Avenue Long Branch — Restaurant in Long Branch

BEWARE. I recently hosted a semi-private event for my son at the Avenue. The entire experience and process from start to finish was an absolute nightmare. Upon my first meeting with the banquet manager, I was informed of inaccurate information. The private events manager, Nancy, then tried to clarify the information. She insisted that we got our venue “confused”. She continuously told me there was a misunderstanding and there was no way her banquet manager told us certain information because she was not authorized to make “these decisions”. Considering that I’ve dined at the Avenue numerous times previously and always received good service, I mistakenly proceeded to book the event despite the red flags.

A few days prior to my event, I was sent a floor plan by Nancy. Realizing that the set up included bench seating, I requested for the tables to be arranged in a manner that omitted the bench seating as I had children and older adults who would need to freely move from in and out of the table. I was informed that an alternate layout would not be possible as there was limited space, and was told I would be taking away from their business. This made me feel undervalued as a customer since I was hosting an event of 40+ guests. Only after I complained, did she make the effort to receive approval on the requested layout from the GM.

On the day of the event, I arrived at 3:10pm for a 4:00pm reservation. Upon arrival, I was shocked to find a larger party of 8-12 guests eating in our designated event dining area. Standing there without being greeted by staff, I called over a waitress passing by and asked for the manager. Marcel came and completely dismissed me as he looked at his watch and told me that my reservation was at 4pm. It was 45-50min before my event and the tables were not even set up, nor did anyone seem concerned. He proceeded to call Nancy to come speak to me. Upon speaking to Nancy, we continued to wait for assistance. My husband and family took it upon themselves to move a couple tables to expedite the process as another manager watched this happening. He later approached us and stated to let them do the work, however time was passing and there were still decorations to be placed on the tables. In the meantime, the cake I brought, which was given to the staff to refrigerate, came back out of the kitchen damaged. Nancy took it to get “fixed”, however the damage was still noticeable and the cake was slightly distorted.

Problems continued to occur throughout my event. There were multiple mix-ups with food orders. As a matter of fact, one of the waiters refused to serve several of my guests food. He told them there was too much food and threatened with extra charges. These guests were not served until a manager was notified, who told us that the confusion was due to our guests socializing. Not an excuse. Furthermore, the waiters did not refill our guests water glasses. Water bottles stood empty. Dirty diningware remained on tables. None of our guests were offered juice or soda. The food took a long time to come out. Dessert was served without us being informed, which also resulted in a significant delay in the cutting/serving of the cake.

At the end of the event, I noticed there were charges on the check for things that were not agreed upon in our contract. I requested an itemized invoice to be emailed to us the following day to further investigate. We then received an email stating a refund was issued due to “major discrepancies” being found. An overcharge of more than $800!! UNACCEPTABLE. I requested to speak to the general manager and have yet to receive a call. It’s now been 2 days.

Needless to say, I’m highly disappointed and unsatisfied by the service, or LACK of service, I received at such a sophisticated restaurant that is supposed to deliver exceptional service. I also received multiple complaints from my guests the next day. Due to the events that transpired and all the stressors encountered, I was robbed of the happiness I should felt celebrating one of the most special days of...

I’ve heard so many great things about this restaurant. I was looking forward to visiting it but I will never return.

I understand we’re going through a pandemic, and many restaurants are getting back into the groove of hospitality and how you treat your customers, but the manager working on July 3, 2020 needs more experience on how you treat paying customers.

We visited Avenue on Friday July 3Rd. It was myself, my 2 sisters, and my 2 kids, ages 15 and 12. We ordered a glass of red wine, and a cucumber martini. The rest were happy with just plain old water. Along with that we ordered 2 Mac and cheese for my kids, a mussels appetizers for my sister, a veggie burger for my other sister and myself. Our server was very polite and kind to us. However, We waited 15 mins for our TWO drinks. I went to the bathroom after 10 mins of waiting for my drinks, and noticed the bar didn’t seem busy making drinks, so wondered why our drinks were taking so long.

The lady in the bathroom was so nice and helpful and made sure only one person at a time was allowed in. I felt safe and secure.

I returned from the bathroom and our drinks were still not at our table. The server, who was very polite as I’ve mentioned, came over and questioned us asking if someone came with our TWO drinks. I nicely said no, and questioned him why we hadn’t gotten our drinks, it had been now 15 minutes for TWO drinks. Our drinks finally came out, and kudos to the bartender for making a delicious cucumber martini.

