Kids Empire Glen Allen — Attraction in Short Pump

This review is based on hosting a birthday party.

We hosted our sons fourth birthday party at Kids Empire, at the Glen Allen location in Virginia.

And while my son had the best time with all his closest friends and family, I do have some feedback to share.

The decorations made party planning super easy. The facility was super clean and definitely got energy out! The huggy parade was super cute and added a nice touch. Providing pizza, gummy bears, and drinks were perfect. I felt like I really didn’t have to do much to prepare, except get the cake.

But, with all the good feedback, I do have some constructive feedback.

We arrived 30 minutes early to the party time. We were holding a full sheet cake, balloons, presents, and all of our baskets full of shoes and socks and belongings for at least 20 minutes before we could get to the desk. I would have expected a party to get somewhat of a priority in line to assure set up before guests arrive.

But then, the majority of my guests waited in line for 45 minutes before even getting to a register. So again, paying for a three hour party, for our guests to only enjoy a little over two hours of it, is inappropriate and to be quite honest, not what we paid for.

As well, information when booking a party, says that you have a party host that directs the children so that the parents can “enjoy some time to talk amongst themselves“. This was not the case. Our party host checked in, but most of the time, either I or my husband, weee tracking her down for drinks, gummy bear refills, even down to bringing out the cake.

When it came time for the cake, the cake was brought out but, no lighter, no cake cutting utensils, no plates, no forks, which were stated to have been supplied at that time. So we had to go hunt down our host again to get these items which to me, should have come out with the cake. In addition, we had to cut and serve our cake (again not what we paid for). Not that it was a big deal, but there were no forks at the facility. So we wound up using spoons.

And while I know the girls at the desk, and everyone who was working that day were frustrated, and I empathize with that, one girl just kept on snickering. I do not know her name, but when asked for anything, she acted as though this happens all the time.

With this being said, I don’t feel the value of what we paid for the party (we had a large party) was met, and this was due to the above. But also, it did not meet your birthday party “what to expect“ document that you provide to your customers.

I hope this review puts some better customer service practices in place to assure future guests hosting a birthday party do not have the...

The only reason this isn’t lower is because the kids had a great time. As a parent spending over $600 I expected more, let me start at the beginning. In order to prepare, I (birthday child’s father) arrived 45 min before our party start time to help set up and was told I can’t get in yet. Fine, I can appreciate policy but if you know you have 8 parties happening at once, why not let adults showing up to setup in earlier so you have fewer people to process. The outcome…was not allowed in until 5 minutes AFTER my party start time because large parties that showed up after me were prioritized for reasons unknown. That was hit 1. When I finally get to the counter and ask how can I avoid a situation like that in the future, a person in a black polo tells me “well, you’re getting in now…” with a very aggressive tone. Hit 2. So now I’m in and scrambling to prepare my party for my guests and at the time we’re expecting pizzas prepared by the facility (not before they’ll be late but at the time they should have arrived!) we are told they’ll be late. Hit 3. So now my party has gathered all our children to eat but there’s no food…toddlers get restless and parents get annoyed. Here was the nail in the coffin for me. When the cake comes out, we had pre-purchased customary items needed for the birthday song portion that we could not find. Going back to the beginning when the wouldn’t allow me in to setup, I was instructed to leave all my decorations with the clerk at the counter and they would make sure it got to my table. Turns out they mistook an item and kept it behind they’re counter. So now for the second time, children have been gathered and parents are dealing with restless toddlers because everyone is waiting due to a situation created by the staff that could have been avoided with a little critical thinking, preparation and adaptability. This is all my personal experience without getting into zero supervision in the play area, the chaos around the electric bike area or watching kids get dropped kicked coming off the slides. I’ll follow strict timelines but when I do I expect the same courtesy. My kid loved it but I was with them the entire time and can only imagine what would have transpired if I hadn’t. Nice facility, great idea….very poor execution and...

My kids had a really fun time here and are begging to go back. It was clean and there was more than enough seating. Things I wish were different:

1. Everyone must have socks. The socks are pricey for being generic socks. Trampoline parks at least have nice quality grip socks. Grip socks would probably be safer for the kiddos too. Please update your socks. Cute, but need grippers. Wear your own socks instead of buying theirs. Everyone.

2)The little kids area rules are dumb. Please change them to a height limit or age restriction. Some kids potty train at 2 and others at 3+. The 2 year olds shouldn't be restricted from this area because they are potty trained. Most ridiculous rule I've ever heard. Also, it's really far from the main area so I'd you have kids of different ages, it's hard to monitor both. Having a staff member or two at the large area to kinda be like life guards would ease my mind knowing my bigger kid is safe. The trampoline parks do this and it would be a great idea here too. The dance room is fun, but again, who is monitoring this very closed off area. No line of sight there at all. With multiple kids playing, it made me uncomfortable not knowing what children were doing in there. One time we went in and big kids were on the tiny balance bikes beating up the wall and almost running my 3 year old over. No parent in sight. There is enough staff there to have help monitoring children.

3. The little balance bikes are fun, but please put an age limit on these. Waaaay too big of kids were using them, and hogging them while age-appropriate kiddos were standing around waiting and crying for them. Can you make a specific area for them by the little kids area to better manage their usage.

4. Please post a menu of food options and pricing and allow people to bring their own water. More healthy snacks please.

5. Staff wasn't happy go lucky like a kids place should have. Please train your staff to engage kids, manage the play area some, and thoroughly know how to answer parents questions and concerns.

We will probably be back, but I'd love to see some additional changes and kinks worked out. We didn't do any of the...