put at least one square (preferably two) between the tables to allow the waiter (you) to pass through smoothly. Also, don't go overboard with the number of tables, remember that you're serving yourself, you don't need so many tables, focus on doing something nice with a reasonable number of chairs and tables, just enough for the number of customers you're serving during the shift. When it comes to position, I'd stress not to leave unreachable spaces so as not to lose orders! Always leave a gap between the back of the chair or sofa and the wall to avoid this;

- How to take and deliver orders with maximum efficiency and nail the customer service minigames: In order to make the most profit you need to be organized, so I'll tell you how I do it: Focus on always taking 3 orders (the maximum you can take at the same time) and focus on doing the easiest and quickest minigames (like filling the coffee and choosing the right sweets shown). This allows you to place more orders until the store closes. Also, keep an eye out for the warning that time is running out! At this point you need to have 3 orders accepted, because after that the orders will disappear and you'll only be able to complete the ones you've accepted. As for the minigames, it involves practice, keep doing them or watch videos of content creators doing them so you can try to perfect them, ok?

- Anything else you think players should know about getting their café looking the way they want it or running it well: In addition to what I've already said, I believe the most important tip is “PROGRESS IN THE MAIN STORY”, this will unlock hundreds of different decorations and new critters as well as new mechanics in the game, it's essential to enjoy the game to the fullest and also to have the most beautiful café in the world, cheers!

Cleaning up the area and creating a pleasant atmosphere is undoubtedly the first step. At first, a good strategy I've learned is to place the tables closer to the kitchen in order to optimize the time it takes to serve customers (we'll talk more about this in a moment). Over time, as you buy more furniture, you can change the configuration, always thinking about leaving a comfortable environment, with sofas for example, without making it cramped, which is very important for customer satisfaction. But at first, I'd advise you not to worry too much about decoration, that's something that takes time, first focus on the basics that work and then improve.

When decorating, think about a balanced color palette and a pleasant environment that the client will want to stay in (I like to think of what it would be like in real life). But don't forget to put your own style and personality into it. It's great to have a place with your own personality, and I love that at the critter café the decoration is already part of the fun.

To optimize time, it's very important to arrange the tables in such a way that you can serve customers as quickly as possible (we all like fast service, so we need to try to serve customers as quickly as possible so they don't leave). It is always essential to think about an environment that is easy to move around in and to focus on leaving a quiet space for critters to move around freely. You can even divide the room into an area for the tables, another for the sofa and the critters' corner.

To optimize service and customer care, without having to go back and forth a lot, I think it makes a lot of sense to take all the orders first and then deliver them all at once.

Depending on how you're playing, if you want to get your adrenaline pumping or keep your mind at ease, you can set a daily target for orders and make the game more relaxing. I think one of the best ways to play this game is when you want to relax!

Exploring the game is also very useful for acquiring new items for your coffee maker, and it's very important to have a variety of critters for more specific reservations and, therefore, more rewards. The missions are very nice, but there's this world that you can explore and it's really cool.