Salad and Go — Restaurant in Phoenix

I’m so happy someone finally created a healthy “fast food” option, and also love supporting a local AZ company. I have visited a few of their locations, but the Pinnacle Peak one is where I go 95% of the time. I’ve been going to that location since at least March or April of 2019 and at least 2-5 times a week, since it’s so convenient to swing by during the work week.

Over the last several months, however, I find myself going less and less so I hope this feedback is helpful because I truly want to see them succeed!

Food quality inconsistency, mainly at breakfast time. I’ve tried out all their breakfast options (but minus the meat since I’m vegetarian). My fave is the Traditional burrito or bowl (no bacon, add avocado). When the ingredients are fresh, it’s delicious, but more and more the quality seems to be lacking. Many times eggs are rubbery (overcooked?) and there’s even been hard chunks in there of...overcooked egg? Stale cheese? Who knows, but it’s not appetizing. It became so consistently bad, that I stopped going there for breakfast for several weeks. Recently went back for breakfast and the last couple times have been good. Also, have to give their salsa a shout out because it’s AMAZING and addictive. They should bottle it up and sell it.

The salads, majority of the time, are good. I’ve only had two or three instances when a a few lettuce pieces were bad. Other than that, quality seems to be consistent.

Service. It’s fast food, I get it. But there are some baseline customer service behaviors and over the past several months, those don’t seem to exist. Every “thank you” I say is either met with silence or “yeah” and “uh huh.”

And in the past couple weeks I’ve gone three times in the early to late afternoon and it’s been the same guy at the drive through window. I pull up, and he’s mumbling to the computer screen with the window barely open. The first time it happened I didn’t even realize he was talking to me reading out my order. And now every time I see him it’s obviously his norm. And saying “thank you” to him is always met with no eye contact and silence as he literally looks off into the distance and stares at the...exciting shrub on the street?

I know the above sounds petty, but more and more they just lack in simple customer service and previously it was never like that so it’s worth mentioning.

Suggestions:

1.I’d love if they had a vegetarian soup. Or maybe they make a vegetarian soup that they can easily add chicken too so all people are happy? They did have 2 soup options for a while and then it went away. :(

2.More vinaigrette options (too many creamy dressings). There’s a couple vinaigrette’s, but one is heavy with feta cheese and still seems like a creamy-like dressing. I miss some of the old salads like the Santa Fe (I think it was called?) and hope they’ll continue to have a seasonal rotation of stuff so it’s not 80% salads that taste good with ranch or another...

2022: Salad and go is the healthiest thing to have happened to drive-through ordering, perhaps ever! Great food, amazing low prices, fast and efficient service, great pay for employees and great mission statement. We come here a lot.

Update 8.2.23 We used to come here more often, and although it's still a good deal, it seems like it's losing its charm.

It appears that the salad prices have increased by more than a dollar, and the chicken is now ground, aerated and a noticeably smaller amount compared to when it was cubed. I had to study the box to find the ground chicken (see photo).

The nested pricing option to add protein for a dollar or so may bring it back to its original protein amount, though it's uncertain. This results in a double price increase in the salad's price to restore what I believe was its original status. While I cannot confirm if other aspects of the salad have decreased, the dressing seems runnier, and the salad overall seems less dense to me.

These tactics are common, and aren't deal breakers, but I prefer the product to remain unchanged with a straightforward price increase. It still provides good value for the price, however, I have removed a star due to the combination of lowering the protein and increasing the price; either one alone would be better in my opinion. It's reasonable to accept a higher price for the same food quality, but reducing both the food quality and quantity while increasing the price appears to be poor management, putting the burden on the customers.

Despite these recent changes, I remain optimistic that the management will listen to their customers' feedback and work towards improving the overall experience. I believe they have the potential to bring back the exceptional food quality and generous portions that initially drew us to this place. With a little effort and customer-centric approach, this restaurant can once again become a favorite spot for many, offering both excellent value and a delightful dining experience. I look forward to returning soon and seeing the positive changes...

if I could give zero stars or negative I would give it. I’ve never had a worse experience in my life, even in the fast food restaurant I’ve worked in I didn’t do this. I went there for salads and one of them was steak. The rest were chicken he got all chicken which is fine. It’s a mistake but I didn’t really care about that went up to the drive-through and we were paying one of our cards declined Which is OK but he said that only covered $.42 ohhhh embarrassing Like honestly, I wouldn’t even say that to my friends even as a joke like you don’t know me I don’t know you that’s not funny, and when I gave my card, he said it declined again which he joked around and turned around said never mind that was a joke like I did not think that was funny that was really messed up to say out loud in front of everybody and he turned around laughing and joking with his friends. I called later on because he never gave a receipt because I wanted to complain and he kept telling me that I’m not being very specific on what order I had when I said, I had four salads and named each one of the salads and told him what time I got there and he was about to say he was going to hang up because he couldn’t understand me but I didn’t even know if it was him or not so I had my nicest voice on he was just totally rude. His name was Jack by the way, I will never come here again and I’m going to get this fixed. my friend was struggling with money. She sobbed the entire way home. I’ve never felt more bad and more upset in my job that I’m in right now they teach you not to ever say that to somebody and to try to be as discreet as possible. He was horrible. I hope he does not have a job anywhere else in fast food because that was a horrible, horrible, horrible,...