Culver's — Restaurant in Grand Junction

Ok, I'm a Culver's fan from a long time ago. I used to live in Illinois and Culver's was always a standout to the point I never considered them on the same level as fast food and more of a restaurant. But the Grand Junction location is doing an incredible disservice to that reputation. It was on par for the first two weeks it was open. Other than the terrible location and parking lot setup which doesn't flow well at all it was great initially. Now having been there at least 10-15 times it has progressively gotten absolutely horrible. The last time I'll be going there was a couple days ago. We were the only people in line when we pulled ahead to wait for one burger, one burger basket and a concrete mixer. After having to repeat the order at the window cause it wasn't right we proceeded to wait 10 minutes then two other people pulled in behind us then one more soon after. We watched as the one guy barely walking at a snails pace to the third car behind us give them what looked like a similar order with ice cream then the car behind them (the last in line) then waited another 15 minutes with the car that was behind us till they got their order. I said I'll give them 5 more minutes then I'm going in to see what the problem is. 35 minutes total wait time for what was one customer in the drive thru then only three more 10 minutes later and still no food while watching people get similar orders before us. I got out of my truck just in time to see said snail take his time walking up and I said: hey I get it things happen and not everybody orders the same thing but to watch all three cars behind us get their order first while we waited 35 minutes was a bad look. All he said was "I'm the only one here today" with a very condescending tone and No Apology! I said well you could at least tell people your short staffed and it's going to be a long wait. He said have a good day and walked away in slow-mo. And to top it all off the order was...

4/27/22: WORST CULVERS EVER! I was soooo bummed out! The wait took FOREVER, and my fries were soggy (as soon as she handed me the bag I checked), and the burger was NOT HOT. And you couldn't PAY ME to try and have them fix it with how long everything took! I'll bet corporate would be very interested in learning they are having cars pull forward to keep their drive-thru times down. Not just one or two or three, but NINE CARS PULLING FORWARD. In my expert observation, they overloaded the kitchen, slamming them with back to back tickets when they had NINE PEOPLE pull forward. Management allowing this to happen is a shortcut and unacceptable in the restaurant/fast food industry and SLAMS the house, leaving employees and customers unhappy. The whole property is tiny, you have to enter from the back and go ALL THE WAY AROUND THE BUILDING, SQUEEZE THROUGH NINE CARS WAITING FOR THEIR ORDER TO GET BACK TO THE BACK FOR THE DRIVE THRU. Eliminate an aisle of parking for cripes' sake, if you need more room. Listen, I haven't had a greasy fast food cheeseburger in 6 months and was really looking forward to my meal and made sure I went to CULVERS so I didn't have any issues. However, THIS Culver's is chaotic and ridiculous. ALSO: If you've been to Culver's, then you KNOW you can get cheese fries. Asked for cheese fries and the guy taking our order was like, "Um, I mean, we have chili cheese fries." So I re-phrased the question and asked for fries with a cup of cheese and he said, "Oh! Yeah we can do that." As if their menu doesn't say Fries: Add Cheese for $0.50... I'm just... I can't LOL I was so hangry I ate the food anyways. And there was nothing wrong with it besides how long it sat before the food was brought out to us. Maybe have more than 1 person running the orders out? I'm not sure... but I WILL be contacting corporate so they can address...

I'm going to sound like a male Karen... Let me preface to say I really enjoy culver's. I normally frequent them whenever I drive by one. This was by far the worst experience I've had. Let's start with the food. The burger was very overcooked, to the point that the patty resembled a rubber puck more than an edible object. The patty melt was disappointing as well, I'm not sure how you cook it? Flattop (God forbid you microwave it). But the corned beef/pastrami was lukewarm, the bread wasn't toasted, the Swiss cheese was put on top of everything cold and not melted on the flattop with the chopped and mixed sauerkraut and meat. So I ended up with soggy bread, coldish meat, cold cheese and to my taste not enough sauerkraut or 1000 island.

Lastly, It was well staffed when I got there. I cannot speak to how many employees were in the kitchen, but in the front counter area there was 6-7 standing idly by talking with each other. When we went to sit down, we noticed every booth was dirty. No problem, my son and I are able bodied and can use napkins to wipe down the booth and table. Sometimes restaurants get busy, it happens . They'll get to it (I thought). But throughout our wait and meal, it didn't happen. I watched 2 elderly couples come in, who very much fit the bill of handicapped/mobility impaired. I saw their frustration when they tried to find clean tables. Long story short. Grab some sanitizer and a rag and wipe down your tables in a timely manner. Watch the food you cook, I'd rather wait 5-10 minutes more for food made right then misfires.

Cheese curds and pretzel bites were excellent. Root beer is some of the best...