Frida's Restaurante Mexicano — Restaurant in Memphis

We had a Birthday Dinner last night (04/20/2019) & had approx 34 people. This dinner was planned way in advance & my wife made the We had a Birthday Dinner last night (04/20/2019) & had approx 34 people. This dinner was planned way in advance & my wife made the reservations. When reservations were made the restaurant/manager’s were aware that we would be having a Birthday gathering with the approximate number of people (30+). My wife was super excited for the surprise Birthday dinner she had planned for me & could not wait to eat at the restaurant, because she had heard great things about the food/drinks... Sadly the service was horrible! I do understand we had 30+ people attend, but it was planned weeks in advance & the server claimed she could handle it by herself & didn’t need a second server.

1. The restaurant placed us upstairs which was fine besides the part where they did not have blinds in the windows and the sun was beaming for about an hour & a half in everyone’s eyes. It’s sad you have to wear sunglasses inside while eating dinner. This situation was brought to the waitress’s attention & she said she could do nothing about it.

2. The waitress immediately came to the table & asked what everyone was drinking. It took 30 mins for me to get my first drink & even longer for other family/friends. The one drink I finally got 30 mins later was the only drink I was able to get for 1.5 to 2 hours because the waitress either did not return for 30-45 minutes at a time and/or forgot that I asked for a second drink 3 different times.

3. Once we placed our food orders mine & my wife’s food came out in a timely manner which once again was good. The appearance of the food looked good But was cold to the touch. That did not bother me though. The part that bothered me was the fact that my last family/friends (3-4 people) did not receive their food that they ordered until 2 hours later & they made the comment that their food was cold as well & not very good. Each one of my family/ friends received their food at different times & mine/my wife’s food came out fairly quick (45mins) & about 2-2 1/2 hours later when the last person got their food.

4. At this point the waitress could tell she was struggling & could see everyone’s frustration. The waitress brought out 2-3 pitchers of margaritas & stated they were on the house to compensate for the food being delayed. My family and friends would have rather had good service & warm food rather than having free pitchers of alcohol. The pitchers of alcohol that were given to us did not even get consumed except for a partial pitcher. NOTE: When you have to give free stuff, that we did not ask for, to compensate for bad service, you know as a server you have messed up.

5. At this point everyone was tired of the wait & ready to go home but still in a decent mood. The part that turned ugly was when everyone got ready to pay. I have never had any problems at any restaurant when trying to pay like my family and friends did last night. The waitress and management were confused, Unorganized, rude and unprofessional when it came down to handing out food tickets and taking payments. It was a monstrosity of a situation let me just tell you that. It was apparent the waitress did not fully keep up with everyone’s tab properly. Ultimately the waitress and management saw they messed up and let it get the best of them. My family was totally upset at the service provided and was still willing to pay their full tabs which everyone did plus some!!! Yes my family/ friends were upset and some showed their butts probably a little more than needed. But at the same time the waitress and Management showed their rear ends and more towards customers. I have never seen so much unprofessionalism from a restaurant’s staffing in my life it was literally unbelievable. It felt like an episode of Jerry Springer.

6. Last, but not least. Every single person in our party paid for their meal, drinks, & appetizers, yet me & my wife were left with a...

I want to start by saying that this review is following my experience delivering for Uber eats last night...

➕➕POSITIVES➕➕ ▪️The order was ready when I arrived to pick it up ▪️The order was correct ▪️The staff I interacted with were pleasant

✳️The rest of this review is based on my over 20 years in the service industry✳️

When I walked into Frida's the music of course was Spanish and rather loud it was not crowded at all the bar however did seem to have quite a few customers so all in all the atmosphere was like any other restaurant/bar. The first thing I noticed which is a gigantic pet peeve of mine was that several servers were sitting in a booth immediately within my eyesight as I entered the restaurant. I immediately asked one of them where to pick up UberEats orders to which one of the servers pointed to what I assume was kind of the greeter to go area when what I believe he should have done was STAND UP, GREET ME, ASK ME THE NAME ON THE TO-GO ORDER & then promptly went to the kitchen to check on the order (if it was ready bring it to me). Once the hostess got off the phone she did greet me and asked me how she could help me I told her I was picking up an Uber eats order the name on the order and she did go to the kitchen and return with the order I was there to pick up. I exited the restaurant and found several employees hanging out in the back of the parking lot near where I had parked one of them seem to be sweeping the parking lot I'm not sure what the other ones were doing but as I went to reverse out of my parking spot I realized the employee who was sweeping the parking lot was standing directly behind my car she's seen brother irritated that I was trying to back out of my parking space I feel she should have immediately gotten very far out of the way when she saw a customer getting in a vehicle and leaving that way the customer wouldn't have to be worried about where the employee was or entering anyone for that matter of course all of this is just my opinion but I have worked in various positions in various restaurants here in Memphis over the past 20+ years. If I could give the owner/managers of Frida's 1 tip it would be this...

When it comes to restaurant and bar clientele first impressions means everything !!!! The majority of your customers are sitting in your restaurant because someone told them it was a good place to go but nobody wants to eat at a restaurant where the staff looks lazy and behaves as though they don't want...

Rudest experience I’ve ever had dining in Memphis. Me and my boyfriend came in and when we first arrived, it took a minute for us to be even spoke to. Got someone to come over to seat us and I asked if we could sit outside and he sighed and told us yes. (Immediately felt that the energy was off) Sat down and he walked off. He brought us some chips and salsa no water. It didn’t take long for us to realize what we wanted to start with but he took a minute to come back. (Side note we didn’t see that many people on the inside. There were three tables taken outside but only two people at each table.) Anyways, he came back to ask us what we wanted to drink and I said a pitcher with two flavors and the Frida's dip. He came back with the pitcher and dip (again no water) and walked off. We had ran out of chips for the dip we ordered (you would think he would bring more chips if we ordered dip right? No). While eating (with no paper towels, straws, or utensils) a woman asked for something and while walking towards us with paper towels he said “one second ma’am” and rudely cursed under his breath when he got to our table to place the paper towels down.

Got our food and he didn’t asked if we needed anything or gave us a chance to. He was overall very cold with us the entire time and we were being very patient with him noticing it was only two servers (we’ve both served in the restaurant industry so we definitely know how it is).

When he brought our tip out we noticed it was $100? We’ve been there multiple times and order way more than what we got and it was cheaper than that. We got the Frida’s dip $12, $19 El jefe grande burrito, $20 Frida's fajitas, $25 pitcher with two flavors that was $1.50 each. Add that all up you get $79 without tax. So how with tax did that end up to $100? We tipped $10.

Called them after realizing we had been up charged, the manager said over the phone that with taxes included all of that would equal $100. We asked for an itemized bill over the phone and he still said with taxes included it would equal $100. That’s when he decided to say we didn’t tip as well lol. So we decided to come up there asking for the itemized bill and saw a gratuity charge of about 12%-15%. Why aren’t you letting customers know about gratuity charges? Overall horrible experience and if this gets deleted I will be...