Falcone Italian Restaurant & Pizzeria — Restaurant in North Carolina

When arriving at the restaurant, we spoke and the owner and lady at the counter just stared at us without a greeting. After sitting down, it took almost 20 minutes before anyone came to take our order. At that time, we were in no rush. We just wanted a good dinner.

The lemons we received for our water was bad..The bread was hard...Our waitress didn't check on us or keep us informed on when our food was coming out. Several customers came in after us, and left with food before us.

We waited over an hour, and all we were served was salad, and hard bread. My children started getting restless (2, & 8). My daughter made a loud scream after and waiting for food for over an hour...while trying to calm her down the owner came and stared at us from the front of the restaurant. He didn't ask if she was okay, acknowledge the fact er had been waiting so long for food...Moments later he sends a young lady over to our table (not our waitress), who still has not given us an update on our food. She said the owner asked her to come over and ask me to stop my daughter from making noise.

I informed her how long we were waiting with no update, and my children were hungry and restless. She apologized and understood my frustration, as she also had young children. She asked what we ordered and was willing to check on our order. Moments later, the owner comes back..still standing at the front of the restaurant..asking what I ordered.

At this point, almost 1.5 hours has passed, and I asked for whatever wss ready to fix it for us to go. The order was wrong. Our waitress had only sent in part of our order. I also didn't get the correct sauce on my pasta....

I said all of that to say this: To the owner: Have some compassion. After a long day at work, and appointments, all we wanted was to enjoy a nice meal at your establishment. Customer service goes a long way. An apology for the wait would have been great. Not charging us for all the food vs. the one piece of pizza your waitress didn't include would have been even better. Since I did pay, it would have been amazing to actually get cooked pepperoni on the pizza and the right sauce on my pasta. You may also want to work on. greeting your customers. This let's them know you are happy to have their business.

To our waitress. I know it's not an easy job to do. We appreciate your apology when coming to our table almost 20 minutes after waiting to be served. Please be sure to acknowledge your customers when the wait is excessive and it's always good practice to confirm the order, so nothing is missed. Also, be sure to check what you are serving. Our bread was cold and hard, and the lemons were bad.

To the young lady they sent to the table to make me feel horrible about having restless kids from the lengthy time it took to get our food...thank you for your compassion and understanding. They need more people like you. You were the best part of this horrible experience.

To future customers: If you have somewhere to be..this may not be the restaurant of choice. If you want to feel like you're wanted at the place you choose to enjoy a meal, you may want to go somewhere else...If you have children and still taking a chance after my review..get your kids food before you arrive and sit outside if it's possible your kids may male a noise.

A simple smile, hello, and apology goes a long way. This type of treatment and service is unacceptable..As a business owner, I would never treat anyone this way. I will not be back, and I don't recommend this establishment to anyone...especially if you have small children.

If you made it this far, we ordered: 3 Pepperoni Pizza's 1 Pasta with a salad 3 waters with lemon

"Our food was not even hot."

Signed,

A disappointed...

I have had wonderful service here! Staff is amazing! Owner is magnificent! Food was delicious and timely! All are beyond courteous! Out ranks ALL other Italian restaurants in Southport/Oak Island and Bolivia! The other place (D’s) once gave me a 45 min wait time on pickup order (which I was fine with knowing how busy things are and have been) but then once my husband arrived to pick up, they had NOT even started our order whatsoever!! Then we had to wait an additional 35 mins and the food was subpar! Another time I called a competitor (D’s) to place and order. Verified verbally I had location at Midway (other non-related restaurant to Falcones) and placed an order with a male. When we went to pick it up they said I NEVER ORDERED with them?!? Infuriating!! Even though I knew that the guy tossing the dough was the exact person I spoke with and told him about our convo.. yet.. they STILL DENIED I had ordered!

That is TRULY OK though and a blessing in disquisition because I was so upset since they had messed up on my order not once but in two separate incidences after long waits…resulting in NO food.. I decided to leave there and never grace them with my presence again!! I then recalled that Falcones was open so, I placed an large order with them and had the VERY best pizza, Stromboli and pasta ever! Definitely better than the competitor on Midway and the others In Southport and surrounding area!! REAL AUTHENTIC ITALIAN FOOD AT FALCONES!! PLUS the staff and owner were incredibly nice while at D’s the woman (and other staff) has been rude to me on multiple occasions! Infact, once the lady at D’s argued with me after a pickup order trying to convince me a Stromboli is not suppose to be long/rectangular shape, and instead is a half moon puffed up shape like a calzone! YES! She did that!! I ordered a Stromboli once from Ds and got a calzone (shape and internal fillings different) and she tried to tell me (after she literally asked me to send pics) that Stromboli’s are ALWAYS half moon shaped and she even went as far as the say that she has “always made them like that”, which I know to be a flat out lie as I have gotten plenty of Stromboli’s from D’s in The past BEFORE Falcones opened (but I will NEVER AGAIN)!! No issues like this at Falcones though! Sure sometimes when they are busy you may have to wait a tad.. but your order is correct and food superb and staff ALWAYS ALWAYS serves you with a smile! Simply put FALCONE’S is WAY BETTER and WORLDS APART from ANY OTHER ITALIAN restaurant that I...

11/3/22:

Wanted to give it another try. Ordered a garden salad and a mushroom pizza. The salad was fine. No real issues this time. The pizza had very little tomato sauce on it and way too much cheese. It pretty much was cheese and crust due to the minimal amount of sauce. I was really surprised at how few mushrooms there were on the pizza. I would say there were no more than 15-20 mushrooms on this 14" pie. One slice had just three small mushroom slices on it. To say they weren't generous with the toppings would be an understatement. The pizza was slightly overcooked, but not as much as the previous visit. This time the restaurant wasn't busy so I don't know why more attention to detail was missing. The main problem with this restaurant is understaffing and inconsistency. I've now eaten here 9 times over the past 4 months. 3 times were very good. In fact, the first time was so good that's what kept me returning. Unfortunately, 6 times were not good at all. That's only a 33% "good" ratio. Roll the dice and give them a try.

10/11/22:

I ordered a mushroom pizza and a garden salad for takeout. The place was jammed and it was immediately apparent that it was way understaffed. The few workers that were there were in way over their heads because the place was packed and they couldn't keep up. The sauce and the cheese were tasty but the pizza was way overcooked. The pizza chef was so busy that he simply left our pizza in the oven too long. And, to compound the problem he ignored it and boxed it up instead of making another one.

The bottom of the crust was burned and, to use a well-worn cliche, it really did have the consistency and appearance of blackened cardboard. As for the salad, the balsamic dressing was delicious, but the portion was so small it only filled up half of the little styrofoam container it came in. It was as if someone grabbed a bit of lettuce and threw it in the container just to get it done. I'm talking just lettuce. No other vegetables. And, to make matters worse, the lettuce was somewhat brown and wilted. Of course, I didn't notice this until I arrived home or I would have brought it to their attention. This meal was completely unacceptable. The owner needs to pay what is necessary to get and keep more staff so the restaurant can have some quality control. This place has some potential, but it needs to put out a consistently good product in order to avoid negative reviews and to keep...