Chipotle Mexican Grill — Restaurant in Kalispell

As a former Chipotle employee (was there when it opened in the valley two years ago and only stayed for 6 months after being the last original employee left working there), I completely understand all the different types of reviews—from 1 star to 5 stars, all are reasonable. The short staffing and being out of things (ingredients; among other things) IS NOT THE EMPLOYEES’ FAULTS!!! A lot of them try their best (I’m sure there’s some awful-work-ethic employees, every place has them, but); for the most part it’s management’s fault. And honestly, more times than that, corporate’s fault. Half the management is underpaid, college-age “kids” who don’t really know what they’re doing and management doesn’t seem to want to help them. The reason they always have short staffing is because it’s such an awful place due to corporate management and no one in their right mind wants to work there—or continue working there after receiving their first paycheck.

Most the employees I’ve come across since leaving are plenty nice enough but you can tell they’re overworked, underpaid, and fed up with working there—probably on the verge of quitting or have just put their two weeks in so they really just don’t care anymore. Most of the kids working in places like this (and specifically in the valley) have had such great customer service—in my experience at least—so I really do blame it on Chipotle corporate itself. How would you feel if you were underpaid, understaffed all the time, and having the keep up with the demand of Chipotle in the valley? You’d probably feel and act the same as these poor kids.

Now, in the past couple months, every time I’ve gone, they’ve seemed to have everything and been decently staffed—now, I still can’t be sure if they’re back up to regular “typical” Chipotle hours as I only go when I know that they’re open—and their food 8.9/10 times is great (sometimes the meat is a bit on the chewy or burnt side, but it depends on the person working the grill and results can vary with that—newer versus more seasoned employees).

All I’m really getting at is please be kind to the employees who might not have a choice in being there or not, because I guarantee you if they had a choice they might have to officially close the store (which they should honestly do if they keep struggling so hard). Just be kind and remember that awful customers make the situation that much worse. Leave your negative reviews, you’re free to do that, and maybe one day corporate will actually listen to them, but please do not take out your frustrations on the employees who are more than likely doing their best to please you and this every-growing and...

UPDATED REVIEW: I've since been back to this location about 4 times since my initial review... And there are still major issues. Ingredients are always running out. I've only been able to order a side of chips on one occasion. Not enough employees and lack of training/leadership. They only have one worker on the line most of the time, and so if there is a few people waiting to order will be standing in line longer than your are used to at other locations. The quality of food is sub-par. About half of the time the food was decent and like the Chipotle I expected. The other half of visits I had issues like cold food, over seasoned chicken, low quality ingredients.

A note to management/owner: Most of the issues with your location can be alleviated with better employee training. That falls on your shoulders. I will be no longer ordering from this location in the near future. I might give it another chance later this year to see if anything has changed. I'm still giving this place 2 stars out of 5. And for anyone reading this, this isn't the Chipotle you are used to, this location needs a few more months to pull it together.

FIRST REVIEW: First off, this location just opened, so let's be understanding and patient to the growing pains of a new location. However, that being said, management and ownership could have handled this launch much better, and I hope they make it up to the community that expected better. That being said, here is a list of things that need addressed...

When items run out keep a dry-erase whiteboard when you walk in the door as to what is missing and keep it updated to the hour. Worst thing is for a customer to sit in line and find out later ingredients are missing. If you are missing items that normally are included in the menu item, you need to offer a percentage discount. Otherwise you are simply overcharging your customers for ingredients that aren't available. This happened to me and while wasn't a big deal, I did assume there would be some sort of a discount. And yes, those ingredients weren't on your "out of ingredients" sign upon entering the location. I hope you are paying your employees a bonus through this launch. They are working hard and deserve all the credit to...

STOP giving EVERY SINGLE CUSTOMER size SMALL queso EVERY SINGLE TIME they order size LARGE queso through Door Dash!!!! Answer your phone, and make it easier to get past the auto attendant when asking to speak to an employee or a manager. I gave up the first time I called after fighting the auto attendant for 10 minutes. The second time I called, I said everything I could think of to get through to a live person that I could think of, and THEN you guys DIDN’T EVEN ANSWER THE PHONE!!! I’ve reported this issue to Door Dash SEVERAL times, because I love Chipotle, order from it a lot, and ALWAYS am delivered the wrong size queso. DoorDash swears that they’re telling Chipotle the right size, and that they’re listing the size on the orders they send in. So Chipotle employees? READ!!! You mess it up EVERY time, and that’s just beyond unreasonable. I’ve talked to an employee about this in person at the store, but it didn’t fix it. Chipotle: This has been going on for months, and you could have avoided getting this bad review entirely. You REALLY pushed me to it by being responsible for all the things I listed above. I only leave reviews if it’s really good or really bad. I hope you’re grateful I gave you three stars, your behavior surrounding this issue is one star behavior. It resulted in me feeling like the only possible way to promote positive change at this point after everything I’ve tried, is to blast you with a bad review, which I just absolutely hate that I had to do. WHY aren’t you doing better? You’re shooting yourselves in the foot in more ways than just earning a bad review. You give me the wrong size and what happens is I report that mistake to Door Dash and get a complete refund for the full price of the Large Chips and Queso. Not refunded the difference between cost of small vs. large, refunded for the whole thing. And then YOU have to foot the bill for your mistake that costs you way more in the long run than just doing the right things in the first place. You’re spending money you don’t need to spend on a...