Denny's — Restaurant in San Diego

I'm very sad to be leaving this one star review, as my family used to love visiting this Denny's, and I am so disappointed to say that it has gone down hill. The service from our waitress Amy was terrible, but what was worse was the condescending and sexist attitude of the manager when I complained. We came here on Father's Day, expecting to wait a bit because of the holiday, but we were pleased when we were sat down right away. It was busy, but not terribly busy. Great, because we have two little girls and waiting for food at a table for a long time isn't the easiest thing for hungry toddlers and infants. Judging by the crowd I expected we would be eating before too long. After we were seated, our waitress brought us our menus and asked us if we were familiar with it, trying to take our order before we had even opened them up. We told her we would just need a minute, but ordered coffee and water, and she left. Sure enough, she didn't return to take our order for at least 10 minutes, with our coffee and no water, not apologetic in the least for the delay. We asked for the water again, and it took one more request after this to finally get it. Our food finally came almost an hour after sitting down. Amy just put it on the table without a word and left. We weren't given an orange juice that was supposed to come with our husband's breakfast, and our table no salt. We were finally able to flag down another waitress about the juice and salt and, again, waited until Amy finally came back. Again, no apologies. She didn't have the orange juice or salt. A family had just left at a table nearby so she starts yelling "salt! salt!" at a busboy who was obviously hard of hearing. The busboy didn't understand so she just left again, without even getting the salt. I walked over and got it myself. She finally brought the juice and asked if everything was alright. I said no, the service hadn't been good, we had to wait too long and didn't get all of our order at once. She just walked away without acknowledging I had said anything at all.

After more than an hour sitting there, she failed to bring us our check, so we went to the front counter to pay. The manager was there and I started to complain about the service. One of my pet peeves is managers who fail to take responsibility for the service in the businesses they run, and this manager was exactly that. He just told me he knew about Amy, that he's had problems with her, in a tone that seemed as though he wanted me to feel sorry for him for having to deal with such a difficult employee. I told him it didn't seem he was listening or sorry, so he turns away from me to turn to my husband and says "man to man, I'm sorry." Are you kidding me?! I'm a grown woman and this isn't the 1950s. My husband wasn't part of this conversation and he doesn't need to be brought in to manage me. Man to man? I can't even believe it.

We won't be coming back here, ever. Which is too bad, because most of the staff is wonderful. We have been going there since our oldest daughter was just a few months old, and it was so nice to have familiar waitresses recognize her and make her and us feel welcome. But it's just not worth it if the manager cannot lead his staff and demand higher standards for customer service. And I simply refuse to support a business run by a man who has such outdated and sexist attitudes towards women. In this day and age, business is not done "man to man," but among men and women as equals. I hope the owners of this business care enough to find management that will take responsibility for how their staff...

I'm editing this to mention two important things. The glasses had not one set of lips worth of lipstick but several...like several weeks' worth.

But more importantly, my mom witnessed something as she walked to the restroom: a waitress polishing the silverware, piece by piece, with nothing but her fingers. No cloth. No polish or water. Just her oily, dirty fingers to rub out the water stains.

Now I know much more disgusting things happen in restaurants every minute of every day, but to see this, in person, right after you finish eating a meal made us both want to vomit.

Dennys, you need to take a very serious look at your employees and how you do business.

And we wonder why things like covid spread the way they do.

Both my Mom and I have waited tables. Neither of us had ever seen something so disgusting.

Original review: This dennys dining room didn't smell like sewer, like the other dennys around san diego, at least. The food was okay...I mean it's denny. Nothing to get excited over. The order came out right...yay. The issue I have with this place though is the FILTHY DISHES AND GLASSES. Horrid. Go ahead, wet a napkin and rub hard around the top of a glass and look at the difference. Lipstick and filth. Just with a napkin and water. If the dishes are this filthy, I can only imagine the condition of the kitchen.

Oh, didn't have to imagine the restroom...very scuzzy. Years of grime built up on surfaces. Come on, dennys. Do better! We aren't living in a third...

Food was presented well, but you can 100% tell it's just pre-made or pre-bagged frozen food tossed onto a skillet or grill and cooked as the directions state. None of it tastes authentic at all. Actually, the only thing that's not fake is the fruit... can't really use fake fruit. We walked in and it took nearly 3-5min just for someone to come to the front and seat us... I'm glad they have benches because I'm in my 3rd trimester and standing is not my friend right now. Other than this, the waitress came to our table when as needed, and she was very helpful at refilling our drinks or other condiments, and the service was pretty fast at getting us our food. The atmosphere seemed drab. I loved the military flags hanging up, especially since my spouse is military. The overall environment was very plain and average, and I wished I went to a retro diner like Johnny Rockets (if one was nearby) instead to add more pizazz. Sadly, I didn't know any retro diners before coming here, so we settled. For drab, pre-made food, the prices are a bit high. They definitely aren't worth that much, but I'm assuming the customers are also paying for the building to...