Native Grill & Wings — Restaurant in Mesa

When to lunch today, grateful that once again, Tanner was our waiter. He is very efficient, friendly & actually makes u feel welcome. Being personable is a major plus to me & he is that, personable. Been going there for yrs. & he is by far, the best staff person they currently have & have had in the past. Corp. needs to recognize people like him, they have a positive asset employed within their company, keep him happy so he stays with the Native. Now, having to sit in the restaurant is another story. Last tues. was the 2nd time in all the yrs. I've been going there that I had to sit on the restaurant side. Was with daughter, son in law & 4 grandkids, kids aren't allowed on bar side. Arrived at 6:20 pm, plans to attend an 8:15 show at the AMC next door. There were a few people on the list ahead of us. But, just because 2,3 or 4 people walk in after u & get seated, u dont keep seating them, u start working on the 7 that have been waiting. Finally got seated at 7:40, fortunately had the kids look at the menu & as soon as we were seated, told the waiter we were ready to order, after I asked for a towel to get the food off of 2 of the chairs & the wait staff certainly didnt look like they were glad to see us or anyone. A little personality goes along way. Been in this type of business over 30 yrs. I depended on my tips, had to, didnt make minimum wage or even close to it. I waited on people the way I enjoy being waited on when I go out for a meal. That's extremely hard to come by today, guess they feel their making 10.50 an hr. & really dont care if u enjoyed yourself or not. We were Served at 8:00, told the waiter, when the food was delivered we needed the bill right away & paid the bill right then. Had 15 mins. Till the show started & already paid for the movie tickets via the AMC app. The bill with tip was near 100.00 & most of the food was left. Couldn't get it in go boxes because it would sit in the car for 2 plus hours & wouldn't be good to eat then any way. If u have no plans within a time frame & are ok with waiting, till God knows when, then enjoy yourself on the restaurant side. Otherwise, the service has always been decent in the bar & quicker. If u should be so lucky to get Tanner as your waiter, your in for a good experience. Thank You Tanner, lunch was great, food was good & service from a personable person was a total bonus. Native gets 5 stars...

Haven't been to Native much since COVID and very recently had lunch with a friend here that was pleasant. So when my family had a holiday event at the school nearby, Native was my recommendation because they have a little of everything. We were told we would have about a 10 minute wait, then we saw 2 other parties come in after us, one was 8 and another was 11. After about 20 minutes and watching them setup for the 8 top, my wife said something to the hostess to which she said we were already crossed off.. should have left then but stayed calm. We were tended to promptly by Filiberto who was training a new hire, both were excellent. We waited almost 40 minutes while we watched tables being sat all around us and served by the time anyone noticed. My little girl actually started complaining to the servers how hungry she was. When my wife's pizza came out, it was barely cooked, dough was still raw. My burger was raw, the other dishes seemed incomplete. They rushed it out. When my wife told the manager that her pizza wasnt fully cooked, she asked if they could make another one.. we had already been there for 1.5 hours and I was getting ready to boil. $6 off a pizza that needed to be cooked in oven for 20 min after we got home? I have not had a lot of great experiences here but this was the reminder I needed... Never coming back, even for lunch meets. Wings are good but not worth being treated so poorly. I am not struggling, dress clean, polite, tip well (yes, I tipped the wait staff, wasn't his fault and honestly believe if it wasn't for him, we would have never received anything) and normally add drinks and glad I didn't this time. Better off going across the street to Barros or Streets of NY. One star added...

I postmated an order of four kids meals. Postmates delivered them quickly. But half of the order was the wrong flavor. I called native to ask them about the order being wrong, and they kept answering the phone with it on the counter. I could hear them laughing and having conversation and then when I said "hello", they put me on hold. I explained what the problem was to three different people and to one of those people, twice. The second person I talked to laughed at me, and then when I asked her if she was the manager, she said yes. Then she put me on hold and someone else came on the phone who told me that she bagged my food herself and it was correct. The whole conversation felt like she was accusing me of lying to get free food. She then said that the button she would normally press for a refund had been revoked so now she could not give me a refund. She told me that she could either give me store credit for the exact same order, or I could call Postmates and get all my money back. I emailed Postmates for my money back and I got $3. (I'm not mad at Postmates.) Every time they kept answering the phone without it being hung up, I could hear conversations and laughing and joking and them being confused about other orders they were taking. The staff seemed so disorganized and accusatory towards its customers, I might not be giving this location another chance. Who knows if hygiene is being kept up in a place that is so disorganized. I have worked in a number of disorganized restaurants. And from personal experience, Cooks who accuse people of lying to get free food, usually mess up a lot of orders. 🤷 Could be the case, could be she was having bad day. I don't know. But I honestly didn't call to have an argument. Won't...