Waveriders Coffee, Deli & Market — Restaurant in Nags Head

40 minutes for three smoothies isn't my idea of timely service. This place has great food and smoothies and I can appreciate that certain times/days are busier than others, but that's simply too long for three drinks. If things are backing up, the managers need to step in and do something about it. Stop taking online orders for a while until you can take care of the guests waiting for their drinks... something!

Edit: I'll just drop my review a little in light of the ultra-defensive response from the owner. I acknowledged the busy time we visited and you're right, you can drop our overall wait time down to about 30 minutes for smoothies if you discount the time spent in line prior to ordering. For an owner to say something like, "...it wouldn't matter to you' to a customer with a legitimate gripe is telling. After reading through a few past reviews I see its pretty much par for the course... I guess good customer service isn't a priority here, so we just won't visit on any day next time around. The young lady making smoothies was obviously overwhelmed and in the 30 minute wait we didn't see management do a single thing to alleviate the wait times, hence the review. I admit the smoothies at Wave Riders are good but they're not the only good smoothies in the area. Looks like this tradition has come to an end for us. Thanks for the good smoothies in previous years!

Edit #2: Truthfully, I'm only continuing this out of sheer amazement towards the owner's responses. I guess we can add 'complete inability to process criticism' and 'reading comprehension' to 'lack of desire to deliver on customer service.' If you re-read what I've written, you'll (hopefully) note that I wasn't criticizing the young lady making smoothies, but rather management's complete inability to do anything to alleviate her stress and your customers' wait times. You seem completely unable to cope with direct criticism (assuming you were the one in charge that day) and instead deflect complaints with hopelessly transparent excuses about how busy it is this year. I know how busy it is; not only did we visit your store the previous Saturday and had a much smoother experience despite a similar number of customer in your establishment but we visited many other places during the course of our vacation and nowhere else did we deal with this level of ineptitude from a manager. Since you're very clearly obsessed with my process of reviewing establishments, please go have a look at the positive review I left for the Black Pelican despite a wait time that was almost 2 hours long. Their managers/owner took the drastic step of closing off half their seating (which I'm sure crushed their bottom line) to mitigate the compounding effects of overwhelming tourist numbers and a lack of service industry staff. Once we were finally seated, our food came out flawlessly and fast! I have no misconception about the weight my single, 1-star review carries. I'm sure it will not send your business into bankruptcy, nor would I want it to. However, there is a reason (that is becoming clearer) you're at 4.8 instead of 5 stars on Google: You're not perfect and there's always room for improvement. Instead I think it's important to expose your attitude (e.g., saying 'Your one star review will not make a difference' for anyone who cares enough to read through this mess before they decide where to get a smoothie! Have...

Complete fail. Great online ordering system, followed all the instructions, but in the end was never able to get my food which was sitting on a shelf in the food prep area because staff would never acknowledge me at the pick up area. This place has great food, but I will not be back until the tourist are gone.

Place order at 938. Online system indicates order will be ready at 1016. 36 mins for 3 bagels. That's a healthy wait. Automated email system instructs me that I will receive a text when the order is ready.

I walked in the store, and one of the employees was echoing that same message to the large gathering of people in the store that all customers would receive a text when their order was ready.

Understood. I proceed back out the door and wait for my text as it has been told to me in two different places that I would receive a text when my order was ready. Finally receive text 1 hr 1 min after placing order for 3 simple bagels. Let that sink in. 1 hr. Armed with the instructions provided by the merchant I proceed to the pick up area which has a halo of irritated anxious customers waiting for their order. I get through the people and stand sqaurely in front of the pick up area as instructed with my credit card out for payment. 2 workers see me and intentionally avoid engaging me. After standing there for 5 minutes being ignored by the workers I left. Never was able to get my food.

The place was absolutely bananas with people all...

Update 2023:

I made it 4 times this year, and it was just as good each time. The Bagels on the panini are great, and adding the Cajun Mayo to the Bacon Egg and Cheese with an everything bagel was absolutely fantastic. I love that they are also closed Monday and Tuesday giving the employees a break along with being able to stay open on Sunday checkout.

Update 2022:

Still the best. One of places I look forward to every year!

Update 2021:

I was super disappointed I only was able to pick up coffee here once this year. We stayed down at Rodanthe and didn't get to make the drive everyday to stop here. We stopped on the way out OBX on Saturday, and it was as good as ever. The inside has improved greatly after the fire, and the expanded retail space is great! The biggest thing though was the online ordering. I placed my order online about 10 minutes away, and it was ready and waiting upon my arrival. I did have to go back in and pick up a bag of coffee, and there was a huge line, but one employee, Isabelle or something like that, saw I was only getting coffee and opened up another register so i could get in and out very quickly! The coffee alone would make this 5 star, but all the new changes and employees should allow this place to receive higher than 5 stars.

2019: Hands down the best coffee shop in the whole OBX. I tried all of the others, and none of them compare to this place.

I tried to stop...