Potbelly — Restaurant in Village of Friendship Heights

The food met expectations. However, the service, accuracy of order, and prefessionalism and attitudes of the staff was sub-par.

I approached the counter with no one in front of me, and the woman behind the counter was preparing the bread for another order.

She looked up at me 4 times under her eyebrows and sighed. Then, she complained to another co-worker about her running nose. I patiently waited. She finally asked for my order by saying, "next in line," without making eye contact. I placed my order, and then she said, "what bread," not being a Potbelly frequenter. I was unfamiliar with the options and asked her where I could find the bread options. She heavy-signed and ignored me. I repeated my question and she pointed with exaggerated annoyance. I submitted my bread preference. She didn't acknowledge me. I then placed my soup order. She didn't acknowledge me but then yelled my order to a coworker. I advanced in the line.

Another in my party placed her order and was met with the same cold shoulder. She did not receive what she ordered.

My wife pre-ordered for her and our 3 year old before we walked to the restaurant so it would be ready when we arrived to keep our toddler engaged. They kept the order behind the counter instead of placing it in the pick-up cubbies because many past orders had been stolen. However, my wife paced back and forth checking the cubbies which were in direct line of sight with the counter and employees. No one else was in the restaurant and the staff didn't notice until she asked for the status of her order. We all received our food before her and our toddler.

She was telling me what happened at the table when another employee yelled out from behind the counter, his explanation of why the pick up order was not in the cubby.

I then made a trip to the restroom. I entered the stall and sat down. 10 seconds after sitting down the automatic lights went out. I waved my arms around but the stall doors block the light sensor. I used the toilet in the pitch black until I was able to open the stall door, at which point, the lights came back on. If a disabled person in a wheel chair uses that stall I am sure they will have challenges. This is unsafe.

The experience was off putting. We will not be returning unless we are starving and nothing...

Today was my first time to order (a sandwich/a bowl of soup/ and a shake) from here. I ordered online at 5:06 PM EST to facilitate a quick pickup to be able to get home as soon as possible to my wife who was sick. This is where everything started to go haywire. Apparently, when you order online they have a surcharge of 30 cents that isn't indicated clearly in your subtotal. 30 cents may not seem much but it shows a company's transparency with their fees they charge their customers.

Anyway, the pickup time I selected was 5:20 PM EST however when I walked in to pickup my order, there was no order present at the pick up station. Wondering where my order was, the employee said it was just being put together. Looking around the store, there were only 2 customers eating, 1 ordering, and 1 (me) waiting on their pickup order. So, it baffles me as to why wasn't my order fulfilled on time. I had to wait for an additional 10 minutes before I got my order.

Other than those two major (?) gripes, I have no other complaints. At least I knew the food was freshly made. Wife was happy that the soup was delicious. The shake and sandwich were also good but not at the level of life-changing or mind-blowing.

UPDATE: After receiving my email receilt, it shows the 30 cents as an adjustment. I customized my sandwich and picked toppings that had no price by them so I didn't think I'd be...

I used to live by this location and would constantly eat here for lunch and dinner, so it saddens me to see how far it’s fallen in such a short amount of time. The prices is high so you’d expect a level of customer service to also be pretty high, but that’s not the case. The constant racism towards customers and trying to hide it by speaking in spanish is insane. Then just waiting to get my food takes so long. My order is very simple a turkey and swiss with mustard and mayo. Not that hard and yet it takes forever to get in the oven and when it does come out it sits there till an employee decides they want to do it. You will see at least 2 different employees walk past your sandwich before either of them even acknowledge you. Then when at the register they’re supposed to have your soup and shake ready like the sign says, but you get there and all of a sudden the forgot you even order it. I got a Oreo shake and a bowl of Mac. The shake was not even thick like before and the Mac was lukewarm like they had just put it through a microwave. The god forbid you sit in the actual restaurant it has crumbs on almost all tables, multiple roaches crawling across the base boards and even the widows aren’t even clean to enjoy the sunlight. All of this wouldn’t matter if the employees actually cared, but at every step of getting this food it felt terrible....