disappointed and need to rant!

share bear

Hi everyone,

Had second thoughts about posting this but need to rant as its annoying me.

Today i took my 9 month old to the play cafe we go to on a regular basis. We were having a great time until i noticed a small shard of glass next to my little ones foot.

Obviously i was a shocked as there were so many little ones running around in socks. So i had a good look around the area we were in and found two more bits and went to throw them away and let the staff know.

They were very apologetic and told me that there was a party in the room the night before and and came out with a brush and pan and went over the floor. Didn't want to make a big fuss so get playing and moved onto a different area where i found more glass.

So at this point I ignored my instinct to comb the floor and just decided to leave. Im so disappointed as I really liked this place and the staff are really very good but its kinda put me off going to places like these :mad:

IvyTheTerrible

share bear wrote: »

Hi everyone,

Had second thoughts about posting this but need to rant as its annoying me.

Today i took my 9 month old to the play cafe we go to on a regular basis. We were having a great time until i noticed a small shard of glass next to my little ones foot.

Obviously i was a shocked as there were so many little ones running around in socks. So i had a good look around the area we were in and found two more bits and went to throw them away and let the staff know.

They were very apologetic and told me that there was a party in the room the night before and and came out with a brush and pan and went over the floor. Didn't want to make a big fuss so get playing and moved onto a different area where i found more glass.

So at this point I ignored my instinct to comb the floor and just decided to leave. Im so disappointed as I really liked this place and the staff are really very good but its kinda put me off going to places like these :mad:

Did you tell the staff about the rest of the glass before you left, or did you leave without considering the other users of the café who didn't realise there was still glass on the floor?

share bear

Of course I did, I said my bit to the staff before i left and they already knew there had been glass there in the morning but thought they had gotten it all. I would have thought they would closed up early and give the place a proper clean, maybe they did so after I left. But I don't think i was in the position to announce it to the whole cafe but I do regret not making more of a fuss to be honest.

PLL

Things like this disgust me. No matter nice you think the staff are they are not doing their job if they did not clean the floor properly. Thank God no child was hurt but my God if there was! There would be war. There is no need for this incompetence.

jane82

When you say shard are you exagerating a little bit?
Would a crumb of glass describe it better or was it actually a large pointy bit of glass?
A crumb here or there could be easily missed.

Hannibal Smith

Im not too keen on the panda cafe. A few of us from here have met there before and the kind of gully in the floor where the partition doors slide is always full of muck and dirt. A few of the kids have eaten it. I suppose you have to accept, it being a rugby club...its not going to ve pristine. ..but im wondering if hoovering out the gully would be all that difficult? No point having a no shoes policy if the kids have access to a feast of dirt.

share bear

They were small pieces but big enough for me to spot standing up looking down, and big enough to do harm. I do appreciate that broken glass is hard to spot its just not something you laxs about. Hopefully they'll resolve the issue as I do think its a great service.

bp

I was there too this morning and also picked big enough shards of glass off the floor and handed them to staff.

They were big enough to see from adult standing height and could easily cut a child (esp with no shoe rule) or be eaten

Don't they have a Hoover????

siobod

Hi everyone,

This is Siobhan, owner of PPC. I was working there today in Ballsbridge myself, and I'm sure some of you posting here are referring to my personal apologies and efforts to get my team to tidy up the very best we could.

First off I would like to point out that safety and cleanliness are at the very top of our priority list. We go to great lengths to clean up these premises in Ballsbridge and Terenure despite the fact that the rugby club events feature a great deal of muddy boots, lots of drinking, and the inevitable dropped glasses. We don't just sweep and mop the floors - we routinely scrub muck off walls, skirting boards, windowsills, shelves, we clean windows, clear cobwebs, clean and fix chairs, remove chewing gum stuck to the carpets and wooden floors - we lavish vast hours on tidying up these premises in ways the rugby club (no offence) would never care to do.

