Vale Healthy Kitchen - Jacksonville — Restaurant in Jacksonville

This place is back to sucking. Below is my previous review, plus my amended review. Today I walked in at 9:45 and they said they were closed. If you want good food or good service or good anything save your time and don't come here. Here's my previous review:

"I'm really slow to leave a bad review. Especially for a fast food place. I generally assume that most people won't be having a good day and to be honest, most of the time, it's true in most places. I had terrible experiences at Vale in the past. I loved their food but had such terrible experiences with their employees that I actually left them a really bad review before.

Things have changed. I don't know what happened, but today I decided to try Vale again. It's been almost a year and I know their food is healthy, so I thought I'd just not talked to the staff if I could and just leave with my food. Today was different however. Justice greeted me and was super nice. I don't expect people to be nice, before people were just straight up mean... Justice was amazing! He was super attentive and super kind and was very interested in making sure that I don't get anything that is spicy. He gave me a great experience and convinced me that this place is good. I wasn't planning on changing my review just for one good time, but he didn't know that I had a bad review and he's still treated me incredibly nicely. If you are management, I implore you to give him a raise or at least a shout out because he was really really good!

I'll still leave my old review below if you're interested in seeing how far they've come:"

"I used to hate Vale's employees. I love their food, but I have been given attitude, told they were closed when they weren't, told food wasn't spicy when it was the spiciest thing... I grew a serious hatred for Vale's employees no matter how good the food was. I've sat at the car while I had someone else go in to order food for me. It was literally that bad! Today I went and I expected nothing different. But Dreaka was there, and she was tired from a long day, but gave me the biggest smile anyone had given me that day. She made my day and she went above and beyond to serve me and get anything she could to make sure I had a good experience! This was supposed to be a single star review, and there was nothing positive that I had to say; until today. Dreaka deserves a raise, and some serious acknowledgement. She should be asked to train the others. This has been the only person I have had a good...

Updated: This situation was resolved and the current staff is very respectful. Highly recommend their acai bowls.

Past issue: Food is great, I’ve been going to this establishment for over a year now. However, there has been recent turnover and the new front of house manager (dark-skinned male) is extremely disrespectful. Walked in at 6:50pm and waited behind one couple to get their food. Then ordered an acai bowl. Another man walks in 5 minutes later and orders an acia bowl with modifications. We both then stand there for 20 minutes and watch the manager boss around the hard-working lone worker to complete all of the orders. The poor man then messes up the modified acia bowl of the other customer but that customer doesn’t raise a fuss and leaves. I then wait another 10 minutes for my original first-ordered acia bowl and watch the manager play/text on his phone as the lone other worker is trying to refill all of the granola and fruit trays and complete my order. I then ask the manager if he could help out the other worker, as i have been waiting a half hour for my simple acia bowl. The manager then raises his voice and instructs me to “wait my turn and see that the other worker is doing what he can.” I asked why he couldn’t help out the worker instead of being on his phone and raises his voice even further inappropriate level to tell me that “it is not his fault that I’ve waited over a half hour for my order.” He then started managing hand gestures towards me and yelling that i “was no longer allowed back in Vale.” He then accused me of recording him and became further aggressive. He was mistaken about being recorded but i was not going to correct someone who was already yelling at me. I had been on the phone and had it up the entire 30 minute wait and during our conversation. I then asked him to please lower his voice, as i had not raised mine at all towards him, and this irritated him even more. I told him i was disappointed with the service. And he did not like this response. He then ordered the lone worker, once again, to finish the orders. This whole experience is extremely disappointing. Vale needs to have higher standards for their managers and encourage them to lead by example instead of bossing others around and then responding with extremely poor manners to a customer once they inquire why one poor worker is doing the work or 2-3 people while the male manager sits on his phone and...

Honestly I don't know where to begin with this place. The food's perfectly fine if you're expecting some vaguely Mediterranean Panda Express or some such thing, but it's nothing to write home about.

I've never once had an order for pickup prepared on time, or even started before I arrive at the store. And even though the orders were placed upwards of 30 minutes in advance, every time I arrive they act like they've never heard of the concept of pickup orders. To be fair, they usually eventually decide to start making it after standing around and scratching their heads for 15-20 minutes.

As I'm writing this right now, I've already been waiting 15 minutes on my order and they haven't even started to prepare it. And half the time when they do start making it, they suddenly discover that they're out of some incredibly specific, rare, hard-to-get food. Like rice or lettuce or...cheese.

I'm in the lobby, right now, with seven other diners sitting here waiting on their pickup orders to be prepared. Not a single one has been started. We're all just here sitting on our phones waiting for some sort of attempt to be made to prepare food that's been paid for.

If you've got an entire evening to waste sitting in a mediocre 'cafe' environment with fake plants on the walls and lemonade that looks like it was made yesterday, by all means, go for it. It'll be a lovely experience if your hobby happens to be wasting your time, money, and sanity watching people do everything in their power to avoid satisfying their guests and customers.

Like really. No. There's a CAVA right next to it. Just go there. I'm warning y'all beforehand.

I've been waiting here long enough to write this entire thing, and it's been...30 minutes now. It's hilariously bad. Like sitcom-level bad. 0/5, not a single redeeming quality of the entire place.

40 minutes now. No food. They're just...standing there.

EDIT : When I tried to ask about my order, again, the employee stood there staring at her phone until I tried again to get her attention. She didn't bother asking who it was for, what it was, or anything. She simply said "It's gonna be a minute", and that I was "Free to cancel the order and leave". And then proceeded to go and...check her phone again. How hard do you have to try in order to be this abysmal at every single...