Silky Otter Ponsonby — Local services in Waitematā

I thought I would share my thoughts on why my wife and I will never frequent your establishment again in the slim hope you will endeavour to lift your game to a reasonable standard as to what should be expected when paying $30 a ticket.

The film my wife and I visited at your Ponsonby cinema yesterday (Sat 24th June) was for the 6pm showing of 'The Flash'. From the moment we arrived, we were rather 'lost' and found the experience overall 'confusing'. There was nothing really made clear right from the start about where we order food, how we order food and where is the cinema and waiting room.

Your maitre'd simply asked for our e-tickets, provided a card with our seat numbers then said take a seat gesturing to what looked like the restaurant section of your cinema right at front. We did not want to eat at the restaurant. We wanted to order food for the duration of the film.

We sat down amongst plated tables which was awkward....No one came to ask us what we would like, so we made our way (looking rather sheepishly confused now) to the bar only to be greeted by a girl / bar lady who was rather cold, unpleasant and not friendly whatsoever. I asked her how we order food and where the cinema is as no one had directed this to us. She responded rather 'sarcastically' and said we will bring it into the cinema. So we placed an order for a flat white, small popcorn and one truffle chips and one kumara chips. I then asked where the cinema was. She then 'coldly' directed me to two other staff that were standing to the left of us like gatekeepers.

They asked to see our cinema card and that they would come and get us for when the film was ready. By this time it was 5.45pm so we anticipated being inside imminently.

At this stage we commented that each of the staff we'd met were incredibly unhelpful, non friendly, non courteous and seemed to pass us over to another staff member who equally was not knowledgeable.

Then we ended up seeing how dirty the cinema complex was. The corridor which then found out for ourselves - is the waiting room.. had half eaten boxes of popcorn strewn around the tables. Used blankets thrown in a heap on the couch chairs. The bar leaners and chairs at the end of the corridor had greasy smears all over the tables. It certainly did not appear clean. More so filthy. Your bathroom was like a public convenience. Well the one I frequented was.

No one came and got us for the cinema even though you had two staff standing aimlessly at the front. We decided at 5.55pm to try and find the cinema (number 1) ourselves. This itself was a challenge as you had no ushers standing at the entrances. No real signage. Nothing really clear.. Finally we asked another patron who was equally lost where he thought cinema 1 was at. Again no help from any of your staff.

Inside cinema 1 we found chocolate drops and popcorn lying on the carpet from the previous session so not clean. We found our seats but the final insult was the chips we ordered (both kumara and potato) when served were stone cold and disgusting. I then had to chase up our flat white by grabbing one of your theatre staff that had brought in food for our neighbour.

The only good experience was the film.

I have to say that we will never return to your unfriendly, unkempt and unprofessionally run cinema again and will happily inform friends, my clients, colleagues and just about everyone I know not to waste time spending money on an overpriced 'Silky Otter' Cinema experience. It was a terrible and rude experience from beginning to end.

We will continue now to provide our patronage to Gold Class - Event Cinemas. At best we think your tickets should be priced in the vicinity of $18-$21. It's simply not worth the $30 tariff you're requesting.

We wish to watch a film without being stressed and confused - to pay for a service expected with high end ticket pricing. An establishment that cares and appreciates us as customers for which Silky Otter...

The seats and cinemas were nice enough the food was very disappointing and i would avoid as much as possible. they took twice as long as we were advised The meals all come individually packed in non recyclable cardboard and plastic boxes with cardboard cutlery. i was pretty disgusted to see this in this day and age as the kitchen is right there. I asked why this was "we only use plates in the restaurant.” (The restaurant is right outside the cinemas door) I asked what happens to the boxes and if they recycle them 
“they go in the bin” 
I expressed my disappointment in this where they replied 
“we are working on this and hope to get a different box that we can reuse” 
Its not exactly a new concept that would have ‘teething issues’ this is their fourth cinema opened since 2019, are they all doing the same? How long have we been ‘working’ on this for? EVENT cinemas who offer the exact same service for the last 20 years, have never used disposable one time use cutlery and plates. Well before we are in the crisis we are in now. the actual food though - the sliders are ordinary, and the arancini risotto was bland and extremely overcooked, due to this plastic packaging lid the fries comes soggy Portions are small, very overpriced. Would definitely eat first at Ponsonby central The popcorn never came to us as others did, I asked if someone could get some to our seats while I was going to the bathroom, he left them on the table (this place prides themselves on their service), I have my phone in one hand, and carried the two boxes back which is quite difficult to do while opening the door, wouldn't hurt to deliver.

a shame as the location is ideal for us but i don't think its worth it and with other cinemas offering several options of luxury seating with reclines and day beds, it sadly...

Enjoyed the night, but a few things let down the experience overall. The positives were the savoury foods - pizza, sliders + fries- which were all very good (on the expensive side for size but expected), as were the drinks. The negatives were that even though we had agreed for the desserts we ordered to come out later during the movie than the mains, they came out all together at once which was a real shame and made things quite overwhelming. The brownie on menu was advertised as being 'warm and gooey' but I felt it when first arrived and it was fully cold which was disappointing. The milkshake was not good - quite a strange taste. The seats themselves are very comfortable with the reclining except that they are so loud when reclining and the gap for staff to walk through to deliver food etc. when legs reclined out is too small so have to keep adjusting up and down throughout the night, so lots of noise and very distracting. Staff were lovely though, and overall we still really enjoyed the night - just a few things that...