When school holidays roll around, numerous cafes and restaurants offer a “kids eat free” or “kids eat for £1” deal. Of course, it’s a great way to save money during expensive times of year, but it’s also a way for these venues to increase their profit by encouraging more customers through their doors.
The Pausa cafes at Dunelm stores, though, do things differently, in a way that helps families all year round. Their own “kids eat free” offer is available all day, every day, and all you need to do is spend £4 as the accompanying adult. For every £4 spent, one child can enjoy a main, two snacks and a drink. Spend £8, and you can feed two children for free.
And honestly? Reaching that threshold is pretty easy.
I didn’t fancy a full lunch on our visit to the Pausa cafe at Dunelm in Bury St Edmunds, so I ordered a maple and pecan latte and a cheese scone with butter, totalling £5.85 – comfortably over the minimum spend. That qualified my seven-year-old for his free meal, which meant choosing a main (pizza or toastie), two snacks and a drink from the selection on offer.
He chose a cheese toastie on white bread, a juice carton, a pack of mini Party Rings and a gingerbread snowman biscuit.
The toastie was proclaimed delicious, and the Party Rings were eaten well before it had been heated up and brought over. He saved the gingerbread snowman for later, and when he did get round to eating it, his response was, “I’d definitely get that again”. A successful lunch!
My cheese scone was decent – nicely dense, flavourful and a good size – and the seasonal latte, while not independent coffee shop quality, was very drinkable.
Despite the positives, our visit wasn’t perfect. The dining area could have been much cleaner – especially underneath the tables. The kids eat free offer could also be better signposted: it wasn’t advertised anywhere, and we had to queue up once to find out what was included, then again after choosing our items, which felt unnecessary. Finally, the team forgot to make my latte: after waiting a fair while I had to get up to ask about it. To their credit, they apologised and upgraded it to a large at no extra cost to make up for the mistake.
So…is the kids eat free deal at Pausa cafes in Dunelm stores any good?
Yes – genuinely. It’s excellent value, the required minimum spend is low, and there’s a decent amount of choice available for kids and adults alike. The fact that the offer runs all year round is a bonus for families – and despite the few small niggles, we’d happily visit again.