The rugby club in Ballsbridge had a big match on yesterday, so there was a formal lunch AND a dinner in the club, but as per our contract, I am required to hand them a clean room, and they hand me back a clean one too - they have a cleaner who performs this service for them and she works for them, not me. I arrived in the club this morning at 8:30am to find the club's cleaner in the room, having already apparently hoovered, and she was mopping the dancefloor. By the time our team had set up all our toys and tables and started to notice bits of glass it was around 9:30am, so we had our own Miele hoover, dustbuster and dust pan out and three of us spent the next half hour inspecting the floor (which also suffered from copious amounts of cake having been thrown on the carpet unfortunately which we also spent time trying to wash out). It was clearly a big event last night, but admittedly this is not the first time we have found bits of glass on the floor - at events such as the club have glasses are inevitably broken. Usually we can clean it all up before we open to the public. I'm really sorry we didn't manage to clean everything up as fully as we could have, but with visitors already in the door and a birthday party due at 11am we did the best we could continuing to circulate the room throughout the morning.

I want everyone to know that we took today's events very seriously, and I have already started planning a formal complaint letter to the club's office manager and club secretary explaining that what happened today simply isn't acceptable, and I am going to suggest that they complete their cleaning suitably early enough following any day we have to close for my own team to arrive an hour or two earlier to conduct our own cleaning so as to ensure the quality of the result. I actually complained about this last week as we had to mop the floor ourselves as the cleaner wasn't done early enough but I was told "it was unusually dirty last week so the cleaner's start time will be fine going forward". After today's results this is clearly not the case.

In a way I'm very grateful for your comments here, as the gravity of the event is even more clear, and your comments on this board will be mentioned as part of my argument.

Thank you to those of you that support us, and to respond to the comment regarding that groove in the floor in our Terenure branch - I personally cleaned that out last week (as I routinely do every few weeks as I like to cast a fresh eye on things that need cleaning when I visit) and yes, it does collect a great deal of dirt, especially after the weekends: I will make sure that our team puts it on our daily cleaning list from now on.

Many thanks for your words of honesty and your continued support - I'm a mum of two kids myself and I'm so sorry that we put your kids in danger today - I'm actually getting emotional even thinking now of what could have happened today, thank goodness no-one was injured. I promise you I will follow through with this and we will strive to avoid any such event occurring again.

Siobhan

bp

siobod wrote: »

Hi everyone,

This is Siobhan, owner of PPC. I was working there today in Ballsbridge myself, and I'm sure some of you posting here are referring to my personal apologies and efforts to get my team to tidy up the very best we could.

First off I would like to point out that safety and cleanliness are at the very top of our priority list. We go to great lengths to clean up these premises in Ballsbridge and Terenure despite the fact that the rugby club events feature a great deal of muddy boots, lots of drinking, and the inevitable dropped glasses. We don't just sweep and mop the floors - we routinely scrub muck off walls, skirting boards, windowsills, shelves, we clean windows, clear cobwebs, clean and fix chairs, remove chewing gum stuck to the carpets and wooden floors - we lavish vast hours on tidying up these premises in ways the rugby club (no offence) would never care to do.

The rugby club in Ballsbridge had a big match on yesterday, so there was a formal lunch AND a dinner in the club, but as per our contract, I am required to hand them a clean room, and they hand me back a clean one too - they have a cleaner who performs this service for them and she works for them, not me. I arrived in the club this morning at 8:30am to find the club's cleaner in the room, having already apparently hoovered, and she was mopping the dancefloor. By the time our team had set up all our toys and tables and started to notice bits of glass it was around 9:30am, so we had our own Miele hoover, dustbuster and dust pan out and three of us spent the next half hour inspecting the floor (which also suffered from copious amounts of cake having been thrown on the carpet unfortunately which we also spent time trying to wash out). It was clearly a big event last night, but admittedly this is not the first time we have found bits of glass on the floor - at events such as the club have glasses are inevitably broken. Usually we can clean it all up before we open to the public. I'm really sorry we didn't manage to clean everything up as fully as we could have, but with visitors already in the door and a birthday party due at 11am we did the best we could continuing to circulate the room throughout the morning.