We got our drinks yet continued to wait, not 30, 35, 40, 45 mins for our food, but an hour for our food. Our nice server came over to us yet again, to apologize for the food taking so long to come out, and reassured us the food would be out in 4 mins. I asked if he would buy us a round of drinks for our in convince, let me remind you it was TWO drinks, and he said he had to ask his manager. And this is when I became completely disgusted with how this manager handled this situation.

First, I saw him roll his eyes at this poor server, who was simply doing his job, second he came over to us and said, verbatim, I’m sorry I know you only ordered 3 appetizers and 2 veggie burgers, but our kitchen is backed up and unfortunately I can’t buy you a round of drinks. I was shocked a manager came over and refused to buy us TWO drinks for our inconvenience. I proceeded to say, if you’re not going to compensate our inconvenience, then we’re leaving. I was appalled to hear him say, ok.... I’ll cancel your order, bring your check for the TWO drinks, and you can leave. My sister and I were not even half way into our drinks, I told this very rude, very incompetent manager, I was not paying for these drinks that I waited over 15 mins for, and didn’t even finish drinking. This unprofessional manager, in front of my 2 kids and sisters, threatened to call the police on me, for refusing to pay for 2 drinks. I said to him, go ahead and call the police if you want to make a big scene in front of your customers. He then said to me, is this the example you want to set in front of your children. My children didn’t know what to think or feel as we were being badgered by this manager. I responded by saying, is this the example you want to set in front of your customers?? He finally said the words, just leave and get out.

Like I said.... I will never return to this restaurant and I hope that manager gets fired and never steps a foot inside a restaurant again. All we were asking for were for 2 drinks, $30 for our inconvenience, yet this idiot manager let us walk out losing about $120. If that’s not an incompotent manager, I don’t know what is.

Way to go incompetent manager, making customers feel comfortable in your restaurant after a 3...

I wrote the following email more than 6 weeks ago to the manager of this restaurant with zero response. Deplorable hospitality. Recommend all restaurants on the Boardwalk except Avenue. Kudos to Sirena for quickly assisting us on the fly.

Email written July 11th with no response to Avenue manager:

On June 12th, I spoke with a member of your team at Avenue to reserve for a party of 12 for 4PM. On July 9th, I received the automated confirmation text asking me to confirm the reservation which I did. I selected Avenue after a fabulous experience with friends in May and had been sharing with my team that they would be in for a real treat.

Upon arrival yesterday, where I was meeting members of my team from all over the state, some driving 2+ hours to meet for this dinner, I saw the sign that said closed for private party. I thought perhaps that was just the main room and figured perhaps we may be upstairs or outside. I entered and shared that I had a reservation for 4PM for 12 people under Lawrence and two members of the team promptly told me I was mistaken as they are closed for a private event. I showed my confirmation text and reluctantly, an associate went to the host stand and looked at the tablet, and said, “Oh…here it is. Well we are closed and I do not know why Ally took a reservation but….oh….there are other reservations in here that should not be….here is my boss’s card. I don’t know what he is going to do, but here.” I responded, “Ok well I guess I hope some other place can accommodate 12 people ten minutes from now…” and the associate walked away, no apologies of any kind.

To add insult to injury, a member of my team who had just driven 90 minutes to get to this team dinner had entered right behind me, and observed me having this discussion, said hello, and started to proceed past me. Another member of your team stopped her and she said she had just driven a distance and needed to use the restroom. The response was, “We are closed for a private event, you can go to the restroom by the carousel which is about a one minute walk.” That is beyond rude, ridiculous, appalling, and unacceptable. Would it have been so bad when this was YOUR error to let a person who came from a distance to simply use the restroom especially when the event had not yet started? I was left simply speechless.

Thankfully, Sirena was able to help us out, was beyond kind, accommodating, put two tables with an extender together last minute, shuffling a few other things around, and…when my colleague was on her way to the carousel per your direction stopped there first since she was still fresh off that 90 minute drive needing a restroom, even let her use the restroom before they knew they had a 12 top coming in….because they are kind and decent hospitable people. We had a fabulous meal with excellent service.

It’s truly unfortunate that a fabulous May brunch which led to my best friend booking a fabulous anniversary dinner for her parents which led to me booking this team dinner and inviting folks from all over the state ended in feeling as though this error was my fault, and gosh, I was looking forward to those mussels. I’d be happy to refer you to some organizations that can assist with hospitality or organizational leadership training if that would be of assistance.

I’d appreciate an understanding of your next steps to address this in the future, as I have several local friends that love Avenue, and to be honest, while mistakes happen, not having any idea whether future plans/reservations can be honored in addition to the way my colleague was referred to a boardwalk bathroom, makes it challenging to consider...