Thunder Alley XL & Big Thunder Mini Golf — Local services in Grand Rapids

Disappointing Experience - Poor Management & Costumer Service

I'm extremely disappointed with the consistent poor treatment I've received at this bowling alley. Employee Chad is disrespectful to customers, including those attending bowling leagues and company parties. I have more incidents than the ones listed below.

During a company work party, an initial announcement was made indicating an early closure, prompting these employees to begin packing up and preparing to depart. However, it was subsequently communicated that employees were, in fact, welcome to stay but only AFTER I had left. Unfortunately, by that time, most staff members had already packed their belongings and opted not to remain.

Another incident that took place; during women's league, Two teams, each with four members, were bowling on lanes 1 and 2. Due to lane malfunctions, we fell behind schedule. Other teams, which were short-handed, finished their games earlier than usual and left. At 8:26 PM, Jasmine, an alley worker, came downstairs and started cleaning off our table, reaching over us to remove water and pop pitchers, while we were still using them. All while clashing beer bottles into a metal bucket, being loud and disruptive. At 8:31 PM, one of our bowlers asked Jasmine what she wanted, as she was sitting behind us with her arms crossed. Jasmine responded curtly, and our bowler apologized for any unintended offense. 8:37PM Jasmine then stated that we shouldn't be there anymore, as everyone else had finished their games. However, I understand that our bowling league has the right to stay and finish our sets as long as we needed. 8:43PM The situation escalated when Jasmine took offense to a comment about the dirty floors, saying "old ladies shouldn't be telling us how to do our jobs." Chad, who appeared to be a manager or supervisor, then intervened, yelling at our league to "not threaten his daughter" and to have us written up. When none of us were threatening her. We responded that we had witnesses and were willing to cooperate. Eventually, the alley workers removed themselves from the situation, allowing us to finish our game but felt like we were walking on egg shells. One team never came back due to this incident.

Jasmine threatened me personally, convinced her coworkers to treat me with disrespect, and reached out to me on a social media platforms in an unprofessional manner. Her reasoning of disrespecting me was that I joined the bowling league.

Unfortunately I lost my safe space, my friends and my place in the bowling league because I refuse to come back to this alley in worry I will be treated poorly by staff like I have been the past several visits. The only way to talk to the owner is writing a Google review because I refuse to go through Chad and there are no numbers or emails listed on their website to reach out to the...

I am not one to go out of my way and write bad reviews but I had a very disappointing experience January 13th, 2023. This was upsetting because I thoroughly enjoyed going to this place also considering that this is one of the few places you can go and do something in this town. But in the last few months it's sad to say their customer service and the way things are ran has been going down hill and I have heard from multiple people that they do not enjoy their experience there anymore. My boyfriend and I were celebrating our anniversary, and on their website they advertise "Color Pin Bowling Friday & Saturday Nights, Join us under the black lights! 6:00-8:00 & 8:00-10:00pm" This was the whole reason we wanted to go bowling. We showed up at 8 and all the lights were still on. We asked the front desk if they were going to be doing the night bowling and the person working was already putting off a rude vibe. He barely acknowledged us and said they were. We waited and played games until a little before 9 pm and went up to the front desk to kindly ask them when they would turn off the lights for night bowling, we got a response from the person working at the front desk again in a rude tone telling us to "'Go complain with everyone else, about the lights'. We don't turn them off anymore." (they had turned on the bowling pin lights, but kept all the over head lights on as they would for a regular bowling day) after his response he walked away from us and ignored us. In which we stood there for a moment shocked at the response we received and immediately left. 1) It should not be advertised on their website if they are no longer doing it and 2) if you're are working a customer service job you should not have a tone or be rude to the customers asking about something that is advertised on their website and not happening. Coming from someone who has worked 4+ years in customer service this was a very disappointing reaction to get from someone working there. Again, I used to always enjoy going there with friends and family. But after this experience and from others I've heard we will sadly not...

Update 9/28/19 - better visit this trip. The staff was cool and not so frustrating to understand on the pricing. We bowled during the unlimited time frame on lanes #1 & #2 again. Bonus this time was #1 lane worked perfectly for the kids and there was no issues with scoring. #2 lane was another story it kept scoring strikes for players who had not thrown a ball and it seemed to happen when a single red pin was left standing but I am not 100% on that. The bowling alley was clean. The kids loved the arcade. Plenty of parking available.

3/16/19 - 2 stars - not a good visit. We setup a party for 4 lanes of bowling and it was not fun. You have to pay for games ahead of time and shoes but you have no idea what you are going to play for games. We had all the kids on one lane #1 lane and it was bad their lane shutdown and kept losing track of the score. We had the computer end games early for no reason even though the game was paid for. So frustrating we would have spent so much money celebrating a birthday but the paying for games and the frustration with scoring we most likely will go elsewhere in the future. The staff was helpful though good people. So to recap we reserved 4 lanes for 2 hours and we bowled 1 games on the kids lanes and 2 games on the adult lanes. We should have been able to get 3-4 if the lanes had not had issues.

2018 - 4 stars - Good time bowling. They have really fixed...