'Coffee House Tricks'

[Littlewood]

There's a guy at work, uses this saying all the time!

He won't say what exactly it means, he just says "it's a black country saying" - Anyone from black country who can tell me?

 

[hairylegs]

might be something to do with the Birmingham Pub Bombings

 

[hairyclaws]

A 'coffee house trick' is a sharp practice. My maternal grandma was a brummy and my family used the expression a lot when I was small. But my husband is Salford born and bred, and his dad also used to say it.

 

[plmval]

Coffee House Tricks references:

Moot Room exchange of ideas, information, commercial goods & services became “coffee House tricks” to the disenfranchised.

Quote; “Polite conversation led to reasoned and sober debate on matters of politics, science, literature and poetry, commerce and religion, so much so that London coffeehouses became known as ‘penny universities’, as that was the price of a cup of coffee. Influential patrons included Samuel Pepys, John Dryden, Alexander Pope and Isaac Newton”

Reference; https://www.historic-uk.com/CultureUK/English-Coffeehouses-Penny-Universities/