Iran’s café culture buckles as everyday life contracts

Mohsen Mobarra, head of the union overseeing coffee shops in Tehran, told economic daily Donya-e-Eqtesad that café operating costs have more than doubled while customer numbers have fallen by as much as 50 percent in recent months, with up to 40 percent of cafés shutting down.

“Continuing operations does not mean profitability,” he said. “The profits of these businesses are steadily shrinking. As a result, cafés that rent their locations or lack strong financial backing are heading toward closure.”

Over the past two decades, cafés became an important part of urban life in Iran, taking root in Tehran before spreading across the country.

With affordable entertainment options limited, they emerged as some of the few accessible spaces where young Iranians could socialize, work and spend time outside the home.

Many evolved into more than places to drink coffee or eat light meals. They hosted poetry nights, small music performances, photography exhibitions and informal gatherings, becoming rare spaces for social interaction at a time when few other public spaces remained accessible.

Until a few months ago, Tehran alone had around 6,000 cafés of different sizes in operation. But the collapse in consumers’ purchasing power has hit the industry hard.

Sanaz, a 28-year-old receptionist at a private company, said she and her friends used to visit cafés several times a week. But now, with sharp increases in the costs of food, transportation and housing, even such small pleasures require careful calculation.

“I have to calculate every expense, even this simple form of entertainment, just to make it to the end of the month — assuming I don’t lose my job,” she said.

“If I lose my job, after years of financial independence, I’ll have to move back to my parents’ home in my hometown.”

The closures and downsizing have also eliminated jobs for many workers, most of them young people and women.

Shana, 26, completed professional barista training before finding work at one of the branches of the well-known Saedi Nia café chain.

In January, the chain’s branches were abruptly shut down after the owner voiced support for opposition protesters. Shortly afterward, war broke out.

“Even cafés that have survived the economic downturn are not hiring new staff anymore,” she said. “Many are actually laying off existing employees.”

“I have no hope that even by learning new skills like cooking or other work, I’ll be able to find a job. The economy keeps getting worse every day, and the job market is shrinking.”

Coffee itself is also becoming a luxury.

Tea remains Iran’s dominant traditional drink, but coffee consumption expanded rapidly in recent years. Now, however, the sharp rise in foreign currency prices and disruptions to imports have pushed coffee prices so high that many households are cutting consumption or abandoning it altogether.

Although global coffee prices have declined, the cost of coffee beans in Iran — largely imported through the United Arab Emirates before the war — has nearly doubled compared to pre-war levels.

The increase has directly affected café prices. With rents and other expenses also rising, the price of a cup of coffee in some cafés has climbed by as much as four times.

One café owner told Donya-e-Eqtesad that even cafés specializing in basic coffee drinks are seeing falling demand because many people can no longer justify going out even for coffee.

Tara, the manager of an advertising company with ten employees, said coffee has become so expensive that even buying it for office use is increasingly difficult.

“For the first time in the past twenty years, I’ve had to stop buying coffee for the office kitchen, where it was always available for employees alongside tea,” she said.

“It’s not just about coffee prices. Since last summer’s war, work has effectively been frozen. Clients have even canceled half-finished projects, and everyone knows the company is taking its last breaths.”

“If this situation continues, we’ll have no choice but to shut down.”