Green Valley Ranch Beer Garden — Restaurant in Denver

We chose to eat here today for a working lunch. We've been here a few times and overall its been okay. Recently they started charging a 20% gratuity that you can not opt out of. This is an entirely self-serve restaurant, with exception to the bartender. You go to the counter and order your food. You go to the counter to pick up your food. You go to the soda machine to fill your drinks. There is absolutely no service that warrants a mandatory 20% gratuity. If I go to a sit down restaurant where a waiter/waitress provides service then I absolutely will tip. This is not that kind of restaurant and your mandatory gratuity is warrantless and baseless. For this reason, we will not be returning. And please spare me the generic PR response of "why" you feel it is justified. Because we simply do not agree. And the only thing we can do about it is not support your business.

On another note, the food quality was not very good. I ordered the philly cheese steak and my colleague ordered the bison burger. Both were mediocre at best. Our bill was $53.00 for subpar food. We did not get $53.00 worth of food or $53.00 worth of quality. This experience was worsened by the amount of fly's we had swarming around us and our food. This is something I would expect if we ate outside on the patio. But we were inside and there were at least 9 or 10 fly's around us and our food the entire time. This seems trivial, but it negatively affected...

Add Beer Garden to the growing list of establishments where 20% tipping is now mandatory if you didn't already get that memo. (I can get you another copy.) They call their fee the "Hospitality Included service model." This is a bit odd when you realize the Beer Garden staff provides the exact same level of service as a fast food establishment.

Customer goes and places their order at the counter, comes back to the counter to pick up their food order, then stands in another line at the bar to get drinks and finally clears their own table before leaving. What exactly is the staff doing for this 20% other than padding the bottom line? I think it is a little excessive to tag on $10 for the "service" of standing behind the counter and taking a $50 food order. (At least you still get to talk to a real person to place your order and you are not pointed to a kiosk while the staff stands and stares at their phones.)

I'm guessing this was implemented because tipping was low in the past. If you don't really do anything from a service stand point for the customer, why would customers be dropping 20% tips for good service? Not my business to run, but you may want to bring in The Bobs and reevaluate your business model related to customer service if 20% is going to...

I'm undecided about this place. The food was pretty good, service was good as well. They have a great selection of beers. HOWEVER it is unacceptable to force me into tipping 20%! They add it onto the bill no matter what. Nothing you can do about it. I am used to that if you are in large groups and that's ok, but we were a party of three and payed separately. I usually pay about 20% in tips, but the only one who decides that is me! What will happen is that they pay their employees less because they get a guaranteed 20% tip. It's the wrong thing to do! Myself and friends will NOT return for that reason!

[Edit] Because of the response of management (see below) I will add this to my review (not changing the rating, though): It is not my responsibility to make up for bad laws (tipped employees sub-minimum wage laws) or the business's inability to pay their employees fairly. An easy solution would be to split the tips between all employees instead of only front facing employees. Especially since you're making the excuse that it's unfair to part of your work force. It is up to you as a business owner to make it fair, not to your employees or...