Bar Merlo UQ

While there are a few great cafes at UQ, Merlo is definitely my favourite place to grab a coffee on those early mornings at uni.
There is often massive line up and people crowding around waiting for their orders (especially at peak times) but don’t be discouraged. Merlo had the fastest system I have ever seen. Multiple people taking orders, one person frothing milk, one person doing coffee shots and another person pouring coffees and calling out the orders. Seriously, I am yet to see a coffee shop that is better managed and organised than Merlo. I have never had to wait more than 5 mins for my order, which is incredible considering how insanely busy it gets.
It is a little bit higher priced than other coffee shops on campus ($ 4.40 for a medium — 12oz), however I can justify the price because of how reliable and fast they are.
If the main counter is way too busy they do also have a little coffee cart situated in the outdoor seating area. However, there are generally only one or two staff members manning the cart, so my guess is that it would take longer. I always go straight for the main counter.
Oh, and did I mention the brownies? So damn good.

Good coffee, and the best option for take home beans in St Lucia/​Toowong — about $ 9 ($ 8 if you reuse the tin) gets you 200g of beans and a free coffee, effectively bringing it to $ 4 if you were buying a coffee anyway. That being said, it is a popular campus coffee spot — expect queues with mid-​long wait times.
I wouldn’t recommend ordering the food — there are better options nearby, and it being an older sandstone building there are occasionally roaches around (on one notable occasion, I pointed one in the food cabinet out to staff, who removed it and carried on, so I’m assuming this happens a bit.

A very cosy location for catching up friends and of course, enjoying the coffee.

Very long wait time over lunch every day of the semester. Overpriced food. Good coffee, decent service. Far too loud to have a good atmosphere, recommend sitting outside.

Coffee is always excellent and speedy, even when there’s a huge queue. The food is really good and fresh for a small coffee shop, during semester the funghi pizza is delicious and during the summer break the range of focaccias are really nice too. I like their muffins, baked fresh first thing, with coffee as well. All the staff are really friendly too! Great place, great service, 5 stars.

Merlo coffee is great coffee (Americans: by coffee I mean espresso. That junk you drink is not coffee). This place is the only place I order coffee from while on campus. It’s easily the best coffee on campus. Can get very busy after 11am during semester. Great selection of pastries. You can get café-​style food here for lunch.
My only gripe about the place is their BLT always has rubbery underdone bacon. NO MERLO NO!!! The BLT is an American foodstuff (they do this well, unlike coffee) and the bacon must be CRISPY. Because of this one flaw, four stars not five. If you fix it by next semester start I’ll up it to five stars.
Logistics: It’s near the Great Court entrance to the SS&H Library and IT support desk area at the Duhig building end of Great Court. Look for the blue Merlo umbrellas in the outdoor area. Line up on the right to order, then wait to the left if you are ordering takeaway. Inside its very noisy but great atmosphere.
Outside of semester it closes at 4pm or sometimes earlier — check to see if its open if the weekend (usually not outside of semester).

«Merlos» is a UQ institution. The coffee is always top notch, the prices are reasonable and the staff is friendly. Often the place is crazy busy, but the guys have such an efficient system, even during peak periods (with 20 or more orders ahead of me), I’ve never had to wait more than 10 minutes. Once I ducked in between tutorials (I’m the tutor) for a much needed fix, and had the nerve to ask the server if they could put a rush on it, and with a wink and no hint of annoyance, he covertly slipped my order close to the front. I certainly wouldn’t make a habit out of it, but in this instance was very grateful for the courtesy. Sorry to the other patrons…

Ah BarMerlo, near the Duhig Library where Unicard is located. It can’t help but get extremely busy here, really packed and in this quaint little corner of the main court, I suspect many if not most of all the thousands of university students have come to get their regular caffeine fix.
And fix you can get with your double shot affogato, or cappacino. If you’re lucky enough to be able to get a seat at one of the cosy little tables underneath the massive trees that point the way to the union complex, the atmosphere has been good to you. you can spend a while chatting away, reading a book watching the anxious and steady stream of students walk on by. The coffee is smooth, the coffee is aromatic, the coffee is Unilocalingly high quality for a university coffee place.
I love this place, the biscotti is really nice with your coffee too if you ever get the chance. The Chai Latte’s are nothing to be scoffed at either, with the creamy frothed milk, how can you not just love it.

