Chuck's Roadhouse Bar & Grill — Restaurant in Ontario

We booked a table at the Chucks Roadhouse Highbury Avenue location in London Ontario to celebrate our boys 7th birthday party with their grandparents. We reserved a table for 6, for a Tuesday, a few days in advance and asked if we could bring a small birthday cake for our boys. The person taking the reservation said it was not a problem as long as we didn’t need to have the cake refrigerated. We didn’t, so we confirmed the booking.

We arrived for dinner Tuesday around 5pm with our two boys in tow and were met by the greeter. She noticed we were carrying the cake and said that we could not bring outside food into the restaurant. We told her that we had talked to someone when we booked the table and they said it was ok if we brought the cake. In a few minutes we found ourselves surrounded by 6-7 staff members while the main young lady who claimed to be the onsite manager was flat out refusing to allow us to enter the restaurant with the cake. She continued to argue with us in front of our children. She continued to say it was their policy not to allow outside food in the restaurant. Believe me, I understand that policy, and for the most part it is meant to keep people from bringing in regular menu items and drinks into the restaurant. However, this was a children’s birthday cake, and if they offered a full cake on the menu, we would have ordered it, but they didn’t, and we had the approval of the person who took our reservation.

The onsite manager refused to seat us with the cake, so we ended up having to leave the location. This manger thought it was a better business decision for the franchise to turn us away, a party of 6 on a Tuesday evening, to abuse a policy and enforce it on a family on their children’s birthday. Let that sink in a little. How disgusting! So, we left with our children very disappointed, not really knowing what just happened.

Our grandparents suggested trying the Chucks Raodhouse at Argyle Mall about a 10-minute drive away. They had been there a few times before and said the staff were very nice. So, we drove over the Argyle Mall location. We were met by the onsite manager when we walked in. We said we were a party of 6 and we were celebrating our boys 7th birthday and could they accommodate us if we brought in our own cake. Without hesitation she said “of course”. She then asked if we needed it refrigerated. We said it didn’t need to be refrigerated and she then offered to hold it in the kitchen until we finished our dinner. When we finished out dinner our sever then brought out the cake with the candles lit. The server and manager were fantastic.

As for the Highbury location, I nor any of my family will ever step foot inside that location again. I understand that it is difficult to find people these days, but I can assure the franchisee who owns that location, having a manager like that running your business is not doing you any favours. There is a saying bad news travel fast, it’s equally true for bad service and bad experiences. Anytime someone asked me about the kids birthday this year, guess what story will be told.

I suggest Obsidian group send a district manager to that location to do some serious customer service training with that whole group of staff. To that onsite manager, you can’t always enforce policy, sometimes common sense and discretion are the better approach.

Photo is from the Argyle Mall location....

I'm writing this review after a bad experience on a day when I thought I was going to a place to finally relax and have good memories. We started going to the place after my husband's co-workers recommended Chuck's. It was around 1:40pm on Saturday July 13th and as always my husband and I ordered our beloved beer and our burgers. We used to have good service until yesterday. It took them a while to get our order and even longer to receive our burger (about 30 minutes). We always order a portion of lemon with our beer because it's the way we always enjoy our beer best and this has never been a problem in all the restaurants we've been to. This has never been a problem. Such kindness also made us very generous when tipping. Another attendant who already knew us always brought lemons around every glass and this filled us with joy and satisfaction. But yesterday the attendant whose name we don't know but is the person who worked on this day and time with long straight black hair and white skin. Also a young black man was equally rude and both started an aggressive dialogue when, to our surprise, we asked for more lemon slices and the first time they gave us two fillets of approximately 2mm even though we had previously informed that we would use it for drink our beer. They weren't small glasses of beer. We also asked to ask a question about another drink (chuks caesar) and the same male attendant asked us for a moment and never came back. We gave up on ordering another drink to try. In the meantime, I asked them to kindly give us more this time as they took a long time to bring it and when it arrived, barely a drop of lemon came out. The female attendant, in a harsh tone, said that we would then be charged for more lemon slices. Yes, amazingly, practically nothing had come, we always went there and consumed good amounts of food and she was harsh when we asked for more of the very thin slices of lemon. In fact, until then they hadn't given us any plates, cutlery or napkins. And then they didn't bring any dishes and after saying how absurd it was to want to charge for a few more lemon slices we only received a pair of cutlery with a napkin each. The attendant started with comparisons like “we weren't going to the market to get free lemons” and started laughing at our arguments that it was a restaurant widely frequented by us and that it would even be a kindness and that if there was a price for They charge for what we would like to see on the menu. After this and being clearly ridiculed in this debate we decided to finish the meal which was already indigestible and asked for the bill. Both attendants continued with arguments that were not sustainable and at no point did they apologize for such rudeness and for only trying to refute our arguments without the slightest sense of customer delight or empathy. I mentioned that I would do a review about this terrible service and in response, non-verbal gestures with the shoulders would indicate that they didn't care and that nothing would change. Unfortunately today we will no longer recommend this unit. We started going to the Clark Road unit and the difference in service is huge. We do not recommend the place especially when these two attendants are there....

My partner and I have been going to Chucks often. With a busy life, it's nice to relax and not have to cook. On March 28, a Friday evening we felt like taking a night off. We got a table in the corner right underneath the surveillance camera. We perused the menu, ordered our food and did what we always do when we go out. We pulled out a deck of cards and started a game of cribbage (we have an app for points) and played our game. With the game almost done, our food came so we set aside the almost finished game. We ate our food and while we waited for the bill we finished the last few minutes of the game. The bill came and as we were waiting for the machine, the manager came up to us and said the owner was watching us on the camera and phoned the restaurant to tell him we are not allowed to play cards. We were shocked and I was also a weirded out that the owner was watching us so closely. I find this a bit creepy and wonder if the purpose of the camera is to spy on customers. We paid our bill, tipped generously and left never to return. However, I am still confused...a well dressed, well to do couple, on a date, minding our own business and he feels he needs to shut down something we do to unwind. I have asked around and heard that many people play cards. We play with our children (uno) while we wait in restaurants as well. It's never been an issue... so can I play Solitaire? Can I read a book? What about study for an exam while I grab a bite? What if I was playing cards on an IPad? Where does he draw the line on controlling what people do to amuse themselves while they wait for their meal? We don't watch sports...we aren't interested in the televisions hung on the walls. It's awfully loud to talk in there. We weren't lingering either...just a couple waiting for the food. It's creepy behaviour to monitor us and it's just plain odd behaviour for an owner to micromanage on this level. I had heard around town that the owner was not a nice person but I assumed that was a disgruntled employee...now I am just plain angry and turned off of a restaurant that we frequently went to. I am sure this is a story of will tell frequently to friends and colleagues because it's such odd behaviour and it's so off putting...there is no by law to support this and again, where does he draw the line in controlling his customers? The food is decent, the price is good but I won't recommend this restaurant to anyone because why support a restaurant that is so obviously owned by an unreasonable and controlling person. The place where we weekend in the summer has a Chucks nearby and they don't mind us playing so we will continue to go there, but not in London. Vote with your dollars...don't put up...