ANTHEM Coffee & Tea | Litchfield Park — Restaurant in Buckeye

First I'd like to start with how badly I want this place to be great! I love to see others succeed, but with that being said some changes will need to happen. I've been here 3 times now and purposely waited to write this to see if the transition got better, and the issues I experienced were just growing pains; this does not seem to be the case.

Coffee/Drinks: We have had a spicy mocha, vanilla latte, protein smoothie, and an ice tea. - All drinks were good, I'd say a solid 7 out of 10.

Pastry's: We had a cheese danish. The danish seemed a couple of days old, it was dry and not too memorable in a good way, although the flavor was great and would most likely be amazing if fresh. 3 out of 10.

Breakfast: We had spicy oil avocado toast. This was fantastic, and hit the spot. PERFECT! 10 out of 10

Pricing: The pricing is slightly higher here than the big chains, but that's common for small businesses with expenses being higher due to not having bulk purchasing. With that being said though, you'd better deliver and be firing on all cylinders to make us customers not care, and that's not happened yet. 6 out of 10.

Customer Service: All 3 occasions the staff was always friendly and inviting. 8 out of 10.

Convenience: The coffee game is not new and has been perfected for quite a while, but it feels like a new concept here. All 3 trips were much longer waits than any of their competition, but I'll give you a detailed run down of my most recent trip (today) for an example. My wife works in downtown Phoenix and must leave by 6:15 to get to work by 7:30 due to the commute and traffic. We left the house at 5:55AM so we could be here when they open and be out with plenty of time to start the drive. We were in the drive thru exactly at 6:00AM and was asked for our order at 6:02AM (so far so good), we ordered 2 spicy mochas, hot chili oil avocado toast and a cheese danish. This seems like a fairly simple order and we thought would move along quickly. Fast forward to 6:17AM the gentleman working the drive thru opens the window and says here's your toast and danish, I'll get started on those mochas. What?!?! It's been 15 minutes, with 2 people inside working and all they've accomplished is running 2 pieces of bread through the toaster and smearing some chili oil doused avocado on it. We finally received our mochas at 6:21AM. 19 minutes is far too long to turn a customer for coffee and toast, especially in the morning when people need to get to work.

Summary: I truly hope that this constructive criticism is met with an opened mind from the owners/management. The potential here is exponential, but some productivity and efficiency is in dire need, as well as some daily quality control for the pastry's. I'm rooting for your success and hope you do succeed. Your location is perfect for all of us in the eastern Verrado area and much needed for us coffee lovers. I personally prefer supporting small businesses first over big chains, you're what this country was built on and is sustained on, and very important for...

I’ve been trying really hard to like this place. Loved the previous shop, was asked by the new owners (Anthem) to be patient as they transition. Well we are well past transition time and i would have hoped things would improve, I’m just not seeing it. Maybe, I’m just always catching them on “off” days, not sure. I’ve stopped several times in the past few months. Tried initially after opening, was left sad, asked for patience, waited a few months, still sad said still transitioning, took a break for quite a while, then back a few months ago to try again. I really feel like I’m giving a fair chance here. They really changed the menu which is fine of course if you actually do have what’s on the menu. Tried to get food several times, ordered from the menu, told oh we dont have that, that’s an old menu, however it’s the one in the drive thru. Also only have 2 sandwich items available of the many options displayed. Acai bowl i ordered looks nothing like the picture in fact in a cup, much smaller than the bowl and mixed together so i can’t see what’s in it. Was almost entirely acai and a few strawberry pieces. Like if we mix it they won’t notice what’s missing? Or i stop on my way to work at 7am, pastry display is blown out. I ask, is there a better day to stop where there might be more options, like when a delivery comes? No we make everything fresh here. Ok is there a particular day things are made so there might be more options, not really just depends on if we need items. As I’m looking at an almost empty display. Are there items being made today, with the response of, I’m not really sure. Today, go through the drive through and order 2 chocolate, banana, peanut butter protein shakes. Get both, one is very light tan, one very dark brown. My husband asks, are these both the same, as they should have been. The young man said, are they supposed to be? My husband says, yes they are both chocolate but one looks pretty light. He says, well we prep them all the same and i didnt make them. We taste them, the light one was all banana with a cinnamon taste and the dark one was all chocolate. Clearly two different smoothies. They did taste ok, but for that price, if id wanted a banana smoothie, I’d ask for banana! I guess my frustration is, that after all this time, the choices are still very inconsistent, and/or seemingly not accurate or always available, and the staff, while generally polite, dont tend to have a lot of information or concern in finding out. Maybe I’ll try again some other time. Hopefully, the owners will try to make things...

Sadly I think I have to throw in the towel with Anthem. I’ve been going here since it opened as Eb & Flow (under different ownership). It’s been a steady decline since it was taken over by Anthem. The prices kept going up. The service kept going down. It’s disheartening because I used to go there daily. Then it trickled down to once a week, if that.

Today was the final straw. I’ve learned not to get in the drive thru line when there’s more than a few cars because service is so slow. Today I got in line because there were only two cars in front of me to order. I waited 20 minutes for those 2 cars to have their order taken. When I get up to order I am told I will have to wait. I ask about if the wait will be long as I’d already been waiting 20 minutes. They said “honestly, ya. Two people called out and we have a full lobby.” So I asked to be allowed to pull through the drive thru to leave because I was not about to wait another 20+ minutes for a coffee. 30-40 minutes in a coffee line is wild on any day.

I can’t confirm if the lobby was full, but I know whenever I go into the lobby it’s pretty bare. The same as the drive thru line, it’s usually not very busy. It’s just the service is unbelievably slow.

They’ve had quite the staff turnover. I’ve heard the staff members say they have trouble with the owners and with the systems being slow. It seems even the staff is unhappy. I hope the owners really read this and make changes. Because I went down the road to Black Rock and was fully served in 15 minutes when there was 8 cars in front of me. They are losing so much business because they’re not the only coffee shop in the area anymore. Hopefully they figure this out before...