Perkins American Food Co. — Restaurant in Duluth

My wife and I were in Duluth over Labor Day weekend for our 6 year anniversary and decided to go to Perkins for breakfast that Friday. We both had our first date at a Perkins and have been to many locations together so we have a pretty good knowledge of what to expect when ordering our favorite foods. I don't recall our server's name but he was professional, prompt and well-mannered which is why I'm giving this place 2 stars. Had it not been for him this place would get less.

We ordered some things for breakfast including pancakes, a skillet meal and my favorite strawberry cream cheese crispers. Immediately upon receiving our food, I noticed quite a few things that were off. Our crispers did not have the right filling and were put together in a very sloppy and lazy manner, rather than having the cream cheese alongside the strawberry pie like filling that we are used to, they were filled with a sploogy and possibly store-bought strawberry flavored cream cheese spread like you would put on a bagel.

Another thing I noticed pretty quickly is that my pancakes were NOT Perkins legendary pancakes. I have been eating them for more than 25 years and in that time frame they have always tasted the same and looked the same, consistent. These pancakes were small, thin and tasted like straight up Bisquick. Lastly my wife's skillet meal was inconsistent in temperature with pockets of scalding hot and pockets of cold, indicating that it was microwaved. Additionally, the meal is supposed to be garnished with melted cheddar cheese and they straight up put cold shredded cheese on top and served it that way.

I understand that Perkins was recently purchased and is now under new management and currently going through a nationwide rebranding. That being said there are 2 possible reasons for our worst Perkins experience ever. Either this new ownership and rebranding came with massive cost cutting, corner cutting and a significant decline in quality and/or this specific location absolutely dropped the ball in almost every possible way. Whoever was in charge of the kitchen that morning should honestly find a different profession.

The only positive about our experience was our server. I forgot his name but he was tall, short dark hair. Prior to writing this review, I filled out a contact form on Perkins website to inform them of our horrible experience which cost us $51 and even gave them more than 5 days to reach out or respond to my contact form and I received absolutely nothing. My final comments on this are simple: This was NOT Perkins quality. I almost feel like we were robbed. Based on our experience we would not recommend or return to this location. If the manager happens to see this review, we are already back in Minneapolis and wouldn't be against...

I used to like this place. Now I'm very unhappy and angry about the service here! And today, while I was seated at my table and just finished my meal, my server (#1019?) comes over and takes away my coffee pot stating they needed to get other people seated. Yet, I was only there for 1.25 hours. Then after I paid and was heading out, I noticed it wasn't very busy with customers at all. Thus, this is quite the contradiction to what my lady server said to me! Then right as I was reaching the site's main door to exit, a lady bus-person states, "Finally leaving now!?!?" And she showed no remorse for her rude comment and attitude towards me. So all-in-all, I find what happened to me here is very disturbing. No one ever deserves to be treated like this. And sadly, I have been noticing these issues in the last few or so months of this 2025 year too when I visited here. Now today, it breaks my heart to have to say I will never do business at this Perkins (East) ever again. Some of the server and bus staff have gotten terrible and they just don't seem to care about the customers they serve. This type of rude behavior by these staff members is unprofessional and unacceptable. Ultimately, they could totally ruin the customer business here if this continues to go unchecked. However if the owners of this place choose to do nothing then, they ought to just close this business down before it becomes a legal liability.

Yet as for me, I will never go back to this place again!

UPDATE: Your reply is nothing more than a typical canned response that basically states you don't care about the site issues. So instead of wasting your time and sending a silly stupid auto-reply, why not fix the issues so they don't keep happening! Otherwise, please close your business so other more reputable ones can...

This was the worst experience I have ever had at a restaurant. We waited 15 minutes before anyone came to get our drink order. We order soup to come before our meal and we had to ask for our soup three different times and after 30 minutes we finally got soup. It took an hour and a half after that for us to get our meal and when our meal came we were getting up to leave and we explained the very bad service to the manager Gail and she mad a dozen excuses for the waitress, didn't apologize for their incompetence plus didn't offer to make it right. The wait staff was making fun of us and they would stand together and look at us and laugh. The manager Gail was rude through the whole process of our ordeal. I have never ever been treated like this at any restaurant and I have been a manager of a couple of restaurants and have also been a server and I would never treat a customer the way we were treated or allow my staff to act or treat a customer the way we were treated. You have lost my respect and you have lost us and anyone I know as customers because word of mouth goes a long way. The manager Gail refused to give us the store number for a review. Gail said she did not know the store number which is a lie because every store manager knows their...