Radio Social — Restaurant in City of Rochester

Sorry for the lengthy review, but I felt like this was a necessary review I had to make because of my experience here.

I honestly can’t say anything good about this place. I planned my birthday here with close friends of mine, most being 21+, but one guest was 20. I went to enter (at 5pm mind you) and was asked for an ID. I’ve been here before for a date and another event and have never been asked for an ID.

I am autistic and didn’t see the security guard because I tend to zone out sometimes in loud environments. I was in my own little world and not paying attention to the fact that there was a security guy in the front checking IDs. The security guard immediately stepped in front of me and was all up in my face asking how I didn’t see him and that I was lying and trying to sneak in (why in the world would I want to sneak into a bowling alley…. To bowl LOL). I have never been asked for an ID here so I was extremely confused and overwhelmed by the fact that he was yelling at me about not acknowledging him standing there. This was my first red flag that this night was not going to go well, as this was very clearly ableism at its finest.

My one friend was 20 at the time and the security guard and the staff insisted that anyone under 21 needed a parent with them at all times while being in their facility, even though I’ve been there when I was 19 and 20 and wasn’t asked then for a parent to be with me.

According to their website, you need a parent with you IF it’s past 9pm. I purposefully hosted my birthday party there at an earlier time for this exact reason and was still harassed to have my friend call her mom and drive over to stay with us the entire time, even though there is nothing on their website stating that they are specifically a 21+ only bowling alley. There was also no special events happening that night, so that was out of the question not the reasoning behind it.

When we finally were allowed to use the lanes we reserved, I had to go get a pitcher of water. This took 15 minutes to do as the bartender ignored both my friend and I when we were not drinking and just needed water for party guests.

I originally reserved 2 lanes, but only needed the one lane. They let a couple take the lane we weren’t using (which is normal and completely fine) and the couple insisted that they needed the entire shared sitting area for them and that we needed to move all of our belongings from the seats we were using for them to use their one lane.

Coincidentally, right as the couple showed up, our lane stopped working completely and was shut off as if someone manually turned it off, even though we still had it reserved for another hour. I mentioned all of this to the staff and their response was “okay so like what do you want ME to do?” In a very annoyed voice as if I was bothering them. I asked for my lane to be fixed as I was still using it and after I realized that they probably turned the lane off manually, I ultimately just asked for a refund for that last hour and left out of pure frustration from everything that happened while being there.

The entire time I was there I felt like the staff just kept giving all of us a really hard time with everything for literally no reason at all and it honestly ruined my birthday and made me never want to go back. I was pretty upset by the whole situation and anyone I know of or talk to in my personal life is told to not go here because of this situation that I had to deal with. My friends that were there that night have all done the same and never plan on going back, especially with the ableism.

I hope the manager sees this review and genuinely sees and understands where I’m coming from because it is beyond ridiculous to treat customers like this, no matter the situation. If it says you’re 18+ friendly anytime before 9pm, then you should abide by that and the fact that staff were backing up the statement of “it states on our website the age restriction” is absolutely ridiculous because it does say that, but it says anytime AFTER 9pm and we were there at 5/6pm,...

What's with the bartenders? Seriously it's so weird.

Like I love this place but so many times the service takes away from the enjoyment.

When I go here I go with friends or family so we can talk to each other, play games and have a good time. Obviously we want drinks too. But there's times I'm spending 20, 30 minutes (no joke, was checking my phone) waiting to order a drink. That's insane. And I'll watch the bartenders take 5 minutes making one drink, or doing God knows what behind the iPad/register thing while chatting with the other staff. And there's generally at least 3 people behind the bar. But for whatever reason I'll be standing there, cash out looking for somebody to get a drink from so I can go back to being with my friends and family. And if I say something or raise my hand as a bartender walks by me I get ignored or a look like I'd just killed their dog.

And I'd understand if it was insane busy but I'm talking about times when it's not. And I'm not the only one. I've seen people walk away annoyed taking their group with them. One guy I was chatting with said he'd been standing there so long that he thought the bartenders stopped serving altogether. And I'm looking back by the kitchen door and 2 people are standing there chatting and the 1 remaining bartender was going on 10 minutes making 3 drinks for one girl. It was nuts.

The first time my roommate went to radio social (Sept 1st, 2017) he disappeared for 20 minutes and came back empty handed saying he couldn't get anyone to serve him. He went back to try again for 20 minutes extremely frustrated and came back again empty handed again because he was tired of waiting and gathered his stuff and left.

Aside from that the food is extremely pricey and there's no cheaper options for people coming for a quick bite, so we typically don't eat there. However the food IS freaking DELICIOUS, so props to Steve and his team. I could eat the wings all day, and the bread is amazing.

Otherwise it's a great place to hang and it's too bad that the experience is frustrating and ruined by having to be away from your friends so long just to...

When this place first opened my friends and I could not get enough, we were very frequent customers. The concept, atmosphere and food are so different from any other place in Rochester.

After a while, the more times we went the customer service would increasingly get worse with every visit. The inconsistency and unprofessionalism has been a complete turn off to the point where we are very hesitate to return.

As a new business, we gave them the benefit of the doubt to work out the kinks because we really wanted to like this place and support a new local business. But time has proved, their service is less than par. A place like this has the opportunity to be great but it seems like they don't really care to live up to their potential.

They should be taking the opportunity to take advantage of their unique food and give bowlers service at their lanes. Instead, as bowlers are paying by the hour, they have to leave in the middle of their game to order food/drinks at the bar in which the service is very slow.

Some nights when we would go they would say they were closing 3/4 hours early because it wasn't busy enough, even though we would arrive with 15+ people. In my opinion, a new business should not be turning away any customers. A new business should be more worried about building a good reputation and less about closing early because they aren't turning a big enough profit.

I would make a suggestion to have the employees at the front desk be more knowledgeable and better trained. When there are any issues, the front desk should be a place where the customers go to find a resolution. In my experiences here, there is never an easy solution to most issues and they always seem to over complicate things.

In closing, this place has the opportunity to be the most popular hang out spot in Rochester, but their unprofessional and poorly trained employees diminish...