Steak 'n Shake — Restaurant in Rome

I know that I'm probably being petty, but many of these fast food restaurants have really been irritating me lately. I had not been to Steak'n Shake in quite a while, so I was rather surprised when I walked in and found that there were no people working the front. Instead, what I found were multiple kiosk's to self order my own food. There were a couple of people working the back area and one that was sort of on the side. As it turns out, the one on the side was calling out names for the customers to come and pick up their trays. They have self serve fountain drinks and the machine is in the corner, unseen from the part of the room where I was seated. When I asked the employee, a nice young woman, where the drinks were she pointed and said they were on the other side of the wall. There are no longer choices for size of drinks, I noticed this upon ordering, when it just said "Drink". The drink station was well stocked with all the necessary items, but the no choices made me have flashbacks to Cuba, where there are many things on a store's isle, so long as you want the only brand offered.

The lack of staff was a bit different to me. As I said, it had been a while since I last visited Steak'n Shake, but I remember not too awfully long ago, ordering at the table from a nice individual, who made sure everything was well done. Now they are no different to Taco Bell, who went down hill in the customer relation department many years ago. All of the cutbacks didn't reduce prices at all. I paid $11.88 for three chicken tenders, fries & drink. I am in no way faulting the skeleton staff that was doing its best to take care of the patrons that were there, but I haven't seen this level of cutback at Chick-Fil-A and they rock constantly. The number of customers in this location were scarce. I rarely see that at the aforementioned competitor. Though the prices there are high as well, a result of the economy, the service has not slipped. I don't mind so much paying higher prices, if I feel that I am getting something in return.

My references to Cuba & Taco Bell are for a reason. They are both places that I would not choose to visit. I will not likely make the effort to go to this Steak'n Shake either. The food was good, but for the money, there are other, more personable alternatives, where I can still get a...

ALWAYS have loved steak'n shake but THIS one trip really changed how I feel about their management and is why they are getting 3 stars today. Short & sweet here, we go through drive thru and order our food and shakes (we usually dine inside). So far everything good, we drive around to the window and when we get to it we here a VERY LOUD pop from under our car. My husband hears it as well as the girl working the window and they both look down. It was a beer bottle from the car in front of us. She yelled for the manager, he came out with a broom and started sweeping it up, this is the best part... get ready.... he says (in the most dull, Alfred Hitchcock type voice)..."I'm so sorry this happened, if there ends up being any damage let us know. Im going to tell my GM that we need a sign that says ""No Drinking and Driving""...... What the!?! That is an actual law already, if someone is breaking a law that could land them in jail then do you really think that they care if Steak 'n Shake has it on their drive thru? Anyway, we didn't even get offered anything like a discount or free fries or even a cookie for us having to pick glass out of the little wedges. So my opinion, eat inside or go inside to pick up if after 11PM because the drive thru can be a dangerous place with people drinking and dropping their bottles there. Your Milk Shakes are still at the top of...

The renovation of the restaurant looks great. It was very clean, and it was quiet to sit down and have a nice lunch. However, upon walking in, we were directed to an order screen on the counter, no person to tell us how the ordering process worked or how to use something we were not familiar with. Once we figured it out, it asked if I'd like to leave a tip, ?. Who would that tip go to as there weren't any servers. Our food was cooked, and we had to retrieve it from the counter and fill our own cups. Way different from how the restaurant was 8 months ago when they had servers. The food was less than good. Fries under cooked, and I'm not sure if it was a burger patty or just scrappings from a greasy grill. The overall cost for 4 cheese burgers, 1 was a double, nothing special and fries, 2 drinks, and 3 milk shakes were more than I would have spent at Longhorns. Would we go back? Absolutely not, and I'm sorry, but I can't recommend a restaurant that does not have staff that can interact with customers. The lady walking by carrying a mop told us where to get our drinks. Other than cooking our food, it's a self-service fast food joint, not a restaurant with...