Cracker Barrel Old Country Store — Restaurant in Shelbyville

I don’t even know where to begin. Short staffed? Not by any means. There were about 12 servers on that floor tonight, give or take one. As well as two hosts that were also helping out on the floor. Don’t forget the managers who were working their butts off. Everyone was hustling which is so nice to see. We, however, were gifted with what appeared to be the most incompetent server in the entire place. First, she took our drink order, FINALLY, after staring at us from the fireplace for a solid ten minutes knowing that we were there. After taking the very simple drink order of two sweet teas, she forgot and left us hanging. Poor girl. She managed to notice us about ten more minutes later, glanced at me, glanced at the table, then ran into the back and came back with two sweet teas that were very generously filled 2/3 of the way. I sipped that nice and slowly anticipating that I wouldn’t get any refills during this visit. She took our order. I ordered chicken strips, a baked sweet potato and broccoli (she responded with “we ain’t got none of the broccoli”) so I replaced it with a tossed salad with balsamic dressing. And an order of corn cakes. Old girl brought out my food 20 minutes later (which really isn’t a bad amount of time for food to come out on such a busy night, kudos to the kitchen staff) and she handed me a plate of chicken fingers and asked if I needed anything else. “Yes, my baked sweet potato and my salad.” She came back with a salad (with ranch and honey mustard because she forgot that I asked for balsamic… which is forgivable I suppose) and a baked regular potato. 🤨🤨. Then asked if I needed anything else. So I responded with “more tea please and my corn cakes”… she came back with neither. And then asked if I needed anything fifteen minutes later. So I asked for my receipt. Without blowing up, because I am definitely not that person. She brought it out.. then asked if she could see it again really quickly and disappeared. Came back with my corn cakes… as we were done eating with nothing more to drink. Then she looked irritated when I told her I didn’t need them anymore. Please! 🙄

I left a pity tip but for the love of god , Desiree at Cracker Barrel needs to stop serving. That was a disaster. Guy who checked us out at the end...

One of the worst customer experiences I have been a part of. First of all, there was a gnat in my lemonade. I drank some before I realized. It was replaced immediately, but bugs in food/drinks is frankly unacceptable. We had to ask for straws for our drinks and it took two requests to get more silverware. One of our sets of silverware was coated in the previous patrons food. Disgusting… In the end, we still only had one knife for a table of seven. After some time after we ordered, we were told the food would be “right out.” Oh how wrong that was. We ended up waiting over an hour for our food. My poor grandmother had to track the manager to ask about the status of our dinner. It was brought immediately after. Unfortunately, many of our items were cool or even cold. Seems like they had been prepared earlier, but the staff had failed to actually bring it to us. Neither waitress nor manager (who helped run our food) offered any apology or explanation for the long wait. We had to ask twice to receive some syrup with the already-cold pancakes. My sister-in-law requested a new steak because her steak was cold. When a new one was received, it was rare and even a little less than that. Truly pitiful and nearly dangerous to consume. The manager was brought over and the meal was removed from the bill and the manager offered a brief apology. Our waitress was friendly, but when she wanted us to help pass around drinks or plates, she would order “Pass that down for me.” Not a please or thank you in sight. It’s embarrassing to take your whole family out to eat after I long week of work and have such a poor experience. The guy who checked us out at the front was wonderful, though, and helped my dear mother find her favorite candies. But still, very...

I placed an order last Friday for curbside. The website said my order would be ready at 7:35 pm (40 some minutes later for 2 dinners which I understood because it’s a Friday). I checked in on the app at 7:25 then at 7:40 I tried to call the store in case the website wasn’t working and the woman on the other end was so nasty, I hung up and waited instead of asking anything. Called at 7:55 and let them know we were there, they said it’ll be out soon. At 8:05 I decided to go inside. Orders were piled on the rack and the employees seemed to have no sense of urgency and were just standing around. I left two stars because two older women upfront were apologetic and kind. The younger woman with dark hair behind the counter was nasty in person and on the phone. The manager had me show him my phone so he could cancel my order for a refund (because it apparently wasn’t even ready). I received no apology from the manager and he wasn’t even going to slug his way back upfront. While expecting the manager to come back and waiting, the woman with dark hair looks at me and says “it’s been canceled” to which I replied that I needed some sort of receipt from the manager. She said “he doesn’t have one” so I told her I wasn’t leaving. The manager finally inched his way back to the front, hands me a print out, and slowly walks back. I get being short staffed, but they weren’t apologetic nor did they have any sense of urgency. You can also turn off curbside or give a more realistic wait time. I’ve never had a great experience here, but an apology or at least having the decency to bring me proof it was canceled without me having to demand it. Mistakes happen but they made it obvious it didn’t...