Hermanos — Restaurant in Concord

My wife took a party of 7 to Hermanos for an early dinner. She arrived before the rest of her party at 4:15. Hermanos had just opened. They were mostly empty due to the early hour and just opening. She had an armful of packages that were presents for the young girls attending the dinner. She informed the hostess that she had a party of 7 that was a few minutes away and would like to be seated so she can “unload” the presents and get a glass of wine. The hostess informs her that she isn’t supposed to seat anyone until the entire party arrives. My wife points out that the place is empty and they are only a few minutes away. The hostess informs my wife that she will ask the manager if she can be seated. She goes around the corner where the manager was located. (Leading my wife to believe that the manager had obviously heard her request.). The manager informs the hostess that my wife could “wait upstairs in the lounge”. The hostess comes out and repeats what she has been told. My wife is so frustrated that she decides to wait outside with her packages. When the other 6 guests arrive two minutes later, they come back in and let the hostess know the entire party of 7 is there. She is told they will have to wait while they set up the table. They do. They are then seated at a table for 6 with a chair squeezed into the end. They attempt to fit at this too small table and my wife decides that there is no point in jamming 7 people into a 6 people table in a restaurant that is empty. She decides that the 4 person and 2 person table they slid together to accommodate the 7 people in her party was not going to work. Knowing that the manager is not really customer focused, she decides to trade the 2 person table with one of the many empty 4 person tables beside them. She is going to pile the presents on the 8th chair so they are not on the floor. The manager sees this happening and asks my wife what she thinks she is doing. She explains that they were put in a table that was too small for their party so she is swapping a 2 person table for a 4 person table. The manager tells her that isn’t necessary as she will take the packages. She informs my wife she doesn’t like to swap the table because that means they won’t have the 4 seats for other diners. Completely ignoring the fact that there were 7 people in my wife’s party that were jammed into a table for 6! My wife told her that she was sorry but they needed room for 7, not 6. The manager walked away and my wife moved the tables herself. As much as my wife was tempted not to spend any money in that restaurant, (and she has been there more than once without this experience) she decided not to uproot the kids and other Moms and stay and eat. The waitress and hostess were very nice and almost apologetic for the treatment my wife and her party received. I found this whole experience to be completely unnecessary and hope the owner of the restaurant realizes the manager on duty the afternoon/evening of February 28th has driven customers to...

First time dining here, wanted to try it for a long time. Here’s the good, the bad, and the ugly: We went in early in advance of a show at th4e Chubb Theater. Place was busy (Friday night) but we were OK waiting for a table. After we were seated, waitress took our order for drinks. We all got margaritas which were served in 8 ounce tumblers. They were OK, but my wife and I specified certain tequila for ours. Tres Generaciones to be precise. My tequila of choice was NOT in my margarita when it arrived. Waitress then disappeared for a while, finally came back for our order. We got the special pork nachos and then ordered our entrees. The “good” – the pork nachos were tasty, so was really looking forward to our dinner entrée’s. After about 30 minutes, the nachos came out. However, after 1.5 hours and watching 5 groups of diners come in, get their food, and leave we realized we were not going to get to eat dinner before the show. The waitress came out twice and said the food would be a few more minutes. Didn’t happen. We finally told her to cancel our order as we needed to get to the theater. That was the “bad” – food never arrived and I’m convinced the waitress never put in our order when we gave it to her. If it did go in, it was way too late. Now the “ugly”: The manger came out and instead of just being honest and saying they messed up (which I would have been fine with – it happens), she went on to make excuses about how “the orders are made in the order they are put into the kitchen” (Her words), etc. and if we could wait LONGER, we’d have our food in 5-8 minutes. If we agreed, we’d be choking it down since we couldn’t box it up given we were going directly to a show and not home. She agreed to take the entrée’s off the bill, however, after getting the modified bill, it was still $52.00 for 2 drinks and 1/2 of the nacho starter (we split evenly with the couple we were with, so theirs was also the same). $104 for 5 drinks and nachos. Having worked in the food service industry, this is NOT the way to garner customer satisfaction. So – if the manager is reading this here’s what I would have done in our situation: (1) Comp’d the entire meal. Forgetting our food order while we’re watching others around us eat and leave is pretty bad. What we had was actually good, but dining out isn’t just about the food only, it’s also about the experience. Given that errors do happen, I would have offered a gift certificate to come back for another meal. Your chance to make it right and bring a potential customer back in to try the food again. You didn’t do that and instead tried to back-pedal the whole issue which left us hungry and disappointed with how this all went down. It was at my behest we try Hermanos based on what I saw for food reviews, so was a little embarrassed to bring my friends there only to walk away hungry and disappointed. Given the experience we had there last Friday, we will not go back and I cannot recommend to...

Yesterday I had received a phone call letting me know that one of my long time friends had died suddenly so decided to get out of the house and treat myself to dinner at a restaurant I had always liked a lot. They are very popular so often takeout is not available. I arrived just after five pm and was able to park right by the entry and be seated at a two-top on the lower floor. I had called my daughter and asked her to join me as I felt the need of company. She arrived shortly after I was seated and we each ordered a glass of wine and waited for a waitress to take our order. It took a while as they were very busy but we were patient. I ordered the enchilito I usually get and my daughter ordered a couple of appetizers since she had actually already eaten before I called her. She told the waitress that she would take hers to go but I planned to eat there. After more than an hour and no sign of food we asked for chips and salsa and a second glass of wine. Still no sign of food and yet people who came in after us had already been served, eaten and were ready to leave! So we told our waitress we would just take all the food to go. Two hours after my arrival we were finally given our order with the food in boxes but not wrapped and the salsa lid turned out not to be on tight so it spilled in my car on the one mile drive home and soaked the bottom of the bag. As we were leaving I told the staff that I was not happy about the slow service and was told that it was their kitchen policy, so I guess that my daughters request for take out and my eventual request to do the same put us at the back of the queue! What if someone else had come and after ordering and waiting didn't feel well or had a family emergency and had to leave and ask for the food to be packaged? A ridiculous way to treat any customers. Normally I would have rated the food higher but by the time I got the non-wrapped food home it was cold and I didn't like having the wet bag drip the salsa liquid in my car and down my leg as I carried the soggy bag in from the car. So thanks, Hermanos for making my tough...