Jim 'N Nick's Bar-B-Q — Restaurant in Georgia

On April 11 at 3 pm my husband and I had a meeting in the Cumming, GA location to discuss the menu and date for our youngest son's wedding rehearsal lunch.  This meeting was with the store manager, Erin Whitney, and her assistant Kevin.  At that time, we tasted a few things, set the menu, date and time (12:30) of the event.  We also reserved the front private room for lunch on that day, June 9.  We were also guaranteed 3 of the best servers who would be doing nothing else but serving our party.  Erin subsequently sent me a file containing the menu and I told her by email I would get back to her as soon as possible with a firm head count.  As soon as I had all of the invitation responses, I sent the count of 39 on May 22.  She did not respond but I didn't think anything about that because things to this point were done so smoothly and professionally.  Little did I know.

This past Friday, June 9, I arrived at the restaurant with 38 people behind me, including 6 children 5 and under.  As I walked into the store I noticed that our room had at least 12 occupied tables.  When I told the hostess the party of 39 had arrived to occupy the private room, she had no idea what I was talking about.  I asked for Erin and she said Erin was not working that day.  Lucky for them Kevin was there.  He recognized me but had no idea we had a reservation for that day and time because it was not posted on the store calendar, neither did he know where our printed menus were located.

So here I am, standing in the restaurant with 38 more people, wondering how in the world they were going to handle this.  Kevin disappeared for about 15 minutes to hunt the menus and I assumed to reassign staff.  When he reappeared he did have the menus but would then have to move the parties seated in the private room.  I asked him to let me walk outside to the patio and check the weather and table availability.  The temperature was just fine and there was only one party out there.  I opted for the patio because we could be seated more quickly.  The people already seated agreed to move inside and we helped Kevin rearrange the tables and chairs.  All of this took another 20 minutes.  So now I was running at least 30 minutes late and there were LITTLE children involved.  We were trapped with no options and no way to relocate, not to mention extremely embarrassed.

Ultimately, Kevin staffed our event, gave us a small discount, did not charge us for dessert which hardly anybody ordered, and apologized profusely for something that was in no way his fault.   It was the fault of the person who was supposed to be sure there was a note made on the calendar.  Am I angry?  Was I embarrassed?  You bet.  As the mother of the groom, I had one, and only one, responsibility for this wedding and that was the meal following the rehearsal.  As the manager of the restaurant, Erin Whitney should have made sure all details were covered before she went out of town or at least delegated the responsibility.  No matter what is going on in anyone's personal life, the professional obligations have to be covered if you want to call yourself a...

My wife and I stopped at a nearby place for lunch, but they are so short staffes that they were closed. We decided to go to Jim N Nicks, well because it was close and we love this place. We walked in and they are not busy, maybe 1/3 of the tables are occupied. 2 teenage female employees stood next to the bar for the takeout orders and looked over at us a few times standing at the host/hostess station waiting to be seated, with no host/hostess around. After standing there for a few minutes a waitress came over to help us get seated. Finally from around the corner a young lady came to seat us instead of the waitress. The young lady had been not paying attention while she was socializing with another employee wrapping tableware in napkins. After we were seated it was at least 5 minutes before anyone came to our table. The 2 teenagers still socializing at the to go order area and the hostess went back to socializing and putting utensils together. We were just about ready to leave when the young man that came to our table asked us what we would like to drink and told him we are ready to order. He said he didn't have a pen, so I told him not to worry about it because we're leaving. In my experience when a restaurant experience starts out like this, it doesn't get better and I'm not paying good money for a poor experience. I understand when places are short staffed but the employees are trying. In fact I tip those people better because, they showed up and are working hard. This was not the situation today. Everyone was compartmentalized and busy socializing. This is a sign of weak management. Employees, especially younger ones, will get away with as much as is permitted. Where is the management to tell the young ladies at the to go area that they can go help in other areas that need it? Where is the management to tell the hostess to keep a close eye on the door instead of gossiping? It was very disappointing to see one of our favorite places looking like it is going down hill. I've seen it before and it usually takes a drop in sales before the weak management is replaced and the place...

We were seated in the bar area at about 2-215. The only two guest in the whole section. It appeared that there were roughly 6 employees in the bar area working or doing work related activities. We received cold food. Our drinks sat empty on the end of our table for most the meal, even with multiple employees walking right by us. We ended up having our drinks filled at the bar. Our server finally checked in on us after having our food for 18 mins. When informed about the cold meal, He did nothing but offer us to go boxes. After declining the boxes he said he would be right back. Now I am not sure if our server realized but we were able to see him in all his endeavors. So the first time he was missing he was in the restroom with other employees for about ten minutes. This second time when he said he would be right back we watched him talk to coworkers(giggling and motioning in our direction) and walk back and forth for almost 10 minutes before we flagged him down for the check. Never once did this employee try to satisfy us as guest or address any of the issues that we brought to his attention. Full price on the bill and no table touch from any of the management. Luckily for us though all those individuals in the bar area with us were all management staff members. One of those individuals is the one that walked past our empty drinks twice. That individual was more interested in rolling silverware and turning her back to the floor so they could be apart of this management gathering that was going on. After dining in front of all the individuals that were ultimately responsible for our experience and paying full price for the bill we walked the 15- 20 feet over to the table of managers and informed them of the poor service we received. Now not a single one of them introduced themselves but by the way he took charge I would assume this guy was the GM. Now to be fair he did offer us a gift card. But in all honesty why would we want to go back to a place that even the managers are unaware of what is going on right in front of them. The pictures show where the staff members were seated at and how empty...