Margaritaville - Miami Bayside — Restaurant in Miami

I visited for the first time on 12/23/24 and had Karen as my waitress and bartender. My husband and I sat at the bar and shared the club sandwich with fries, which was plenty for both of us. It was FANTASTIC. I also ordered the margarita that comes with the orange liqueur floater. OMG!!! It was delicious as well. Karen’s high energy, genuine smile, and even her warm hug was contagious. She was as sweet as can be, and just a wonderful being altogether with such a Christ-like spirit. My experience was definitely an AMAZING one. So much so, that we visited again, the day after. GREAT JOB, KAREN!! On 12/24/24, Jaamal was our waiter and bartender. We sat at the bar again. OMG! When I tell you, this young man had smiles, laughter, intelligent conversation, and so much more. He is definitely on my list of top 3 bartenders/waiters I’ve ever had in my life, and I am 61 yrs old. And for me, that says a lot because I am not that easy to please. I seek and love top notch service. Jaamal gave it all. He suggested the fried chicken wings with the jerk sauce on the side, and my husband asked for an additional buffalo sauce. The wings were delectable, and the jerk sauce was AMAZING. I favored it to the Buffalo. The Buffalo sauce was good, but the jerk was EXCELLENT!! I also ordered my favorite margarita with the orange liqueur floater again, and boy did he come through with my drinks. GREAT JOB, JAAMAL!!. So, I’m thinking. I’ve hit a 2/2, let’s go back and have another wonderful experience. So, we visited again on 12/24, but our experience was TOTALLY different than the other days. Again, we sat at the bar, and Alexis was our waiter and bartender. First of all, her personality was not a pleasant one. No genuine smile and no conversation AT ALL other than what was required. C’mon, now. We’re sitting at the bar, and there weren’t too many guests sitting there. We’re tourists. So, that alone should have been enough to strike a conversation. Like, where are y’all from, how long will you be here, have y’all done any excursions, maybe give suggestions of fun things to do. You get the picture. NONE OF THAT! We ordered the Cajun pasta with shrimp and scallops (DEEEELICIOUS), and I ordered my favorite drink (which she made NOT my favorite)…the margarita with the orange liqueur floater, which tasted nothing like the ones I had both days prior. There was hardly any liquor in it. On top of that, I ordered and paid for a LARGE ($5 more than a small), but she brought it out in a SMALL glass, without my knowledge, and then gave a lame reason to justify why she did it. This made no sense at all. NO. THAT IS NEVER WHAT YOU DO!!! When I questioned her about it, her attitude shifted, and my experience with her was on the downside from that point on. When I got my receipt, there was an 18% gratuity added to my bill, which she was not deserving of at all. I love tipping my people, but this is one who would not have received HALF of what I was made to tip her. YOU HAVE A LOT TO LEARN, ALEXIS!! I am a firm believer of the saying, “One bad apple will spoil the whole bunch!” But in this case, I look at it differently. Alexis was horrible, but Karen and Jaamal prevented the bunch from spoiling. And, because of them, Margaritaville still gets a 5 star rating from me. I will tell all of my friends about Margaritaville, and to make sure when they visit, sit at the bar, and ask for Jaamal or Karen. If Alexis is working at the bar, PLEASE DO NOT order any drinks, and if she happens to wait tables also, ask for another server. Jaamal and Karen made sure my experiences were memorable ones, and because of them, I will definitely be...

Just ate there. Amazingly for a Saturday evening, there was no wait to get a table and restaurant was not full at all. We immediately got sat at a table. Server was somewhat prompt showing up to take our drink order, but that’s where the promptness ended.

From sitting down at table until receiving our food was nearly 45 minutes. During that time, we only saw our server once. Our sodas and teas that cost $4.25 each were never refilled.

When the food finally showed up, we expected it to be fresh since we waited so long. However it was obvious that it had sat for awhile because the fries were cold. My club sandwich was actually pretty good, but the fries were cold and hard from sitting around. My sister-in-law ordered crab cakes that came with vegetables and mashed potatoes. She didn’t sub anything out when ordering, but somehow it showed up with French fries instead of mashed potatoes. We never asked, but they obviously threw fries on her plate in lieu of mashed potatoes because either they were out of mashed potatoes or too lazy to make them. Would’ve been nice for them to offer her a substitution rather than just create one on their own.

Service was a 1/10. Only saw our server twice. Upon receiving the bill, the server automatically charged 20% gratuity. He had zero motivation/incentive to provide good service because he’s just going to add 20% anyways.

We gave our credit card to pay. Apparently they charge a credit card processing fee (or at least that’s what the manager told us). Our card was processed for almost $5.00 more than the total of the bill. Would’ve been nice if the server would’ve informed us of that prior to running our credit card. If I would’ve known, I would’ve paid cash.

The manager working tonight (a gentleman) just stood around the hostess podium most of the time we were there. He never once walked around the restaurant to patrol his servers and ask customers if they needed anything. Meanwhile half of the restaurant is sitting with empty beverages and complaining about how long their food is taking.

I spoke with the manager as we were leaving and voiced our frustration with the lack of service, unannounced credit card fee, and mediocre food. His only response is that they are short staffed.

If they are truly that short staffed, they should close early or let people know before they are seated that they are short staffed and it may take longer than normal to get food.

Regardless, the manager should be out refilling drinks and helping. The service was beyond terrible, food was mediocre, and the manager this evening needs to do...

I never post bad reviews, however, we had a pretty terrible experience that I can't not post it. Food was ok, if you actually received it. We ordered water 3 times and never received it. We did get our stuff l drinks, but we pre ordered from the bar before being seated. Otherwise I doubt we would have gotten them. We were never asked about a refill even when our beers were gone before we even ordered our meals. Had to eat without anything to drink. He never checked back on us after taking our orders until well past getting part of our meals. My mother ordered a meal and never actually received it. She was told by the waiter he had a huge table (6 people, and he only had 5 tables total) and that they'd forgotten her order. The place wasn't that busy at this point- multiple open tables and no wait time. Her order ended up going to the wrong table and he offered to put it in again, however the rest of us were done eating by that time so she said she didn't want it. He then told her they'd make it to go and she'd have to pay for it, after she said she didn't want it at all. This was after sitting for an hour and fifty minutes, so we were obviously frustrated (and thirsty) and just ready to get the heck out of there. The manager came by and let her know there comp her meal and pack it to go, but then she still had to pay an 18% tip because she hadn't paid for her drink yet. When we finally got our bills, they were NOT split correctly as we had asked for when we first arrived, so the waiter had to go fix them after telling us it was a huge hassle for him, however we were not paying cash so it needed split correctly. Took another 15 minutes for him to come back after splitting and it still wasn't correct. We ended up just paying as-is because we'd been there for almost 2.5 hours by that point and just wanted to leave and still we're forced to pay 18% tip for service that honestly didn't deserve a tip at all. Overall terrible experience and was incredibly disappointing which is unfortunate because it's a place my mother had wanted to go for several years.

EDIT: I had a response to my review and was asked to email to discuss my experience, responded with MULTIPLE forms of communication to get back with me and haven't heard squat. I even reached out a second time to follow up and have yet to get a response. Terrible experience a second go-round to go with the awful first experience. Please don't waste your money here. It's really...