That's nice to hear, I've always wondered about that. I grew up in a small town where every business for young people to hang out would fail. It was partially because we didn't have much money to spend, but I realized later in life that we didn't feel any responsibility for supporting the businesses in return. It's not that we were selfish necessarily, we just didn't understand how things work. Then when a business would shut down we would all complain about how we had nowhere to go, but failed to consider the fact that we had utilized the place to the fullest extent without making many financial purchases. As I recall this happened with an arcade, a couple of coffee shops, a skating rink and various other businesses.

Now that I'm older I do see a lot more clearly that when you find a business that you like, you should make a point to support them and help them to stick around.

Local coffee shop owner here in town echoed that to me last year. The teens hanging out rarely buy anything. Adults 'hanging out' are often working (or studying) and are far more spendy(?). He counted me in that 'spendy' lot, but I'd rarely spend more than a couple bucks every hour ($4 coffee, then a few hours later a coke, banana or $2 tea). So... the 'non-spenders' really are not spending (I feel like a cheapskate half the time I was there).

If you're not there during peak times, then your presence potentially serves as some social proof that the place is worth visiting too. Probably better to have one customer on their laptop than a completely empty café.

We've heard this point quite a bit.

Totally. I work from coffeeshops all the time and find it a form of good patronage to buy something every few hours and leave a tip. Most people I know do the same.