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whose idea was it to rebrand the East Coast buffet as 'Food bar'?

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4SRKT

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Whoever it was didn't do any sort of sound check through a PA system, because every time it is announced it sounds exactly like 'FUBAR'. This does not make me want to eat there BTW.
 
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richw

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Sounds more of a case of not speaking properly for the announcement or not listening properly. It doesn't sound like it at all when spoken clearly.
 

GatwickDepress

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For me, the loudspeakers on the 225s do make it sound like "FUBAR". It seems extra emphasis on the "d" is needed.

Although from my sole experience of using it, the food bar is aptly named. The last time I was on a heavily delayed EC service, they served everything bar food. :D
 

dk1

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All this 'shop, cafe bar, food bar' nonsense really annoys me. Just call it the buffet car. AGA have started the ball rolling by adding a thick RED bar above the windows.

The HST i used a few weeks back from Donny-Pbo looked very shabby with the Food Bar vynal already peeling off the front of the counter & only 3 sandwiches & a toastie left & it had only come from Leeds!!
 

ryan125hst

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For me, the loudspeakers on the 225s do make it sound like "FUBAR". It seems extra emphasis on the "d" is needed.

Although from my sole experience of using it, the food bar is aptly named. The last time I was on a heavily delayed EC service, they served everything bar food. :D

Sounds about right for East Coast, sadly. They only had a couple of sandwiches left when I went on the 12:39 from Retford to London (ex York) back in July with my parents and sister (back in the CafeBar days though).:roll: A lunch time train with so few sandwiches is ridiculous!

East Coast are a good company and I am impressed with most of the things they have done, but the one area that lets them down is the catering. Bring back the restaurant car, I say! While I never ate in it, the menus I've seen look good and the reviews were always good as well (in GNER days that is).
 

4SRKT

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The food grip on the 16:30 Cross > Edinburgh today is very carefullly saying 'cafe bar' instead of 'Foodbar'/'FUBAR'. I wonder if she's reading this thread? ;)
 

Chrisgr31

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All this 'shop, cafe bar, food bar' nonsense really annoys me. Just call it the buffet car. AGA have started the ball rolling by adding a thick RED bar above the windows.

The HST i used a few weeks back from Donny-Pbo looked very shabby with the Food Bar vynal already peeling off the front of the counter & only 3 sandwiches & a toastie left & it had only come from Leeds!!

It's not a buffet bar though because the selection is always rubbish and expensive.

Of course those in charge of catering will tell us there is poor choice because of lack of demand. However if the product was good, looked appetising and was value for money then they would sell a lot more of it! Reality is that customers have a huge choice of places to buy food before they get on a train, and the food on a train needs to compete with that or be different. At the moment it does neither.
 

Nym

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It's not a buffet bar though because the selection is always rubbish and expensive.

Of course those in charge of catering will tell us there is poor choice because of lack of demand. However if the product was good, looked appetising and was value for money then they would sell a lot more of it! Reality is that customers have a huge choice of places to buy food before they get on a train, and the food on a train needs to compete with that or be different. At the moment it does neither.

Have you been on Newcastle station recently, Greggs is shut so the choice has gone rather much downhill as a result...
 

yorksrob

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Have you been on Newcastle station recently, Greggs is shut so the choice has gone rather much downhill as a result...

Funnily enough, we've just gained a Greggs at Wakefield Westgate. Perhaps they've just transferred it !
 

4SRKT

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I agree!

Echoing earlier comments about poor value, selection and quality, I would say that after visuting the FUBAR both my finances and digestive system end up FUBAR! ;)
 
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DarloRich

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Whoever it was didn't do any sort of sound check through a PA system, because every time it is announced it sounds exactly like 'FUBAR'. This does not make me want to eat there BTW.

WOW - first world problems right there! ;)

Have you been on Newcastle station recently, Greggs is shut so the choice has gone rather much downhill as a result...

