The Friendly Toast — Restaurant in Burlington

There is a “policy” that you cannot bring in outside drinks. Despite 2 other tables having PLASTIC tumblers from Starbucks I was told the $8 coffee I purchased IN THE BURLINGTON MALL (150 feet away) while waiting 1 HOUR for a table was not allowed in. First I was told it was “health code violation ” then after arguing the reasoning I was told it “was a town code/bylaw” I asked to speak to the manager and I was told “I am The manager” by the man in the front. Younger gentleman short dark hair. I have pictures of the other 2 families that had cups. I refused to point them out and told the staff to look around for themselves because I didn’t want to ruin someone’s day and it was clear that I was just being heckled with. After waiting 1 hour with my family and having 3 kids myself and my wife we wanted to but chose to stay.

The waitress Caitlin was sweet and professional kind and (probably didn’t know what happened)

Beware it seems that the front door staff while at first glance is “welcoming” like to pick and choose when they enforce these “so called laws” I asked multiple times to be directed to these laws and the manager replied “that’s just what I’ve been told we don’t know what could be in the drinks” given the time and day and the situation I believe this could have been handled in a much more professional and reasonable way. The health violation is taking my $8 coffee and leaving it on the floor under the cash register. It’s a shame because it just shows how some people lack the ability to have any authority in life so they thrive in these situations.

The moral is that some people need education in de-escalation and it’s not like I had a soda or bottle of water or some mug from home. This was literally bought moments prior receipt sticker on it with time and date. I also want to mention that this policy is obvious because they want to capitalize on getting you to buy their coffee / cold brew.

Last time I will come here. The sarcastic body language and attitude and inability to have any empathy at all was just sad. Wasted an hour of my life waiting just to get treated this way and be told multiple stories. If this is really a thing maybe educate your employees on the actual section and subsections of the city’s laws and by laws regarding this.

Lastly it was merely the attitude from this guy that made it worse. He could have made an exception (clearly cause of the others with cups) but he chose to utilize his only chance to tell people what to do.

Never again. I will make sure every way possible to voice this concern and situation on every social media platform possible. Very disappointed this place has been a place we had started to make tradition like my brothers family and his kids. You lost a lot of...

DO NOT GO HERE!!! This place should be called Unfriendly Toast. The manager is rude and horrendous. I had a terrible experience at this “Friendly” Toast today and will never go back.

I called ahead to see if I could bring in a birthday cake for a friend who wanted to come here for brunch. The woman who answered the phone said they didn’t have anywhere to store a cake in the back, but that it was fine for me to bring it with me and eat the cake at our table. She even said she carries an extra lighter in her pocket in case a customer wants to light a candle. As we were putting candles on the cake at the end of our meal and about to sing happy birthday, the General Manager came over and said they have a strict “no outside food” policy and he made me put the cake away, effectively ruining my friend’s birthday celebration! I explained that I had called ahead and was told this was fine, but he apparently thought I was lying because he said “no one here would have told you that. You probably called our Burlington, VT location, not Burlington, MA. Maybe they have a different policy.” I offered to show him evidence of the number I called last night in my recent call history and he didn’t care. I argued with him and said he should train his staff better if their policy is so strict. He eventually gave me a $25 gift card for my friend to use another time, but I am still giving this place 1 star because of how we were treated. I get that they have a no outside food policy and I respect that, but seriously, if you want repeat customers do not ruin someone’s birthday to enforce a policy that was not communicated correctly. It’s bad business and plain disrespectful.

I don’t see what the hype is about this restaurant chain. The ambience is pretty casual. The food is not that good. They don’t take reservations and there is over an hour wait if you don’t put your name on the waiting list. There are plenty of other restaurants in the Boston area with better brunch that take reservations and will let you bring in a birthday cake or order dessert off their menu and put a candle...

Very disappointed AGAIN. Arrived at time designated for take-away order to be picked up. Girl at counter said it wasn’t ready. OK, that happens. 10 minutes go by and orders come and go, including one that was ordered in-house while I’m waiting. Ask the girl again, she checks and says no, not ready yet. Another 10 minutes go by (20 minutes after order was supposed to be ready), and one of the guys asks me what I’m waiting on. Give him my name and lo and behold it’s the same order that’s been sitting on the shelf for 10 minutes that the girl said wasn’t mine. Leave and decide to check the order in the car. The food is now cold and it’s missing the side order of two eggs (for another person). Go back in and tell the guy it’s missing items. They take the order in the back and I see the counter guy, wearing gloves but touching everything on the counter and order screens, paw through all the food items in the one container. They close it back up and bring it back out to me. Guy says the eggs are in the same container. I tell him it was supposed to be a side order and he says “you didn’t say that in your order.” It is literally ordered as a side order, so I’m unclear as to why there was a need for special instructions to not combine the two. He has no intention of giving me the order separately and the eggs (over easy) could not be separated. Ask for a refund and he smartly responds “because it’s not a side?” Explain that the side is for another person and I shouldn’t have to explain what a side order is. Explain I watched their counter guy paw through the contents of my order touching every food item without clean gloves and that doesn’t work for me. He said “Oh, OK,” and agreed to the refund. No apology, no attempt to remake the order correctly, just smarmy because I expected my order to be fulfilled correctly and without hygiene concerns. Will never...