Picks Bar — Restaurant in San Antonio

Update: I am working with one of the owners to resolve this issue. She has been very understanding of my grievances and apologetic for the staff's treatment of situation. Additionally, the offending server no longer works at this bar so shouldn't be an issue in the future.

Short version: I rented out the VIP section for my birthday party. The server refused to serve me after serving me only one drink all night. It was my birthday and I only got one very weak drink over 5 hours. We ended our party early because of it. DO NOT RECOMMEND AT ALL.

Long version: I rented out the VIP section for my birthday. Around 12:45pm the issues began. First, the waitress initially lied to me when I asked for a glass of wine telling me "we're not allowed to switch alcohols." Maybe she thought I was asking for a bottle of wine but in all the years I've been going to Picks they have never carried bottles of wine. Instead they carry canned wine. Regardless, her telling me she couldn't switch alcohols made absolutely no sense given that many of my guests were drinking their own non-vodka based drinks.

Second, I then switched my order to a single Tito's and Sprite. She went to the bar and came back telling me they could no longer serve me. She then turned to my friend right next to me and asked if she wanted another drink. My friend was working on her third straight double of the night. She was also not drunk (see breathalyzer comment below). For the waitress to offer to serve her and not me was insulting. The waitress wasn't cutting off anyone else in the party, only me. She singled me out with no proof of intoxication. When we asked her about it she just went back to the bar area.

Third, we had to ask what was going on to get any sort of explanation. My friend had to go up to the bar to talk to the waitress and find out she thought I was drunk and cut me off.

Fourth, when we asked to speak to the manager and he came over he never apologized for the incident. He thoroughly explained the bar's policy of allowing staff to cut off people they believe are drunk, which makes sense. However if we're all clearly sober and having a civil discussion about it then the waitress made the wrong call. Also, our waitress should be the only one that knows exactly how many drinks I ordered for myself. If she does not, then she's not good at her job. It was 1 coffee with Bailey's at 8:30pm and 1 Tito's and Sprite at 9:30pm.

Fifth, the manager did not apologize for the incident or even offer to get me a drink on the house. Instead he said he would make sure I could order a drink. We had just spent hundreds of dollars that night between the VIP area and the bottles and his solution was I should be allowed to give the bar that insulted me more of my money? That's greedy and poor customer service.

Lastly, I carry around a breathalyzer on my keychain because I won't drink and drive. I blew into that after being denied service and only blew a 0.015. The bar has camera footage showing me blowing into this. Later in the parking lot my friend and husband blew into it. My friend blew a 0.047. I don't remember what my husband blew but he was also below the legal limit. A large part of that is the shots we were taking were not straight alcohol but rather vodka and cucumber mixer so were not that strong.

I ended up being the designated driver from my own birthday party that...

Every Friday and Saturday night this place is packed with drunk patrons that start fights and altercations under the influence of alcohol as they spill drinks on the dance floor and other patrons and aggressively bump into one another. We got injured here in October 2017 when two women were fighting and we got caught in the middle on the dance floor trying to get away from them; a member of our group got kicked by a woman twice when she was trying to kick the other women she was fighting with then the other women fell into his knee. The dance floor was so packed we couldn't get out of the way and were caught off guard while dancing. The crowd that goes here is drunk, ill mannered and impulsive. The bouncer just sits there and watches and does NOTHING to correct the problems on the overcrowded dance floor. The bouncer needs to be replaced. This place has zero crowd control and many altercations between drunk and impulsive patrons. This place finally had to hire a security guard on Friday and Saturday nights due to all of the fights, altercations and skirmishes by patrons that are impulsive and under the influence of alcohol as they spill drinks on the dance floor, other patrons and aggressively bump into other patrons on the dance floor. There is zero crowd control on the dance floor by the owner/manager. The owner/manger have a duty to control the number of people on the dance floor to prevent injuries to patrons and even though the owner/manager knew they had a duty to act and control the number of people on the dance floor they did not and still do not. The owner and manager of this place should be ashamed of themselves for not controlling the number of people on the dance floor which they have a duty to do in order to prevent people from getting hurt. Sadly the owner/manager make no attempt to control the number of people on the dance floor which is their responsibility to do so. We are not ridiculous and neither are the facts in this review. Of course the owner and manager will attack this review and claim we're absolutely ridiculous and claim this review is ridiculous since the owner/manager knows they did not do their duty to act and control the number of people on the dance floor to prevent injuries to patrons while dancing even though they knew they had a duty to act and do so. The shame on you is directly on the owner and manager for the reasons...

The band was very good. Venue is well done and clean. We purchased a table that was described as obstructed view corner and private. It was $49 for the reservation. upon arrival we had trouble finding the table we reserved. It was in the corner of the bar, squeezed and obstructing the exit/ entry for the kitchen with two swinging doors. We brought the placement of the table to the managers attention, he said that if they didn’t put the table there it was wasted space that nobody would use…thanks for placing us in unusable space for $49. Service initially was very good, but as the evening progressed it was infrequent and I needed to go to the bar to order drinks for the table. An automatic up charge was added to the ticket of 20% at the end of the evening on the ticket for a “tip” . An additional line on the ticket for a tip was in the usual place. Our party of (4) has frequented Picks previously, we had fun listening and dancing to the band. The waitresses attempted to provide good service, but appeared to be overwhelmed. Business practices are not transparent and concerns communicated to management fall...