Greggs? Newcastle? Shut? WTF? I assume you mean the little kiosk on the platform rather than the big shop over the road. Otherwise the entire space time continuum may shatter and suck us all into a vast abyss of healthy salads and wheatgrass shakes!


Sounds about right for East Coast, sadly. They only had a couple of sandwiches left when I went on the 12:39 from Retford to London (ex York) back in July with my parents and sister (back in the CafeBar days though).:roll: A lunch time train with so few sandwiches is ridiculous!

East Coast are a good company and I am impressed with most of the things they have done, but the one area that lets them down is the catering. Bring back the restaurant car, I say! While I never ate in it, the menus I've seen look good and the reviews were always good as well (in GNER days that is).

And there is the reason. Not enougth people DID eat in it often enougth!

Anyway - just call it a buffet!
 

4SRKT

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While I appreciate the ;), this, and this whole thread, is not a 'first world problem' but a joke. It wasn't meant as a critique of catering, a complaint about naming conventions for buffets or anything remotely serious. It was a response to being amused by repeatedly hearing the word FUBAR on EC announcements.
 

DarloRich

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While I appreciate the ;), this, and this whole thread, is not a 'first world problem' but a joke. It wasn't meant as a critique of catering, a complaint about naming conventions for buffets or anything remotely serious. It was a response to being amused by repeatedly hearing the word FUBAR on EC announcements.

I know! I just dont know why it isnt simply called a buffet!
 

4SRKT

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No, I don't either! It's amusing though that the name they have chosen can be so aptly misheard!
 

lincolnshire

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I know! I just dont know why it isnt simply called a buffet!

I wonder what it cost East Coast to come up with the name of Food Bar, it will be some agency brought in to make it sound something better than the Buffet Car as it sounds common these days and not upmarket for East Coast.

Its another of the image thinks again, re brand it and make it sound better as you say its still the buffet what most people know it as.

Can anyone confirm if you pay VAT on purchases on a train ot not? as I understood that you pay VAT on a train as its a service on a train as against purchaseing food from a shop at a station been VAT free.

As for running out of food, in the old days they could pick up stock at stations en route when the buffet on the platforms belonged to them, not any more, another thing that come about through privateiseation of the railways.
 

Darandio

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As for running out of food, in the old days they could pick up stock at stations en route when the buffet on the platforms belonged to them, not any more, another thing that come about through privateiseation of the railways.

It's still happened, albeit rarely. Several stories on here of staff diving off the train and into the local shop to grab some packets of bacon, bread etc.
 

Emyr

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Isn't a buffet normally a format whereby you pay a flat fee for open access to a table of regularly-replenished offerings?

So a British Buffet Car never contains a buffet.
 

LateThanNever

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I wonder what it cost East Coast to come up with the name of Food Bar, it will be some agency brought in to make it sound something better than the Buffet Car as it sounds common these days and not upmarket for East Coast.

Its another of the image thinks again, re brand it and make it sound better as you say its still the buffet what most people know it as.

Can anyone confirm if you pay VAT on purchases on a train ot not? as I understood that you pay VAT on a train as its a service on a train as against purchaseing food from a shop at a station been VAT free.

As for running out of food, in the old days they could pick up stock at stations en route when the buffet on the platforms belonged to them, not any more, another thing that come about through privateiseation of the railways.

Have certainly obtained a VAT receipt from the buffet - and even from a catering trolley. Would have thought the buffet must count as catering - similar to paying VAT in a restaurant but not in Tesco. But there is more confusion when the food is not hot and whether it is for consumption 'on the premises'. I would imagine all the train counts as the premises on the grounds that you are unlikely to buy your sandwiches at the buffet and then wait till you get home to eat them! But what happens when they sell you an apple which is hardly catering and conceivably you might take home, just don't know!
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Isn't a buffet normally a format whereby you pay a flat fee for open access to a table of regularly-replenished offerings?