I want everyone to know that we took today's events very seriously, and I have already started planning a formal complaint letter to the club's office manager and club secretary explaining that what happened today simply isn't acceptable, and I am going to suggest that they complete their cleaning suitably early enough following any day we have to close for my own team to arrive an hour or two earlier to conduct our own cleaning so as to ensure the quality of the result. I actually complained about this last week as we had to mop the floor ourselves as the cleaner wasn't done early enough but I was told "it was unusually dirty last week so the cleaner's start time will be fine going forward". After today's results this is clearly not the case.

In a way I'm very grateful for your comments here, as the gravity of the event is even more clear, and your comments on this board will be mentioned as part of my argument.

Thank you to those of you that support us, and to respond to the comment regarding that groove in the floor in our Terenure branch - I personally cleaned that out last week (as I routinely do every few weeks as I like to cast a fresh eye on things that need cleaning when I visit) and yes, it does collect a great deal of dirt, especially after the weekends: I will make sure that our team puts it on our daily cleaning list from now on.

Many thanks for your words of honesty and your continued support - I'm a mum of two kids myself and I'm so sorry that we put your kids in danger today - I'm actually getting emotional even thinking now of what could have happened today, thank goodness no-one was injured. I promise you I will follow through with this and we will strive to avoid any such event occurring again.

Siobhan

Thank you for the reply - the service is usually impeccable

Hannibal Smith

To be fair siobhan...your issues with the clubs fairly explain the difficulties of opening a clean cafe in a rugby club but that remains your issue with the clubs and it doesn't excuse parents finding lumps of glass and having to leave.

In dealing with your own customers opening a safe clean environment is the responsibility of the panda cafe and you can't blame anyone else. If you're not satisfied the place has been thoroughly cleaned and checked you shouldn't open.

You say you clean out the groove in terenure regularly? We went there every Monday for months and it looked like it was never cleaned out.

January

Siobhan, while I appreciate you taking the time to reply to people here directly, you will have to contact reps@boards.ie and get yourself verified before I allow you to post on behalf of your business again. Thank you.

dublinlady

To be fair I frequent terenure and never find it dirty - I find the staff helpful and they will always keep an eye on my toddler for 2 secs if I need to change my youngests nappy etc, they have no obligation to do that and it's extremely helpful when your on your own with more than 1. I don't have issue with the venues and do see effort is placed on hygiene. I don't have affiliation other than being a customer but don't think it's fair to hang someone who is on 99.9% of occasions doing a great job and providing a very reasonable and good service.

Hannibal Smith

dublinlady wrote: »

To be fair I frequent terenure and never find it dirty - I find the staff helpful and they will always keep an eye on my toddler for 2 secs if I need to change my youngests nappy etc, they have no obligation to do that and it's extremely helpful when your on your own with more than 1. I don't have issue with the venues and do see effort is placed on hygiene. I don't have affiliation other than being a customer but don't think it's fair to hang someone who is on 99.9% of occasions doing a great job and providing a very reasonable and good service.

Im not trying to hang anyone. ..just stating what I found at terenure on more than one occasion. It definitely wasn't a one off.

MammaZita

If the owner of this establishment couldn't be bothered to thoroughly vacuum the place prior to opening on a Monday morning then I certainly wouldn't return.

Shards of glass from the night before is unacceptable anywhere- never mind in a children's play cafe!

I've heard this place is a licence to print money which makes it even more unacceptable as people are paying through the nose to attend. I've been to voluntarily run playgroups where these standards would not be accepted by the organisers- makes one wonder why a commercial enterprise would?!

January

siobod - as I mentioned above, please email the above email address to be verified before you can post about your business again.

siobod

MammaZita I'm afraid I am deeply offended by your comments.

If you read my post you would see that we spent a combined 1.5 hours of work hoovering the carpet before we opened, and felt we had cleaned the floor well enough to open the doors to our visitors. This was on top of the job that the club's cleaner was supposed to have sufficiently completed. I would also like to point out that the pieces of glass in question were usually smaller than half a grain of rice so we certainly couldn't see them all that easily - I can assure you it's not like we believed there were lots left when we opened.

