Tropical Smoothie Cafe — Restaurant in Corpus Christi

I’ve visited with my family twice already. The first time we visited we had high hopes to try a few staple items. We were disappointed in that a couple of things we wanted to try weren’t available. We drove 30 mins out on a Friday at 7pm, and the restaurant closes at 10pm. I don’t understand how several “staple” items are sold out so early in the evening on the first day of the weekend? The customer service wasn’t knowledgeable of much on the restaurant and did nothing to try to make our visit less unpleasant. Besides that, everything else we purchased was great. Second visit with my family again wasn't a pleasant one either. Visit was at approximately 7:30pm, This time, I wanted to use my coupon for a free smoothie that I received on my first visit, but for whatever reason it didn’t pop up when the cashier scanned my app code. The cashier lady just kept answering “I don’t know”, to my questions about the coupon and “that would be a question for the manager”. I replied if she could go ask her now please, and all she did was smile and say “I don’t know” and chuckled. I left it like that and still placed our order. I was very thorough with my order to avoid mistakes but she still managed to not get my order right. It was simple, i asked for a side of honey for my oatmeal/chia bowl. When I got up to ask for my side, she said it was already added on top of it. And I said I wanted on the side, and she just walked away to the back while I waited. Another young lady brought me the side of honey. As time passed and we were still sitting enjoying our order, the cashier lady kept talking to her co-workers whispering and quickly glancing at us, and immediately resuming their tasks when noticing I had seen them. That behavior continued on several times, All this while their manager was there and did nothing to address the situation. PS. Another commenter said they had given her a PB cup for her pup. So I assumed it was pet-friendly. We took our puppy with us and right when we got there, a lady nicely handed me a small cup of Peanut butter for him. And although he’s a well behaved puppy, he barked several times while I took my kids to the restroom, and my husband was approached by staff and told him dogs weren’t allowed. So we had to leave. With the gossiping behavior and the puppy situation we got to the point of feeling very uncomfortable and leaving before we were even done. Overall, the food was great, and I understand it isn’t a fancy restaurant but they highly lack quality and professional staff. And unfortunately will not be visiting again. It it isn’t worth driving 30 minutes and being treated...

So the first time I went to this location they did really well; it was the first week they opened. Every time after that it has gotten worse and worse. The drive through takes over 30 minutes minimum and I feel like I can’t order food and smoothie at the same time; if I order both one of them is messed up and either my smoothie melts or my food gets cold. It’s crazy to pay $20+ for 2 propel just to have to have it remade every time I go. Today for example, I ordered a detox, add pomegranate, a kiwi quencher add pomegranate, a flatbread and a Turkey bacon ranch, no ranch. The person who helped was super nice but the detox didn’t have any pomegranate added to it, the Turkey bacon ranch had ranch on it and needed to be remade (that usually is the thing that has to be remade because they always put the ranch on it) and by the time I got the new sandwich my wife’s smoothie was completely melted so now it’s in the freezer at home to try to thicken it back up. I will not be going back here for a while. If this was a one time thing I wouldn’t even care but I have had similar things happen every time I have gone here, at least 6 other times.

Update: I don’t understand why every other Tropical smoothie in the country knows what’s going on and this one has been terrible since it opened. So my family and I tried it again. The service is better but the food is still just bad. The smoothies are watery, lack flavor and have fruit that’s just chunky and unblended so you just can’t use a straw. My wife’s turkey bacon ranch sandwich had half of one strip of microwaved bacon and 7 slices of turkey on it. Imagine you bought a pack a bologna and grab 7 perfectly stacked slices and just slapped it on a sandwich. It’s like an extremely lazy person or a psychopath put that sandwich together. Definitely not giving it...

I ordered a flat bread, avocado grilled cheese sandwich and two smoothies. Ordered ahead on the app and chose the option of later instead of ASAP. That didn't matter though because when I went to pick up the order, they informed me they did not have my order and asked me to tell them what it was. Waited an HOUR to get my food. Even telling them what I ordered didn't matter because I got home and they gave me the wrong flatbread and forgot my side to my grilled cheese. I went back to the place to tell them and kept getting cut off with the employees saying "i'm sorry we're really busy". I understand being busy because i had worked as a server for quite some time, but what I don't understand is as I'm standing there watching them prepare orders there was NO sense of urgency. It was almost like slow motion and when they'd finish one order instead of moving on to the next they waited for the drive thru employee to ask them "do you have this?" and THEN they would start the next order. Fast forward, I get home and sit down to eat my now cold avocado grilled cheese, just to realize they didn't even make their own sandwich right. There was no tomato spread on it. To top it all off, instead of being offered a refund for all that happened I received a coupon for "buy one get one free". So I have to purchase something again in order to be compensated for their mistakes? That's wild. What's the point of ordering...