Arnie's Bakery & Restaurant — Restaurant in Grand Rapids

I absolutely love the new menu, the food was great and new menu items seemed of higher quality (or at least the bread)--although chips are now $1.00 extra for some menu items, it seems like most prices are exactly what they were before the changes--and unlike others I always have good service and seem to get my food very fast. BUT no more free cupcake with your dinner?!?!?!

Anytime I talked to anyone about dining at Arnie's, I ALWAYS spoke of the free cupcake with dinner, and Arnie's made me a liar. Honestly why wouldn't they just bump up the price $0.50 on any item on the menu rather than charging people for it.

Sure I get it. It's $0.50. But there is something to be said about the UNIQUE (competitively advantaged in terms the Arnie's folks should understand) experience of getting an Arnie's Bakery cupcake included with your meal at the restaurant and having the waitstaff ask if what kind of cupcake you'd like at the end.

Unfortunately, I think this change is here to stay as they have a stack of placemats printed out with the new $2.99 cupcake with soft drink and dinner promotion, which seems more like a demotion. In the words of Sean Connery as Captain Hook: Bad form,...

I have basically NEVER written a review of a company, but I didn’t want anyone else to go through what I did. I scheduled a bridal shower, had to reschedule due to COVID - no worries not a problem. Less than a month before the new date, I called to ask the restaurant for what capacity restrictions, mask requirements etc - so we are prepared!

I called, the manager very casually says “oh we have to cancel this event” I am shocked that I am hearing about this less than a month before the event. She informed me they decided to cancel events because Arnies is rebranding and renovating their restaurants. I never received a call, email - nothing. I could have showed up 3 weeks later with 40 guests with no place to have the event - after I booked it, signed a contract AND put a deposit down.

After going around and around with the general manager and event coordinator who only bashed Arnies corporate offices on he phone to me. I was expecting a phone call by end of the week, for them to try and remedy this even a bit and return my deposit...no phone call.

I will tell everyone, DO NOT host an event with Arnies. The lack of professionalism , courtesy and overall business acumen is...

Extremely disappointed. Arnies used to be my favorite restaurant. I was so upset when they changed it to beer city bread company. Arnies was such a classic and this is coming from someone currently in her 20s. When they added a small restaurant to the bakery I was so excited. We came right when they opened and I got the same order I used to always get. The cheese soup used to be creamy and was a very light orange color served with saltine crackers and bacon bits and in Feb it was a bright unnatural orange with bread. No bacon bits or saltine crackers and the taste went way downhill. The fries are also no longer crinkle cut. We kind of forgot about the disappointment and came back today and the soup was 1000x worse. It was so liquidy and even more orange and looked like it had been sitting out separating for a long time. I wouldn’t even try it this time. Also, this time and last time, the 4 packs of cupcakes were half vanilla and half chocolate and we don’t like chocolate so we didn’t get one like we were planning. PLEASE bring back the real Arnies. So many people want it back it’s...