BJ's Restaurant & Brewhouse — Restaurant in Columbia

I use to love BJ’s until I dined in at the Columbia, MD on 6/16/23 @6:30pm. It was my birthday and I wanted to celebrate at BJ’s with coworkers/friends (15). I had called the restaurant 2 days in advance and reserved a time and space with a very nice and friendly manager named Jim who I had wished I had a chance to meet. Anyway, I get to the restaurant only to be told that I had to wait an hour to sit. I kindly asked the host to speak to the manager on duty (It was not Jim). He came out and organized a table seating after he had realized the wrong message was sent out to me. We then get our server (I forgot her name but know her face) and she proceeds to take our drinks first and then orders. The staff brings out our food (not the waitress) And all the food was fine except for one person’s meal (Blackened Salmon) She politely let the server know after trying to find her because that became a problem. She was always never around when you needed her. The Salmon was very salty and so the server took it back. During this whole time she never once checked on us, asked us for more drinks, napkins. etc. She then comes back in less than 5 minutes with salmon -whoever’s salmon- I just don’t know. The Salmon came back too quickly and it was not blacken at all. We all (at the table) agreed and could see that she just picked up another person’s order. She knew exactly what she was doing when she had dropped it because she literally just ran off after placing it down onto the table. Now correct me if I’m wrong but as a server you would want to wait to leave off after the customer tries the meal to make sure it’s right, right? We called her well in enough time so that she hears but she act like she didn’t hear us. Why would she anyway, she had her added gratuity, in which we didn’t mind paying for in the first place, but after that horrible experience we were about to take it back and refuse. At this point we are done with the service overall and so I called for a manager to explain our situation and that’s when the manager (I had thought) would handle the situation but I was totally wrong. He was NEVER apologetic! He had asked for my name and email as if to contact me about the matter and compensate something but he did not! In fact, he pursues to have a actual conversation with us to avoid the subject. Long story short the manager and the service rendered was absolutely horrible. Ugh! I have yet to hear from him still and it is now Sunday. Such horrible customer service. Never going back there again until that server and that manger is far gone! My birthday really went down the drain that day. And I really wanted a pizookie but I was too done and ready...

Bear in mind that this visit was between Thanksgiving & Christmas. We arrived at the restaurant aaround 2:50. The hostess coughed, holding her shirt in front of her mouth but still coughing on her hand. Then she picked up menus with that hand and handed them to us. Eww. Fortunately I carry sanutizer in my purse. We sat for 7 minutes before a server visited us. He took our order, asked if we wanted water in addition to our beer, and left. 6.5 minutes later we got glasses of water. 1.75 minutes after that our beer arrived. Brian ordered a Tatonka Stout. I ordered a Gold Metal beer flight, asking to substitute Jeremiah Red for the Lightswitch Lager. He forgot to make the switch and had to go back for the red. We really liked the Oasis Amber. Nice body, a little hoppy - it was Brian's fav. The Hopstorm IPA seemed to us to be misnamed since we could barely detect the hops in it. My fav was the Jeremiah Red. A little hoppy, good mouth feel, some complexity in the flavor profile. I am a big porter and stout fan and both were disappointing - flabby, mild-flavored. The PM Porter at least had some nice coffee notes in the flavor profile. Our meal arrived 19+ minutes after the beer. The person delivering tried to give it to the next table over and we had to call for her attention twice as she started to return to the kitchen with our food. She said the wrong table number was on the order. Brian's Bistro burger was done as ordered and he liked it - the pickled onions and crumbly cheese kicked it up a notch. The french gies accompanying were an appropriate quantity, not at all greasy and a bit crunchy - they were good. My Enlightened Barbecue Bison Burger was perfectly cooked, the sauce was interesting - a bit smoky, not too sweet, not too vinegary. Quite tasty. The burger came with a dry salad - no dressing was offered. I thought that was a little odd. 9.25 minutes after our food arrived our server checked in with us. 9.75 minutes after that he stopped again and we asked for the check. It took 5 minutes to process the check and return our card to us. Atmosphere: the place is pretty noisy, there are sporting events on TVs around the dining room and bar and people are cheering and such. You would not go here for a romantic evening, but the place was sorta fun. Prices were midrange for food and a little...

My latest review.

My wife went with my youngest, and they waited over an hour for their food. Mind you, they have their system where you order the food with a tablet, and it goes back to the kitchen right away.

Over an hour or so later, the waiter came by to tell her that their system went out, but the orders are in the system.

No managers came by to check on the patrons, the waiter did not come by to get refills, or check on drinks. If you look at my review from five years ago; it's on par for their service.

Nothing was discounted. Nothing was comped. Nothing was done to compensate for the long wait. My wife could have left if they were given a warning of the issue right away. It shouldn't take an hour to let customers know there was an issue with the kitchen.

My wife wrote to the business to let them know what happened. We got a generic, "oh we'll use this as a learning experience."

If the managers were present, they would have handled this, but they weren't. IF they were present, this wouldn't be a learning lesson on how to deal with a kitchen issue like this.

People have expectations for how long a meal should take, and this did not meet that whatsoever at all.

They offered a gift card, but that wasn't our intent for the message to them.

Because management was non-existent, they lost out on a lot of future business from customers to rake in money for that night. There is a reason why we didn't show up here in five years, I don't see how they are still in business.

Review from 5 years ago: I have mixed feelings about this place. The first time we came it was awesome, and it's been a roller coaster of consistency here from food to service. I'm glad they dropped their app that would basically allow you to cut in front of the line if you used it to reserve your spot. The last visit, the waiter had his tablet to put our order in and it was quick but we had a hard time finding him to get refills on drinks. I'm not a fan of restaurants that just take your order and you then have to look for them to pay for your bill or get additional drinks. We'll eat here if we are in a pinch but it's not on the list of places to hit up on our dine out night.

We've hit here with much more frequency the last three months and I just wish it was more consistent...