Eko Atlantic Restaurant and lounge — Restaurant in Newark

I made a reservation online for 4pm on Saturday, 30 min prior to the reservation I received a text letting me know my reservation will be starting soon. I arrived first before my friend at 4:05 so I went inside to give our name. The second door to the actually restaurant was locked and all of the lights were off. There was a guy sitting in front security guard possible (not sure) who said it was closed they open at 4. I explained to him that we have a reservation and online says it opened at 3:30, and it’s currently after 4 but his English wasn’t that good so we didn’t get far in the conversation. My friend arrived at 4:10 and I explained the situation to her so she went to try to talk to him and got no where as well. We tried calling the phone number twice but kept going straight to user busy with no answer. We waiting around to about 4:40pm and went to go eat across the street instead: when we left the other restaurant at 6pm we went back across the street and saw the lights were on so we went inside. I explained the situation with my reservation and how no one was there and she pointed us to sit down now. I declined and asked what time they open she “Sophia” said 4 but no one comes until 5 to work because we don’t get customers that early. I explained that we even tried calling but it didn’t go through she told be because no one was here to answer. I asked why online does it say 3:30 and allow me to make a reservation for 4pm if no one comes that early to open the restaurant . She said idk I just work here. I asked to speak to the manager and she said they “Kathy” weren’t there: I asked who here was in charge out of the 3 other workers sitting down at a table and she said none of us. She explained that no one of a higher or management position was at work and that I could wait until they came but wasn’t sure when that would be… sometimes “soon”. Tried supporting my fellow black owned business but when met with lack of professionalism or organization, or care for the customers it is a sad waste of time. Was very excited for this experience but sadly didn’t get to...

I recently saw this advertised on Instagram and thought it would be a great spot for a birthday dinner, Dec 12th 2024 I reserved a table for 8 pm, the parking is absolutely ridiculous the 1st most unappealing thing was a big trash dumpster was filled to the rim right in front of the restaurant, but I still decided to go in and give it a chance. A Saturday night it was literally 6 people in there, it was so quiet I thought maybe a funeral was in procession, no music no vibe nothing just eerily quiet, once the music did come on it was low and static filled, we were told where to sit & the couch which was bright orange had cigarette burns on 3 different spots that was visibly noticeable, there was a funny rancid scent flowing throughout the space not sure if it was the hookah 1 of the customers was smoking but it was unpleasant, I had to go back on Instagram to look at the video again because it was not what I expected... We decided to respectfully leave & went somewhere else to go eat for the night, I was so unimpressed that I didn't feel the need to even try the...

I attempted to call to state I was running 15 minutes late, and the phone kept having an off the hook sound. When I got there, all the chairs were gone and there were two other people standing by the door. Eventually, those people left too. We went straight to the bar, stated we had a reservation and they said that they have an event at 11:00 pm (in two hours) that’s why everything was packed up. It was very odd to welcome customers that way. We stated that we tried to call multiple times and they said their phone wasn’t working. They asked if we still wanted to dine in a small area by a window, and we stated no because for one, there’s no one else there (the atmosphere felt off). Secondly, it appeared that they were more concerned about setting up for the event by pushing us to a small section. We spent over 20 minutes driving there and spent money for a car to drive us. If you know you have an event, why are you allowing reservations to be booked online? We were VERY disappointed as it was one of our birthdays. VERY...