With probably the best coffee in UQ (with a rotating featured bean), a beautiful location adjoining the grassy Great Court and food options, it’s easy to see why there are such big lines for this place around the clock. The staff are usual pretty friendly, though perhaps sometimes a bit ‘too cool for school’. Once you place your order they’ll ask you for your name and then you wait awkwardly amid the crush of bodies for your takeaway, or take a seat if you’re dining in and they’ll bring your order out to you.
There are fun and games on offer too. On Fridays from 2−3pm you can play scissors, paper, rock with the barista and if you win you get a free coffee! If you lose you have to buy one, or run away and risk becoming a social pariah.

This is the place I come to when exhausted and my mind needs a kick. It’s one of those habits I dream of while reading or writing in some obscure part of the library. It’s a reward I suppose, and as I’m on a student’s income I limit myself to a piccolo, and when rich I add some toasted banana bread.
This is one of the privileges to study, the ability to take time out of the day to sit and sip at a nice café such as this. Bar Merlo may be busy, in fact extremely busy, but the coffee is served fast. These guys have the routine down, and there’s rarely a mishap.
There are other coffee shops on campus, but this is the best. The food and cakes they serve are also better in quality than other ventures in the area. If looking for a caffeine hit while wandering St. Lucia campus, this is the place to get it.

There are not enough fingers on my hands to count the number of loyalty cards (every tenth coffee is free) I go through every semester at Merlo. All I know for sure is that I definitely would not be passing my courses (or even staying awake throughout lectures) without Merlo.
Visiting at least once a day (three times on average during exam block), the friendly staff remember me, and often place my order before I even reach the till. Each week there is a new bean of the week — always fair trade and sourced from places such as Jamaica, Kenya and Costa Rica. They bake an assortment of muffins everyday, and it becomes ridiculously hard to resist the waft of warm raspberry and white chocolate muffins for the fourth time in a week. So it’s best not to resist.
Despite my loyalty and successive visits, I never seem to be able to win the ‘rock-​off’ (paper-​scissors-​rock against the barista) which ensures you a free coffee every Friday between 2 and 3pm. Fortunately for my battered competitive streak, they serve up one damn good coffee, so the initial disappointment quickly evaporates.
So thank you Merlo, for ensuring that I will have a degree and a semblance of knowledge upon the completion of my university years.

I am a BarMerlo UQ regular. And by regular I mean I go there almost everyday, sometime multiple times a day. Being a humanities student at the University of Queensland, I practically live in the Social Science and Humanities Library, where Merlo is located. They have probably the best position of any of the cafes on campus, connecting to the library but also having plenty of outdoor seating jetting out into the iconic sandstone encompassed great court area. I have spent all too many hours sitting with a coffee here, watching the crows, chatting with other students, reading, writing, and even having meetings with my thesis supervisor.
Merlo gets pretty busy but they are well staffed for it and even when there is a giant line up you always get a smile. They churn their coffees out pretty quickly so you never have much of a wait for either takeaway or table service. And the coffee is good. I regularly get either their smooth latte, delicious iced coffee in summer or delectable hot chocolate with marsh mellows in winter. The food is also good. They have a nice selection of foccacias and toasties as well as some chocolate cookies that are true indulgence.
I adore this Merlo, not only because the service is good and the coffee and food hit the spot but because it is beautifully situated and has become such a prominent part of my university years. I totally recommend BarMerlo UQ if you find yourself on campus.