So a British Buffet Car never contains a buffet.

Don't think it necessitates a flat fee but it does indicate pre-prepared dishes which I would expect normally to be cold! The real origin of the word is a sideboard (French) I think. So I suppose the word probably goes back to the first catering on the railways and thus the marketing department considers it should be modernised....
 
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GatwickDepress

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Isn't a buffet normally a format whereby you pay a flat fee for open access to a table of regularly-replenished offerings?

So a British Buffet Car never contains a buffet.
Oxford Dictionaries gives one possibly definition of a buffet as "a counter where light refreshments are served". The French word "buffet" and all subsequent definitions arise from means (or meant, I'm unaware of most of the French language) "sideboard", which seems perfectly apt. :D
 

Be3G

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As for running out of food, in the old days they could pick up stock at stations en route when the buffet on the platforms belonged to them, not any more, another thing that come about through privateiseation of the railways.

It's still happened, albeit rarely. Several stories on here of staff diving off the train and into the local shop to grab some packets of bacon, bread etc.

As far as I'm aware FGW still restock the buffet with prepackaged food routinely on their services between London and Penzance, so I'd be surprised if it didn't happen elsewhere on the rail network too. I think the stories about staff jumping off the train to grab things like bread etc. are more ‘unofficial’ restock attempts for food that's prepared on board (e.g. Travelling Chef); after all, things like loaves of bread and uncooked bacon don't have a place in an actual buffet car.
 

Nym

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Greggs? Newcastle? Shut? WTF? I assume you mean the little kiosk on the platform rather than the big shop over the road. Otherwise the entire space time continuum may shatter and suck us all into a vast abyss of healthy salads and wheatgrass shakes!

It was shut for refurbishment the time before last I headed south, I was megga peeved off and couldn't get anything to eat until London...
 

Darandio

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I think the stories about staff jumping off the train to grab things like bread etc. are more ‘unofficial’ restock attempts for food that's prepared on board (e.g. Travelling Chef); after all, things like loaves of bread and uncooked bacon don't have a place in an actual buffet car.

Depends entirely what you mean by not having a 'place'.

Many East Coast services don't have a chef as such, but bacon is prepared in the on board oven and bread is toasted for the breakfast service.

One story I seem to remember last year was in the 'East Coast First Class Service' thread where exactly that happened.
 

al.currie93

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I actually really liked the East Coast food when I was on the Highland Chieftain recently... apparently I'm their only fan ha!
 

Be3G

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Depends entirely what you mean by not having a 'place'.

Many East Coast services don't have a chef as such, but bacon is prepared in the on board oven and bread is toasted for the breakfast service.

I meant in the sense of pre-packaged food available from the buffet for passengers to walk up and purchase.
 

BestWestern

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Chrisgr31:1799768 said:
Of course those in charge of catering will tell us there is poor choice because of lack of demand. However if the product was good, looked appetising and was value for money then they would sell a lot more of it! Reality is that customers have a huge choice of places to buy food before they get on a train, and the food on a train needs to compete with that or be different. At the moment it does neither.

Absolutely spot on. At the moment there seems to be a general tactic of selling supposedly 'high end' products at prices which are often stupidly steep, thus you end up with low sales and either carrying very low stock levels to avoid potential waste, or sailing with more supplies on board but frequently encountering lots of waste products at the end of every day. The ever growing high street chains demonstrate that there is a clear demand for simple snack offerings at sensible prices which are adequate to 'keep you going' until meal time. Offering tarted up versions of similar fayre at massively inflated prices works less well. Why TOCs continue to try and punch above their weight with fancy grub on normal services is beyond me, and seems not to be overly successful. There is a clearly successful business model demonstrated by the likes of Greggs, Costa etc. Costa in particular have spread enormously beyond the high street, and indeed I know of at least one British ferry operator who have them on board. Why we don't see TOCs just franchising out their buffets and enjoying the profit I really don't know.
 
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