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Belfast Live
Belfast Live
National
Damien Edgar

Titanic Quarter donation-based café celebrating over 10 years

The Dock Café is celebrating over 10 years in the heart of Belfast's Titanic Quarter, with its donations box policy still being embraced by visitors old and new.

The café operates as a community hub and as part of that, people are asked simply to donate what they feel is fair for what they eat or drink.

Stephen McIlwaine has been managing the café for the past five years and said everything in the café has also been donated, from furniture to plates, mugs to tables.

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"Everybody knows us as the donation box café in the city, so we have for the last 10 years, been running a donation-based system café," he said.

"People come in, we provide tea, coffee, some freshly baked scones and traybakes and things like that and provide the space for people to come in and enjoy the best of what Belfast has to offer.

"We provide it on a purely donation basis, so we don't set or charge any prices, we let people come down, sit in and enjoy it, and if they want to give us something on the way out, it's totally up to them, there's no obligation."

Stephen said the café continued to thrive as a meeting place despite its almost unique approach to how it operates.

"Ten years says it all, that it does work out - you could write a whole thesis on the psychology of the honesty box, donation box," he said.

"Generally, when they first come in, people are like 'what's the catch?', there is no catch, you sit down, enjoy it and if you want to give something on the way out you can.

"It sort of balances itself out, some people obviously would give less, some people would give more, some people would give what they expect in another café.

"We don't suggest anything, we just say sit down and enjoy it and it's up to you yourselves."

The café has become a key part of the experience for those traversing the city's Titanic Quarter, reflected in it number one ranking among the city's cafés on TripAdvisor.

"The whole idea of what we want to do here is a community building initiative, that's why we try to emphasise sitting in to enjoy the experience and the atmosphere," added Stephen.

"Teas and coffees are just a mechanism to enable that and generate conversation with people.

"People are generally happy enough to make a donation after that.

"And as well, we are here if people are stuck and they can't afford it, we're here for that too, because we want the equality where people can feel regardless of your background or where you come from, come in, sit down, have a cup of coffee, have a scone or a bun and nobody will know or treat you any different than anybody else that comes in as well."

A Prayer Garden in the café also reflects its status as a place where people of faith can come to meet and pray as well.

Meanwhile, with the staff all volunteering their time to run the coffee bar and the donations-box approach, it would only be natural for those involved to worry about the cost-of-living crisis.

"As you can imagine, certainly running a commercial café is challenging enough, trying to run a donation-based system is extremely tough," said Stephen.

"But we're covering ourselves - obviously things like electric, milk sugar are going up, the challenges are there but over the 10 years we've had our hurdles to cover and this is just another one.

"You find people in Belfast and obviously in the Titanic Quarter, where there's a more worldwide feel to it as well with the visitors it gets, people are extremely understanding of the cost for charities and commercial businesses at this time and are reaching into their pocket to sustain us here.

"So we are very, very thankful for that.

"We just keep going, we keep striving and we'll see where we're at, but yeah, 10 years has been amazing here and we're grateful to all the people who have been involved over those 10 years.

"We hope and pray for another 10 years."

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