As for the comment regarding this business being a licence to print money - I am a mother of 2 children and created this business for my peers. I actually feel like we are more a community service than a business, and our financial records would agree. I won't go into details as I'm not looking for any sympathy, but I'm afraid for every busy day we have here we have there are 3 or 4 that are quiet. Most of last summer we had just 4 or 5 visitors the entire day. I persevered because I believe in the value of this business and really love what we do here. Considering we ask a mere €6 for entry fee for the entire day, I wouldn't call this "paying through the nose" and with half a dozen play cafes in Dublin charging basically the exact same fees and the likes of Imaginosity charging 2 or 3 times this price, (for a visit where you cannot sit and enjoy your cup of tea whilst the children play) I can tell you that many people feel we are a godsend and vital to their sanity. People regularly make reference to what great value they get here as a creche in Dublin is normally €50 a day. We regularly see parents working on their computers and doing paperwork, achieving things they couldn't do at home unless they put the TV on for their kids.

I'm not trying to make excuses for the state of cleanliness Sunday morning, I'm trying to explain it, and I've sent my complaint letter to the club as promised, and hope to find the state of affairs very different after our closure this weekend. Whilst we could have forseen that it would be messy after the function on Saturday, it was not within my power to know that the club's cleaner wouldn't clean the venue sufficiently. I appreciate posters like Dublinlady who point out that such cleaning issues are not the norm for us, and I am very grateful for your support.

Kikster

While certainly glass in an environment is not a good thing and rather scary, I am a bit shocked how quickly people are willing to bash out. I wonder if the staff did not respond appropriately when told about the glass - oh wait, they did, didn't they? I wonder, if they never use a hoover - oh wait, she said she did and does so on a regular basis.

I have been in both venues many times, never had any issues, actually we had our little girls birthday party there the same day of the glass incident and no one found any glass, the staff even went so far and told us about it, so we took an extra good look around and found nothing.
I really like this place, been a haven many times and I have never had any issues what so ever. Mistakes happen, unfortunately, but in the end it is important how theses issues are being dealt with and from her response I feel like she is taking charge and making sure, it won't happen again - so what is the fuss about???

MammaZita

The fuss is about the fact there was broken glass there in the first place and the fact that the owner tried to blame the venue / rugby club when it was entirely her responsibility.

I'm sure you'd see what the fuss was about if a child or indeed adult had cut themselves due to the floor not being vacuumed prior to opening.

Gross negligence at the very least.

Hannibal Smith

Kikster wrote: »

While certainly glass in an environment is not a good thing and rather scary, I am a bit shocked how quickly people are willing to bash out. I wonder if the staff did not respond appropriately when told about the glass - oh wait, they did, didn't they? I wonder, if they never use a hoover - oh wait, she said she did and does so on a regular basis.

I have been in both venues many times, never had any issues, actually we had our little girls birthday party there the same day of the glass incident and no one found any glass, the staff even went so far and told us about it, so we took an extra good look around and found nothing.
I really like this place, been a haven many times and I have never had any issues what so ever. Mistakes happen, unfortunately, but in the end it is important how theses issues are being dealt with and from her response I feel like she is taking charge and making sure, it won't happen again - so what is the fuss about???

No one's creating a fuss. ..if you read the thread you'll see the majority of people are praising the service.

Not everyone is going to like a particular service...it was a great service and served a purpose for meeting up with friends but I wouldn't call it impeccable and all it will take is for your kid to find a flaw and that can change your thinking

Fries-With-That

siobod wrote: »

Hi everyone,

This is Siobhan, owner of PPC. I was working there today in Ballsbridge myself, and I'm sure some of you posting here are referring to my personal apologies and efforts to get my team to tidy up the very best we could

You were there, you apologised to members of the public that found glass on the floor of a childrens play area, if you were alerted to the fact that there was still glass in the play area you should have closed the area until you had verified that it was free from glass.

