Honda Center — Attraction in Anaheim

We attended a sold-out Shane Gillis (not a review of his show, venue only) show at the Honda Center, the lack of organization made it one of the most frustrating visits I have had to a venue of this size. The venue sucks.

The issue was how poorly the crowd was managed from crowd control and flow in the streets, to the crowded entries, to getting to our seats; it was a disorganized mess.

Our tickets listed an 8:00 PM showtime, which usually means doors open earlier to give people time to get inside, find their seats, and grab a drink. That did not happen. It looked like the doors opened right at 8:00 PM, and the show began around 8:30 (Maybe even sooner). This left thousands of guests rushing to enter, with very little time to settle in and grab drinks. As a result, many people missed the opening acts, who were well-known comedians that fans clearly wanted to see.

The beer lines were about 15 minutes long, and it is likely that mixed drink lines were even worse. It felt like the venue was understaffed and unprepared, which I'm attributing to the rush to get into the building. Things were even more frustrating for people with floor seats. They were not allowed to bring the beer cans purchased as stadium concessions to their seats. Floor ticket holders were told to pour 24-ounce beers into 18-ounce cups at the floor entrance. This caused people to stop and try to transfer their drinks, which blocked views and added to the overall confusion. Since the lines were so long, many guests were carrying two beers, which meant they had to either throw away or quickly drink 12 ounces of overpriced beer just to sit down.

It would have made far more sense for the venue to serve the drinks in the correct-sized cups at the time of purchase. That simple change would have avoided most of the hassle and improved the experience for everyone.

Parking was another major disappointment. Traffic control was poor, and the layout felt chaotic. It was almost as bad as SoFi...

The show itself was excellent. Shane Gillis and his openers were funny as hell. The issues were entirely due to poor planning and operations by the Honda Center management. While the staff did what they could, it was clear they were not given the support they needed. For a large and well-known arena in Anaheim, the Honda Center did not meet basic expectations for managing a sold-out event. I hope future shows are better organized, but based on this experience, I'll be sticking to Crypto or any other LA based venue before purchasing tickets here.

I usually include more “view from my seat” photos with my reviews, but I was not able to get to my seat until the show had already started, thus the shit review above.

If you are considering floor seats for Shane Gillis, I recommend looking at tickets in row 10 or farther back. You will have a better view of the side screens, which helps since he is not always facing the entire crowd directly. We were in row 6, seats 10 and 11. The view of the stage was very good, and we were close without being so close that it strained our necks. It looked like rows 1 through 4 were angled up quite a bit, so people there may have been looking up for most...

Never again. I attended a Ducks vs Blues game with my younger brother and experienced discriminatory behavior from the Honda Center staff members. From the beginning when we were making our way to our seats, an elderly woman who is a staff member for Honda Center instantly walked up to us and asked to see our tickets, and no one else around us. After reading our tickets with a distasteful look she rudely pointed us to our seats. After the Ducks game was over, the same elderly staff woman walked up to us and asked us to leave immediately. We simply nodded our heads and stayed seated a litter longer, waiting for other attendees to clear out so that it wouldn't be too much of a hassle navigating through everyone. The same elderly woman decides to keep harassing us demanding we leave. As I looked around, I noticed that around 30 others or so were still, some in their seats chatting, others taking pictures, a younger teen getting hockey sticks from a gentleman, and so on... and then there is us getting kicked out. Keep in mind my brother and I were the only 2 being asked to leave by this elderly woman to which we have brown skin while all the others, including herself, have white skin. Ultimately, my brother and I make our way to the stairs and I look back to see the elderly woman following us and nodding her head making disrespectful gestures. So I questioned myself why were we the only ones getting kicked? Then the elderly staff woman stopped to chat gracefully with a group of fanatics, and she didn't indicate them to leave. As we are halfway up the stairs, I look back again and noticed her talking to an elderly security man. By the time we got up the stairs, security caught up to us. The elderly security man walks up to my brother from behind and with his chest up, he leans on my brother's shoulder yelling at him to leave and commenting that he "doesn't belong here". To which my brother replies, "Okay just don't touch me." The elderly security man shouts back angrily saying "Don't try that with me, I'm not the one" with more profanity and decides to put his hands on my brother pushing him out. In these 5-10 minutes while the altercation is happening, I noticed that the other attendees didn't make their way up the stairs. This leads me to believe only my brother and I were asked to leave and not any of the other remaining attendees. I am still in disbelief at tonight's horrible experience. In my 27 years of living, I have never experienced such discriminatory behavior and harassment from anyone or a staff member from any other stadium or arena. We are all humans and we shouldn't be treated differently for the skin color we are born with. Staff members should make you feel welcome, making you want to come back. Not make you feel alienated. I'm saddened to not have ended this night with excitement after an interesting...

Update (as of 6/7/2025)...

There is major construction all around the stadium. They're directing almost everybody to the overflow parking lot near the corporate buildings. But if you have a handicap parking pass then you can immediately take a right hand turn and pull into the front lot of the stadium, and park by the front door.

If the game starts at 7pm, then the stadium only opens at 5:30pm. We got there right at opening and it was a nice slow paced amount of time to have dinner, get our drinks, then get to our seats in time for the national anthem.

You can use the Honda Center app to order food, pick it up, and beat the lines.

Section 225 sometimes has an Apricot Wheat Beer.

Section 209, in the large foyer there's a neon sign hanging from the ceiling saying EAT which points to a side room. This is the secret Golden Road bar and grill. Short lines for food and drink. More variety of beers here with 9 different Golden Road beers to choose from. They also have the regular Hefeweizen which is much better than the Mango Cart. As for food, if the grill isn't open then they still have premade food items to grab off the shelf with no wait.

If you are seated in the first two rows of the lower level, you qualify to catch the elevator at Section 219 and take it to the Jack Daniels Bar located on the CLUB level (300s). It has better selections of food and drink than the rest of the stadium. A bottle of wine is the same price as two glasses, so you might as well buy the bottle and they'll pour it into a plastic carafe for you that you can carry around the stadium. It also comes with cups that click into the bottom of the carafe for easy transport.

Later catch the elevator at Section 219 and take it to the top floor and it will open up at Section 430 which is the dessert stand! They have Cap n Crunch squares there which I love.

Continue over to Section 433 and there's a Mexican food stand sponsored by Wholey Guacamole. Your only choices are to build your own bowl or build your own nachos. The difference is that the bowl comes with white rice instead of chips. Also the bowl doesn't let you choose queso cheese. Finally the bowl doesn't let you choose double meet. This all happens in the self ordering kiosk. With that said, get the nachos. Unfortunately there are no burritos here. But the food is great!

If you parked in the overflow parking lot by the corporate buildings, then be sure to leave the stadium when there's 5 minutes left in the game. Otherwise it will be about a 1 hour wait to get out...