Delsea Drive-In Theatre — Local services in Vineland

Horrible experience. There were a number of issues, but I mainly want to focus on the concession stand and its poor management. We placed our order for concessions at 8:30pm. The online system told us it would be ready at about 9:10. By 9:45 we were trying to figure out how to cancel our order because it still wasn't done. No way to cancel. At 9:57 we were notified the order was ready. Our second movie was just starting. My husband went out to the concession stand.

45 minutes into the second movie he still had not returned, so I went out to look for him - he was still in line at concessions!! I went in search of a manager to ask if we could switch to screen 2 for the second movie (since it had just started and my husband had literally missed half of the one on screen one). I found two teenage employees sitting at the front gate playing on their phones. They told me we weren't allowed to switch screens. I wondered why they were sitting there doing nothing and not helping in concessions...

They told me there was a mass-quitting of 7 employees, but only 2 spots had been filled. That tells me management is not great. Also, the way the "staffing issue" was handled, so poorly impacting the customer experience, also tells me that management needs work. Offering a limited menu at concessions and not texting customers until it was ACTUALLY READY, would have been the proper way to handle it. Not having people wait in line for an hour. But I guess, gotta make a dollar, right? I wouldn't be surprised if more employees quit after the amount of angry customers they had to deal with last night.

My husband heard an employee complain "people don't want to work." Surely a line parroted from management. Guess what? People want to work - they don't want to work for bad management. Period.

My husband finally returned to the car with 2 sodas, a popcorn and chicken fingers at 10:58pm - exactly one hour after getting in line. I filled him in on what happened in the hour he missed, and we ate during the last 38 minutes of the second movie.

Look, being that I'm pregnant and it's a pandemic, we don't go out much. Trying to keep away from the maskless, unvaccinated masses to protect the baby. So getting to go on a date night is kind of a big deal and we were super excited to get out of the house. The drive-in is one of the only "public" spaces that feels somewhat safe. So this experience was very disappointing and upsetting.

My little baby started giving me hunger pains at 10:00pm... At one point, I ended up in full-on tears - hungry, sad that I watched most of the movie alone, and angry that my husband spent most of the night standing in a line. We're going to try to figure out how to get a refund, but I doubt we'll make any progress.. because, you know, poor management. I guess next time we'll just do movie night at home.

*Edit: I just read some of the other reviews and it seems like this concessions issue had complaints as far back as TWO YEARS. Maybe the story told by the teenagers is just management's latest excuse for habitually understaffing to...

UPDATE: (lilo & Stitch) I hadn’t been to Delsea Drive-In in years and was genuinely excited to go back, but unfortunately, it was a major letdown. They've made what they call "upgrades," but honestly, nothing about the experience felt improved—if anything, it was worse.

First off, you're now required to buy tickets online—but the website doesn't make that clear at all. It only says you can buy online and that the box office opens at 7:15. So, if you're expecting to buy tickets in person, good luck—it causes a lot of confusion and frustration before you even get in.

Once inside, the signs directing you to the correct screen are basically non-existent. It's literally a piece of paper with directions scribbled in marker—nothing you'd expect from an establishment that’s supposedly been "upgraded."

The concession stand situation is a mess. Only two windows were open, and you must order your food online. Then you have to wait around until they text you it's ready. The whole time, people were just standing around waiting and missing large parts of the movie. It defeats the purpose of even going to a drive-in if you can't enjoy the film uninterrupted.

They also charge $10 to rent a transistor radio to listen to the movie. Why not develop a simple app so people can just use their phones instead of draining their car battery or paying extra?

As for the bathrooms—awful. The stalls are so cramped that you have to straddle the toilet just to sit down. One sink wasn’t working, there was no toilet paper in the stalls, and the only drying option was a mess of scattered paper towels. Meanwhile, the main building is mostly unused, and it seems like they could either renovate it properly or just tear it down and rebuild it. Right now, it's not serving anyone well.

It’s a shame because this is the only drive-in left in the area—and possibly in the whole state. Hopefully, that changes and someone opens up a new, better-equipped drive-in soon. This one just isn’t cutting it anymore.

I used to come here regularly but haven't in a while. I'm hoping I caught them on a bad day. but after sitting in line for over an hour and missing half my movie I went to the concession only to be greeted by a bunch teenagers that spent more time chattering than actually doing anything. I counted 7 employees then 4 more came and I still waited 45 mins for a hot dog. Got back to my car just in time for the ending credits. To top it off another customer got frustrated waiting for his drink and snacks only to be mocked and disrespected by one of the teen employees instead of reprimanding her one of the 4 adults on duty also gave a bit of attitude to the other customer. It was ridiculous either they are going down hill or it was a bad day in any case the person I was with never had been to a drive in and this was his first experience. Very disappointing to...

After being cooped up in the house for months with, “this could have been an email” conference calls, 3 star Netflix series and watching V for Vendetta and 28 Days Later play out live on the news, we drove down to Delsea’s Drive-in Movie Theatre for an escape from #2020. As we drove in, we observed the list of No’s (Pets, Outside Food, Smoking, Headlights) posted at the entrance and were kindly guided to our screen where we parked, ordered concessions and started our first film. We were concerned about gas, so we brought our concerns to the concession staff who reassured us that we would be fine as there was a Wawa close that we could go to. After the first film ended, we went to the Wawa for gas and upon returning, we came to a full stop at the entry booth to get cleared to go back in, where the attendant stopped traffic but did not come over to our car. After holding up opposing traffic for 15 Mississippi-seconds, we decided to move on to free traffic. Upon arriving at the closed Screen 2 gate, we flagged down field staff to let them know that we left to get gas and would like to re-enter. They checked our tickets, confirmed that we ticketed and opened the gate and we returned to our previous spot. Strangely, we were approached moments later by two field attendants and told that we needed to leave because there is no re-entry allowed. Confused as to why we were not made aware of this “rule” by the signage, on our tickets or by concession staff we asked to speak to the manager. The manager (Jude DeLeonardis) rudely radioed in, “No re-entry…let me know if they cause any trouble”. We asked the attendants if there was anything we could do as we traveled from Philadelphia to see the film and Jude radio in once again, “let me know if they cause any trouble!”. I asked the attendant, “what kind of trouble is he (Jude) talking about? We don’t want to cause any trouble, we just want to watch the movie.” Jude radioed in for an unprovoked 3rd time “let me know if they cause any trouble!”.

Now, I’m not sure what “trouble” two African American seasoned IT professionals in a classic Lexus would cause in this scenario, but I can reassure you that we didn’t cause any trouble when the popcorn we purchased was stale. We didn’t cause any trouble when the carbon chip cookie we bought was burnt and inedible. And we didn’t cause any trouble when we were selectively (we know that others were allowed re-entry in the previous week) asked to follow a rule that was not stated on the ticket, posted at the entrance nor relayed to us by ANY staff until we were asked to leave. Though the attendants were cordial in relaying the off-putting messages from management, this soiled our experience and we will NOT be returning nor recommending this theatre until this situation...