siobod wrote: »

First off I would like to point out that safety and cleanliness are at the very top of our priority list. We go to great lengths to clean up these premises in Ballsbridge and Terenure despite the fact that the rugby club events feature a great deal of muddy boots, lots of drinking, and the inevitable dropped glasses. We don't just sweep and mop the floors - we routinely scrub muck off walls, skirting boards, windowsills, shelves, we clean windows, clear cobwebs, clean and fix chairs, remove chewing gum stuck to the carpets and wooden floors - we lavish vast hours on tidying up these premises in ways the rugby club (no offence) would never care to do

Regarding the above, your customers don't care how dirty the place is before they use it, what they expect is that you have the place in a clean safe condition for their children

siobod wrote: »

The rugby club in Ballsbridge had a big match on yesterday, so there was a formal lunch AND a dinner in the club, but as per our contract, I am required to hand them a clean room, and they hand me back a clean one too - they have a cleaner who performs this service for them and she works for them, not me. I arrived in the club this morning at 8:30am to find the club's cleaner in the room, having already apparently hoovered, and she was mopping the dancefloor. By the time our team had set up all our toys and tables and started to notice bits of glass it was around 9:30am, so we had our own Miele hoover, dustbuster and dust pan out and three of us spent the next half hour inspecting the floor (which also suffered from copious amounts of cake having been thrown on the carpet unfortunately which we also spent time trying to wash out). It was clearly a big event last night, but admittedly this is not the first time we have found bits of glass on the floor - at events such as the club have glasses are inevitably broken.

You and your team noticed bits of glass at around 9.30 and used a Miele hoover etc, if you have as you mentioned above found the premises in a filthy condition, with broken glass etc, you should realise that a domestic standard hoover isn't up to the job and 1 hour isn't sufficient time to have the premises in pristine condition.

siobod wrote: »

Usually we can clean it all up before we open to the public. I'm really sorry we didn't manage to clean everything up as fully as we could have, but with visitors already in the door and a birthday party due at 11am we did the best we could continuing to circulate the room throughout the morning.

You knew about the glass, and you've admitted that you went ahead and opened anyway, do you think parents would have been that upset if you delayed opening by 30 minutes and explained why.

siobod wrote: »

I want everyone to know that we took today's events very seriously, and I have already started planning a formal complaint letter to the club's office manager and club secretary explaining that what happened today simply isn't acceptable, and I am going to suggest that they complete their cleaning suitably early enough following any day we have to close for my own team to arrive an hour or two earlier to conduct our own cleaning so as to ensure the quality of the result. I actually complained about this last week as we had to mop the floor ourselves as the cleaner wasn't done early enough but I was told "it was unusually dirty last week so the cleaner's start time will be fine going forward". After today's results this is clearly not the case

I'd be very careful as to how you word your letter of complaint as if they are reading boards I'm sure they are far from happy with your attempts to minimise your responsibility at their expense.

siobod wrote: »

In a way I'm very grateful for your comments here, as the gravity of the event is even more clear, and your comments on this board will be mentioned as part of my argument.

Thank you to those of you that support us, and to respond to the comment regarding that groove in the floor in our Terenure branch - I personally cleaned that out last week (as I routinely do every few weeks as I like to cast a fresh eye on things that need cleaning when I visit) and yes, it does collect a great deal of dirt, especially after the weekends: I will make sure that our team puts it on our daily cleaning list from now on

Again you were aware of a problem and now that it has been aired in public you intend to add it to a daily cleaning list.

siobod wrote: »

Many thanks for your words of honesty and your continued support - I'm a mum of two kids myself and I'm so sorry that we put your kids in danger today - I'm actually getting emotional even thinking now of what could have happened today, thank goodness no-one was injured. I promise you I will follow through with this and we will strive to avoid any such event occurring again.



Siobhan

I don't know you or the people that complained to you,but you are incredibly fortunate that people have taken the time to complain. You need to be proactive not reactive, if you see something is wrong don't wait for a complaint. It is your business, you should be the person that cares the most and be prepared to crack the whip if things are not up to standard.

share bear

I would agree that you should have delayed opening until you were satisfied there was no glass left however I would imagine that it would be very hard to get all bits of broken glass from an area that size.

