Aqua Grill — Restaurant in Ponte Vedra Beach

I had an absolutely appalling experience at Aqua Grill last weekend. I am a loyal patron who has frequented this restaurant throughout the years, which made the whole thing even more despicable!

I had planned a joint birthday dinner with my friend. We had the reservation made for over a month for a group of 15 women. I’ll summarize here by saying, in a matter of 30 minutes upon arrival – the manager, Tara managed to offend and discriminate against myself (the birthday girl) based on another random patrons subjective assessment of my attire, then she got argumentative with others in the group over ordering appetizers, then finally managed to run 15 women (business owners and professionals) out of the restaurant, due to her rudeness and harassment of the group. It pretty much goes down as the worst experience I’ve ever had in a restaurant and for my birthday, no less. EPIC FAIL Aqua Grill!

As for what happened, I was there not even 10 minutes when I am getting pulled aside by Tara, the manager. I had not even had a chance to sit down at the table. I was pulled over to a side area in the restaurant along with the other birthday girl and we were asked if our party could move to this area that was hidden off to the side. I am extremely confused at this point. My friend had just spent time setting up table decor, some friends had already started ordering drinks and were seated at the table in the main restaurant. It would be extremely disruptful to our group of 15 to move. When I asked why, I was informed by this manager that allegedly some other patrons had complained that the dress I was wearing was “inappropriate”. I am speechless at this point and frankly just shocked and appalled that this is even being brought up to me. Seeing that we were not going to agree to moving, the manager than asked me if I can “put a sweater on”. This just kept getting worse by the minute. To this I responded, that no, I would not put a sweater on and that I thought this entire interaction was extremely rude. She then tried to justify it by saying that the patrons complaining were “old” and then said, “that’s fine, they will just need to deal with it.”

I am still unclear what about my outfit was deemed inappropriate as it was never disclosed to me specifically. I was wearing a dress which showed my arms and legs. As far as I know, that is not breaking any dress code. This NEVER should’ve been brought to my attention. If patrons complained, that’s their problem. Make them move and don’t make it my problem. I did nothing wrong. I wore a dress to my birthday dinner. The way this was handled was extremely unprofessional, discriminating, and unnecessary.

Things went downhill from there when my group caught wind of what happened. We attempted to salvage the night and stay but manager Tara wasn’t having it, it seems. She got argumentative re: an appetizer order my friends were trying to place and then when one of my friends addressed her rudeness with her, she got irate and started berating my friend to leave. Of course, this was the final straw and all 15 of us women gathered our belongings to leave.

The treatment we received was truly disappointing and appalling. It’s very unfortunate as Aqua Grill has always been one of my favorite places to go.

We ended up taking our party to Coop 303 who were more than accommodating and welcoming to our group and treated us with the common decency that anyone dining out would...

I had a terrible experience at this restaurant this weekend. My friend and I planned a joint birthday dinner for Saturday night. We made the reservation far out in advanced and had dined here numerous times with large parties previously. Minutes upon arriving I was pulled aside by management and informed that a person in my party was dressed inappropriately and asked that my friend cover up. I'm not sure what could have been deemed as inappropriate. My friend is a professional woman in her forties and her attire would be considered appropriate in any standard dining establishment. I was beyond confused and shocked. I couldn't believe I was having this conversation. Management then approached my friend directly about her attire in a patronizing and aggressive manner. Hoping to move on and salvage the evening our party sat and begin to order drinks. Upon sitting, management approached our table multiple times with various issues including the splitting up of checks. We were fine with only splitting checks so many ways and advised management of that. But, then manager found another reason to come to our table. Upon being told that the handling of the situation seemed inappropriate, we were asked to leave. When trying to leave the establishment we were yet again approached again by management multiple times. We were so confused and disappointed.

The nature in which management approached our party was unjustified and embarrassing. It is disheartening that a restaurant we loved to visit is now a strict no-go.

I'm not sure what is going on here, but if you are a woman or have any women in your party, be advised that the atmosphere fosters an outdated sense of misogyny and there is a chance that the women in your party will be be approached about their attire, whether or not it is appropriate. Again, we are talking about a professional women in her 40's. Not that this incident would be justified for a woman of any age. I urge management to review their policies and see to it that all guests are treated fairly and respectfully. Until then, ladies and friends/family of ladies, beware. Take your...

My friend from out of town was visiting this weekend, and I wanted to take her somewhere nice that we could order seafood from. This spot came up in our search so we decided to give it a try. We attempted to call ahead for a reservation, but knowing it was a Saturday, we weren’t expecting much. Sure enough, they were booked for the evening but told us there is a “first come, first serve area” that had bar seating and a few tables. This was a very small, super crowded and loud space, but we wanted to try the food so we were willing to give it a shot.

We quickly learned that once a table got up, you had to jump on claiming the table before it had even had a chance to be cleaned. That was fine with us as it was her birthday and we wanted a little more elbow room than what we got at the bar. We helped clear the table so our server could wipe it down and this is where the issue started. Our server rarely made eye contact, was very flat in her responses, and barely checked on us. We had originally ordered our food at the bar, so it was shocking she was so cold to us to begin with. She seemed annoyed we weren’t drinking alcohol and possibly upset our party of two was taking up a larger table.

As someone who worked in the service industry for over 8 years, it was disappointing to feel so unwelcome at an establishment. We didn’t make any special or crazy requests while we were there and couldn’t understand why we were being treated that way. It was apparent she was being nicer to other tables than she was to us, but overall she just seemed miserable. I tip great for exceptional service but that is not what I or my friend received this evening.

If you’re looking for amazing food, this spot is great-which is why I gave it three stars. The service we received left us feeling less than joyous for my friend’s birthday celebration and our server clearly didn’t care that we were celebrating. Hopefully management finds servers who actually want to be there...