Cracker Barrel Old Country Store — Restaurant in Palm Coast

Let me start out by saying that my wife and I have been longtime and loyal fans of CB restaurants located throughout FL for the last 20 years. We have spent a lot of $ dining at many of their locations. During these previous years, we experienced consistent food quality/portion size, great customer service and fair pricing no matter what CB store we visited. As a business and non business traveler, these are metrics that you appreciate. In the past few years, something has changed with the overall dining experience at CB restaurants. It is no longer the CB of the past that I remembered and enjoyed coming to with my wife and friends. We curtailed our visits to CB stores in part due to long wait times and the bottleneck you experience when checking out at the cash register as well as the shrinking portion size and higher prices. At all CB stores there is no separate cashier to handle dining only customers so you are stuck in the gauntlet of waiting in line for customers who have bought retail items and store associates who are checking out for their business at the end of their shifts. More on that latter subject matter to follow.

Against my better judgement, I decided to give CB another chance to see if anything had changed. We chose to do lunch at a CB store located in Palm Coast, FL. which our dining experience there could best be described as the DINING EXPERIENCE from HELL. It started out with a long delay before a server showed up to our table to take our order. We specifically told the server that we both wanted the Meat Loaf Lunch special with the same sides mashed potatoes w/gravy and cole slaw. In fairness the food did come out fairly quick, hot and correct as we ordered. While we were eating our meals, my wife overheard a customer at the table next to us arguing with a manager about the delays in someone acknowledging him and not coming to his table. He informed the manager of an under cooked portion of meat and not to his liking The manager informed him in a disrespectful manner that she disagreed with his opinion/complaint on this item but would make it good anyway. She stormed away from his table uttering some nonsensical and unflattering comment. We finally received our check after a long time and it was incorrect. The check indicated that we were charged for the dinner price of the lunch and not the lunch pricing. After bringing it to the attention of our server and after giving us an eye roll, he returned much later with correct pricing.

As we were checking out at the cash register, I observed several CB store employees making small talk for a long time to the cashier. They were both still wearing their CB server aprons and appeared to be conducting business - cashing out at the end of the shift. The only other cashier was checking out a customer who was purchasing a retail item. I asked to go before the store employees as they were not customers and I was told to wait my time. I said a few choice words to the cashier to express my displeasure of having to wait for a store employee to finish conducting their business before me. That prompted the same snarly manager we had witnessed previously arguing with another diner to come up who also echoed those same words...CB associates get priority over customers at the registers. When I mentioned that said associate was still wearing her apron she gave me a blank BS excuse. So much for putting your paying customers first.re

Based on my experience at this store and other CB stores where I have had the same level of poor customer service, I probably will not dine there any more. I go to restaurants where I am not disrespected and appreciated for...

Most important is the unfortunate thing is I really dislike doing this type of review. 3/7/2025 My wife and I passing thru decided to stop for a dinner figured it would be good and pretty quick, we were able to add our names to the online quick que, and was seated promptly as we arrived. Our waitress came, got our drinks and our order and that was pretty much the end of our good experience. From there we sat, and watched people come be seated ordered their food came and others same as well, we had not even had a drink refill. When finally I had gotten our waitress attention she said it was coming, but I had to mention we had been waiting and watching others maybe it was time for a manager. A few more minutes had passed and another waitress had seen us waiting and asked us if we were ok and needed anything and we told her she said she would also go for the manager who we had not seen yet, then finally after a while a lady whom claimed to be the manager came out with food and was like who had chicken, we are so backed up, to which then I had to interrupt that our neighbor next to us also had chicken and had arrived after us had her chicken others over there had also arrived then she went to just try and make more excuses, to which then she just rudely asked do you want the food or not? Which of course we did but at this point we did not feel welcome anymore, nor did not want to patronize this location. The manager whose name was Holly, (I had to ask her twice and actually get her attention to ask her as she ran off away from us), excuses do not make happy customers after they had been waiting patiently. Having understanding and compassion on peoples time and their patience is how you approach your customers because without them your business will not grow. We ended up leaving and went to Chick-fil-a where service is always a pleasure served with a smile and...

Beyond exceptional. If I could give this establishment and staff 1 million stars it wouldn’t be enough.

Cracker Barrel is the go to spot whenever I travel. Their food is above quality and whenever I crave fried chicken this place always come to mind. I mean I have yet to find anything as delicious as their gravy and if It was on option on the menu, I would literally inject it intravenously into my stomach. Don’t forget about the buttery, soft and airy on the inside basket of clouds they call biscuits… I mean I’m drooling writing this right now. They are pet friendly and accommodating as they have outside seating and my dog was given water on ice without us even asking which was really great. Our server was responsive on time and really just the best. Now this is where the service and the establishment as a whole really outdid themselves. Moronically, I left my wallet there, and I’m from Miami this specific location was already two hours away from me when I realized I lost it. It still had the $250 dollars in it and more importantly my I.D’s and other contents. After discussing with the manager, they were able to ship out my wallet. And to my surprise, they covered the shipping. Now I was fully ready to reward the server, manager and hostess for recovering my wallet via cashapp, or zelle, etc. and they said “No thank you, we’re just doing the right thing” I mean, I thought these type of people were something of legend and they didn’t exist. But the good people of Cracker Barrel restored my faith in humanity. Coincidentally, I’m also a Bartender/Server, and when ever I have the chance I will pay it forward by doing the same thing Cracker Barrel did for me. So whenever you recover a lost wallet, think WWCBD? I can not thank you enough, and thanks for the amazing food, service and hospitality.

(what would...