Unfortunately I don't think its feasible to have a play area in this kind of location and for that reason I won't be returning as Id be sitting at the edge of my seat wondering wether or not there was a party the night before and if they managed to get all the glass.

I will be a bit lost without it, as I really enjoyed going and its a great place for infants to socialise.

January

Reply from siobod as above

MammaZita I'm afraid I am deeply offended by your comments.

If you read my post you would see that we spent a combined 1.5 hours of work hoovering the carpet before we opened, and felt we had cleaned the floor well enough to open the doors to our visitors. This was on top of the job that the club's cleaner was supposed to have sufficiently completed. I would also like to point out that the pieces of glass in question were usually smaller than half a grain of rice so we certainly couldn't see them all that easily - I can assure you it's not like we believed there were lots left when we opened.

As for the comment regarding this business being a licence to print money - I am a mother of 2 children and created this business for my peers. I actually feel like we are more a community service than a business, and our financial records would agree. I won't go into details as I'm not looking for any sympathy, but I'm afraid for every busy day we have here we have there are 3 or 4 that are quiet. Most of last summer we had just 4 or 5 visitors the entire day. I persevered because I believe in the value of this business and really love what we do here. Considering we ask a mere €6 for entry fee for the entire day, I wouldn't call this "paying through the nose" and with half a dozen play cafes in Dublin charging basically the exact same fees and the likes of Imaginosity charging 2 or 3 times this price, (for a visit where you cannot sit and enjoy your cup of tea whilst the children play) I can tell you that many people feel we are a godsend and vital to their sanity. People regularly make reference to what great value they get here as a creche in Dublin is normally €50 a day. We regularly see parents working on their computers and doing paperwork, achieving things they couldn't do at home unless they put the TV on for their kids.

I'm not trying to make excuses for the state of cleanliness Sunday morning, I'm trying to explain it, and I've sent my complaint letter to the club as promised, and hope to find the state of affairs very different after our closure this weekend. Whilst we could have forseen that it would be messy after the function on Saturday, it was not within my power to know that the club's cleaner wouldn't clean the venue sufficiently. I appreciate posters like Dublinlady who point out that such cleaning issues are not the norm for us, and I am very grateful for your support

MammaZita

January wrote: »

Reply from siobod as above

You may have "felt" you cleaned the place properly- but clearly you didn't as evidenced by the shards of glass all over the floor!! Again you continue to blame the premises and their cleaning staff. Totally unacceptable. And comparing your business to a crèche or Imaginosity is just ludicrous!!

The fact that you fail to grasp the seriousness of broken glass on the floor in the play cafe just beggars belief.

Chattastrophe!

I've heard a lot about Panda Cafe and was half-thinking of visiting there someday, when my baby is a bit older, even though it's a bit of a trek for me.

If the owner had come on here posting about how absolutely mortified they are that this happened, stating how they find it completely inexcusable that there would ever be shards of glass in a childrens play area, and explaining the actions being taken to ensure it can never happen again ... maybe I'd still consider going there.

But coming on here and trying to make excuses for it, basically defending the indefensible? I really don't feel assured that it couldn't happen again.

You say you had to open despite knowing the place wasn't fully clean because there was a birthday party due - if I was the parent in question, I would SO much rather that the party was delayed, or even cancelled, rather than risk the safety of my child and others.

