Follow the Smoke, AKA Flynn Crew BBQ catered a company picnic that I coordinated on July 22nd for roughly 300 people, adults and children from 11am – 3pm. I’ve held off writing a review because I was waiting for the owner to get back to me with a resolution to the complaints I had about our event and their services that day. However, it has now been over a week and no return call was received, my calls and messages have gone unanswered. So, I’m left to assume no resolution will be provided and these massive oversights are of no importance to them. My specific issues are detailed below. I’ll try to keep it as b rief as possible. But, the moral of the story is, don’t use them to cater your event.
• The buffet was set up and ready to go for about 30-45 minutes before their staff told anyone. anyone knew. By the time we told the guests that the food was out, everyone was so hungry that all other picnic activities stopped, and everyone dashed for the buffet line at once.
• The pizza was not put out on the buffet, as our agreement stated it would be. Their staff told me they were “waiting for individual orders to be placed”, but they also never told any of the guests that they needed to place an order. Upon finding this out, I was able to make an announcement that people could get pizza, but this was about 1 hour before the picnic was ending. A massive line formed for pizza, and still hardly anyone received one, max 15 people. And the few that did, said the dough was completely uncooked, but the bottom was still burned.
• Their team didn’t bring napkins. And, they didn’t notice until I brought it to their attention…after about 50 or so people went through the buffet line and started asking me for napkins. We used whatever rolls of paper towels we had on hand, but ultimately sent a member of their staff to buy them.
• The beverages and ice were a total disaster. I only saw 2 VERY SMALL carafe’s of iced tea and lemonade. There was supposed to be 3; sweet & unsweet tea, and lemonade. Also, these carafe’s weren’t labeled, and were wedged into the buffet table with all the food. The GIANT jugs of water, that apparently people had to try and pour for themselves, were shoved underneath the buffet table and were completely lukewarm, not at all kept on ice. Also, where was the ice? I didn’t see ice from their team anywhere. Thankfully I brought 4 small bags myself in the morning to get our soda’s chilling before their team arrived, but no ice was put out or given to me to use for the drinks at all.
• The desserts completely ran out by 1pm, and the biscuits for the strawberry shortcake were ALL burnt. And, they were flipped over in the serving dish so as to hide the burnt end, only to be discovered when each person picked up their serving. Also, the desserts that were baked into pans (sheet cake & brownies) weren’t cut up or put out in individual servings. We had to cut our own pieces and scoop them out of the baking pan ourselves.
• The food on the main buffet kept running out creating a giant log jam for people with some guests getting served large chunks of fat for their entire serving, as that was the last piece left in the pan… and the servers still dished it out.
On a more positive note, everyone seemed to enjoy the BBQ buffet - the pork, mac & cheese, cole slaw and salads were all delicious!
I asked the owner to make an adjustment/credit to the overall total bill to account for the pizza, dessert, and ice that we were charged for. As less than 20 people got pizza and those that did were inedible. The shortcakes were all burned, rendering them inedible. And there was no ice at all, even after requesting and paying for extra. These requests have...
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