20th Century Bowl — Local services in Bellingham

Came in and was told that, in a little over an hour, there was going to be a league coming in and they would be using all the lanes. I thought "Okay, a game takes no more than 30 minutes; we will have plenty of time for a game, maybe even two". They told me I would have to wait while they "cleaned" our lane and thought "Okay, why aren't they clean already? Why don't they do that after closing or before opening?" but I was completely okay with it. I'd rather wait and have a perfect lane than a dirty or poorly polished one. He asked for our shoe sizes, and we got our shoes. I put my shoes on, as did the person I came with.

So I waited while the gentlemen slowly cleaned my lane, the next lane, and the next lane (probably for the league). I couldn't start bowling because the cord for his machine was still in my way, so I waited patiently for someone to give me the "go ahead" that we could start. After almost 20 minutes of this, the clerk, who I originally talked to said, "Yeah, the leagues going to be using all the lanes, soooo yeah." I was confused because I was already told the league would be there, so I said "So, what you're telling me is I have to come back at a different time...?" and he said yes. So I took my shoes off and we left. Probably 30 minutes later.

I obviously can't speak for the actual "bowling experience" that this place had to offer, but I can say the service was terrible, and the disorganization of this establishment was laughable at best. This was my first time at this establishment, and am confused why they would turn away (new) paying customers for a league that is probably going to bowl there regardless... Would...

I went here with a group of friends to bowl but we wanted to have a beer or two before we got started, so we go up to the bar and order a pitcher. The guy rudely asks which lane we were on to which I responded that we haven't started bowling yet and wanted to enjoy a drink first and maybe some food. He proceeds to explain to me that we weren't allowed to order beer without first purchasing a lane for bowling. I explained that we weren't ready to bowl and wanted to drink our beer and eat food at the tables first. Again he was very rude, and he tells us that they aren't a bar and the only way we were going to get beer is if we were occupying a lane at the time. I told him that was bad for business and that he was turning away paying customers. Needless to say we were very put off by the experience and decided to take our business elsewhere, and I hope you avoid them too if they still do business this way. I really hope this behavior wasn't condoned by the owner and that this problem has been rectified since my last visit. If it has, I would be happy to give them another chance. If I want to enjoy a beer and some food at the tables before I purchase a lane for bowling, that shouldn't be a problem for a paying customer and I shouldn't be rudely...

While I had a lot of fun here, our lane kept messing up the scoring and I didn't notice until about half way through the game. When I asked the employee if we could start over on a different lane he asked me with complete disbelief if I wanted to start fresh after already both taking several turns, as if we were taking advantage of the bowling alley with our game that's score was completely messed up, and it was worth about $2.50 even if it hadn't been messed up. But we couldn't tell what our score was because it kept messing up every round since we noticed, so it had probably been messing up before that. The machine basically wouldn't pick up one of the pins, so sometime people were getting strikes who weren't supposed to, or getting extra turns. Anyway, the guy ended up resetting our game back to the beginning. But I thought it was hilarious how much he apparently wanted us to pay $2.50 for a totally messed up partial game of bowling.

It was super fun to go bowling though. Can't wait...