Boards.ie: Niamh

A response from Siobhán from Panda Play Café:

It really saddens me that several people posting here seem to be under the impression that we don't care about safety. The events of Sunday morning have been portrayed as if there were pieces of glass all over the play cafe area, when in reality, we were slowly searching for hours for every glint of every tiniest particle of glass, walking around, hoovering, sweeping, and we hoped each fragment was the last we would find. I think at the most there were 4 or 5 fragments were found by visitors who were for the most part specifically searching for them after the first one was found. My own team searching found another couple, but they found less than half a dozen fragments in a space that is the total size of a 4 or 5 bedroom house. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying this is acceptable, it 100% isn't, but because of the nature of the comments here I am trying to give you perspective as many of you weren't there. Several people here clearly believe we had chunks of glass all over the place, and we never would have dreamed of opening if this were the case. We worked very hard before we opened the doors at 10am, 1.5 hours worth of direct attention to the floor looking for these tiny shards, we found a few, and yes we missed a few, but once we had hoovered the full floor thoroughly we genuinely thought we had it all. With all of that said however, in hindsight now I agree that once the first fragment was found after opening I could have told everybody we had to close and ushered them all out. I think my judgement was clouded by the fact that a party was due at 11am and I was hoping that our continued efforts were successful in finding each fragment. I can tell you now that since Sunday morning we have spent around 6 hours hoovering this floor, with I promise you a very powerful and commercial-grade hoover, and we are continuing to do at least 2 hours each day, even though we have not seen another fragment of glass since Sunday lunchtime. We were here very late Sunday night and I am confident that with every square inch of the floor being swept and hoovered so many times over now that we have a safe environment again.

I have also had a meeting with the club officials this morning and whilst it appears that the function Saturday night involved an unprecedented amount of drinking, messing and throwing of glasses, we are going to be better prepared for such things in the future as they realise now that they don't want these kinds of extra boisterous function bookings anyway, and we will close for an extra day in the future, just for cleaning, and the club's cleaner will spend whatever time necessary to ensure everything is cleaned perfectly before we come in, inspect it ourselves and we will work on the floor area again to be sure. We will never compromise on this.

It has been said that I am putting all the blame on the club. I have told you the full story because I have been trying to explain the reason why the glass existed, pointing out that it was the club's activities that created the mess, not because I don't want to take the blame for it, but because we don't engage in such risky activities and I don't want people to be left with the impression that we offer a less than safe environment. We serve coffees in disposable cups with lids, our drinking glasses are heavy duty and shatterproof, all of our children's plates and cups are plastic, and in three years we've never had anything break that would cause a health and safety risk for our visitors. We go to great lengths to make this a safe environment, we don't compromise, safety and cleanliness go hand in hand with anything we do. I can assure you I will never forget the error in my judgement on Sunday, or forgive myself for the risk the children were put under. Thanks to the vigilance of the mothers, two of whom posted here on this board, we have picked up everything now, and having briefed my team on the events of Sunday we will ensure that we work even harder in the future to respond in the correct manner to any cleaning or safety concerns. I have been very upset by these posts that suggest we have no regard for our guest's safety, and as a result the last two days have been my most stressful since we set up over 3 years ago. We have learned a big lesson here, and promise to work even harder in the future.

dublinlady

One isolated incident - which granted should have been handled as a black and white case of to open or close for baby safety - does not complete my opinion of the two cafés. As I said I've spent more time in the terenure one but have visited both - I have had so many positive experiences which I feel should be taken into consideration and so feel compelled to post that here. Sometimes people in society now are very quick to just focus in the negative and I feel there is an awful lot of positives about this organisation too. A mistake was made - I appreciate the response - i don't doubt the safety of my kids and always am watching them like a hawk anyway to keep them safe and to ensure they are playing nicely!! Anyway I'll be back and hope the service continues as it is an extremely valuable one.

Actually on a side it really annoys me when there are parents there who don't watch their kids - it's not a crèche the staff aren't paid to mind your children - please for god sake look up from ur phones occasionally and notice that ur child is about to jump off a car table or is throwing hard toys in the ball pool! I'd be more worried about the unsupervised kids causing my children harm than the organisation as this is the only incident of dispute with the organisation whereas every time I go there some child is left ignored by its mother to cause chaos and danger.....
Now that's off my chest too!

Fries-With-That

Boards.ie: Niamh wrote: »

A response from Siobhán from Panda Play Café:

Fair play to you for being so forthright with your response. I think you have learned a valuable lesson.

I have sent you a PM.