San Francisco Cited as Most Pretentious American City

Café Valet Pretension Index Looks at Most and Least Pretentious American Cities

ST. LOUIS — Noting an increase in macchiato swirls, poetry readings, Moleskines and animal acupuncturists, Café Valet has cited San Francisco as America’s Most Pretentious City in their first annual Pretension Index, a quantitative analysis of pretension levels in America.

Developed by a team of data scientists, the Pretension Index examines where these modern day latte art lovers are most concentrated, mining data from a variety of sources including the U.S. Census Bureau, Facebook, local business data and more in the 50 most populous U.S. metro areas.

San Francisco earned a Pretension Index score of 85 out of a potential 100, besting San Jose (64), San Diego (59), Denver (56) and Portland (56).“As the standard-bearers for the ‘Regular Joe,’ we fear for San Francisco’s future,” said Andrew Barnett, who led the analysis for Café Valet. “The notion that people are paying $100 for civet coffee to drink while wearing a woolen cap in the summertime is a problematic trend.”

The Pretension Index examines not only America’s most pretentious cities but also the least pretentious ones, noting major U.S. cities that eschew the trappings of the cultural elite (such as art galleries on every block downtown, Whole Foods that are leading the way to gentrifying neighborhoods and the struggling poets who are just a little bit better than you and me).

Birmingham and Riverside, California led the list of the least pretentious cities with a score of 18, followed by Detroit (20), Dallas (20) and St. Louis (22).

“It’s good to know there are cities remaining in America where people still hate Sting, know their mechanics by their first names and would rather go four-wheeling than play squash,” added Barnett.

METHODOLOGY

Café Valet analyzed the top 50 U.S. metro areas, each with populations of 1,000,000 or more. The Pretension Index was calculated based upon a combination of metrics from three categories.

Local business concentration (63% of the overall score) is based on the following five metrics from business data providers Infogroup and Localeze:

• The number of independent coffee shops per capita. The higher the concentration, the more pretentious.
• The number of yoga studios per capita. The higher the concentration, the more pretentious.
• The number of art galleries per capita. The higher the concentration, the more pretentious.
• The number of Whole Foods per capita. The higher the concentration, the more pretentious.The number of Walmart stores per capital. The lower the concentration, the more pretentious.

Area interests (25% of the overall score) is based on the following five metrics from Facebook Audience Insights.

• Indexed number of people interested in philosophy by metro area. The greater the interest, the more pretentious.
• Indexed number of people interested in poetry by metro area. The greater the interest, the more pretentious.
• Indexed number of people interested in Moleskine notebooks by metro area. The greater the interest, the more pretentious.
• Indexed number of people interested in Sting by metro area. The greater the interest, the more pretentious.
• Ownership of electric or hybrid cars by metro area. The higher the ownership, the more pretentious. (This data from Edmunds / R.L. Polk)

Area activities (12% of the overall score) is based on two metrics from business data providers Infogroup and Localeze.

• The number of community gardens per capita. The higher the concentration, the more pretentious.
• The number of opera-related events per capita. The more events, the more pretentious.

About Café Valet

Since 2003, Café Valet's 100 percent Arabica coffees have been enjoyed by millions of consumers in hotels across the United States. Today, more than one million hotel rooms feature Café Valet's patented single-serve coffee system, with more than 100 million servings annually. Café Valet's parent company, St. Louis-based Courtesy Products, has been serving the lodging industry for more than 60 years. For more information, visit CafeValet.com.