Applebee's Grill + Bar — Restaurant in Virginia

Stopped in here with my wife for dinner this past Sunday about 7:00 pm. We were promptly seated by the host at a high-top in the bar area per our request. The place was not very busy (about 1/3 capacity) and appeared to be staffed well. A quick study of the menu and we were set to order. There was one waitress in the bar area and she had 3 tables occupied she was serving. The manager on duty appeared to be keeping herself occupied with the right rear corner area of the bar and back table section close to the kitchen entrance. During our wait, we overheard what appeared to be an unhappy bartender carry on about someone/something she appeared to be upset with and during the course of her conversation, drop more than 4 F-bombs - totally inappropriate. More than 15 minutes had now passed and no one had checked in to great us, see if we wanted a drink or to take our order. The host reentered to seat a party of 5 at the corner booth next to our table. As a former restaurant owner I have a habit of observing the activity of restaurant staff (and patrons) closely when I dine out. During our wait I did not see the waitress (nor the manager on duty) ever raise their head and look up to acknowledge other patrons had entered the restaurant bar area and attend to them. After the party of 5 was seated a few more minutes past when the waitress finally came over and she greeted the party of 5 next to us. Again, she never establish eye contact with us (I truly believe she had no idea we were there). I reached my tipping point and decided to check in with Stormy, the MOD to share my feedback. My dissatisfaction was 3-part; (1) The waitress who never established eye contact with new customers who entered her serving area - and when she finally did, she went to the next closest table instead of acknowledging who came in first and serve in that order. (2) The bartender who did establish eye contact with me numerous times but I got the the impression from her based on her salty conversation and the fact we were not seated at the bar, it was not her job to attend to us. 3) Stormy the MOD who was not engaged with restaurant operations and failed to place any focus on seated customers. Stormy was very receptive to my feedback and she seemed genuinely concerned with the missed opportunity to serve us. We departed Applebee's to dine at another restaurant in the area.

On a positive note the young host on duty opened the experience with a friendly greeting as he promptly seated us with menus in the bar area per our request. The establishment appeared tidy, neat...

A friend and I revisited Applebee's in Mechanicsville, Va on Friday, May 27. Our first visit was Father's Day. We went a second time to see if the experience would be better. I called ahead of time to see how busy they were and, if they had enough waiters on staff . The person that answered the phone assured me that they did. She said they weren't over crowded. We arrived 30 minutes later. There was a party of six ahead of us. Several people came in and left. We were told it would be a 15 minute wait, that turned into 30 , and then 45 minutes. We were told that they couldn't seat anyone until the kitchen caught up. They were out of silver ware and dishes because they didn't have a dishwasher. The cook has to cook and wash dishes. There were several or more booths with dirty dishes. The customer service person Jlo was very nasty and continued to ignore us when we tried to get her attention. Finally after 45 minutes they put us at this little table backed up to the wall. I asked the waitress Kimora who serves us Father's Day , to clean a booth for us to sit in and she did. The nasty one Jlo continued to ignore us. We were finally seated and our order was taken. They had a number of servers but no clean tables. My friend sent her dish the Bourbon chicken and shrimp back twice because the shrimp were uncooked. I got the Special, all you can eat Boneless wings, chicken tenders, and ribs. The boneless wings were hard. Kimora tried to make it a good experience but she has no control over the cook. The manager was no good, she wandered around like she was oblivious to what was going on. I asked them to remove the Bourbon chicken from the ticket because she was unable to eat it. Another couple across from us tried to ge J'los attention and she ignored them to. He had put in their drink order and they left. Jlo could use some customer service training. The server can only perform as well as the cook gets the meals out. This was their second and last chance for me. What good is it to have a lot of server's, and no dishwasher. The customers can't be seated or served. I don't blame the servers, this is poor management. Kimora is a good server she just needs to serve at a better restaurant. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree. Very...

The restaurant was at least half empty. We were seated fairly quickly. We were a party of 4. We ordered the chips and queso app which took 30 minutes to get and the chips were stale. Two of us ordered the boneless wings, 1 ordered the appetizer sampler, and the other ordered the crispy chicken sandwich. At the 50 minute mark we still had nothing besides the stale chips. Other tables that had came in after us and ordered wings also had gotten there’s. So we asked to speak to the manager. At this point I didn’t want to argue or get anything for free I simply just wanted the check for the sodas and chips. Well the manager stood at the table for 4 minutes and proceeded to say the food was ready and give several reasons why our food was taking so long. I continued to be firm on just getting the check so we could leave and he wanted to give us free food and say he would do whatever to make it right. I told him if that is the case please just give me the check for the app and drinks. He still would not give me the check(I just wanted the check so i could tip the server, because I felt like none of this was really her fault and she had been very friendly). After asking for the check again he said no that we could just leave. On a side note, i would think if the food had been ready it would have probably come in the time he stood there arguing with me, but it never came. I know places are short staffed and most are doing the best with what they have, but the manager was just terrible. All he had to do to let me leave on a good note was give me the check when I asked for it, but instead he wanted to waste even more of my time...