Shoney's — Restaurant in West Virginia

It needs to be NO STARS!That place is so run down i dont see how anyone can eat there!Employees arent much better then the food or the atmosphere!Really needs worked on!Didn't get seated so we had to seat ourselves of course we didnt get approached by an employee cause we sat ourself so i had to let them know we was there to eat. The food was NOT EDITABLE!!What food they did have couldn't be eaten!!3 people hollering where's the food at they've been waiting for the food to be brought out and wasn't!No lettuce bar cause no lettuce!Food all over the place it was never cleaned off.What food they did have sitting out looked old and tasted even worse!Was NOT about to get food poisoning!What my kids did try and eat was old!You have employees walkig in and out from smoking instead of serving customers!Couple behind us couldn't eat either no food plus the the smell of dirty of the place just was no appealing at all!We had to pay full price for food we didnt and couldn't eat!Asked for the ticket twice and had to go up and get my own of course!We saw our waitress once that was it!Im from princeton have lived here my entire 33 years and have only been in this place a handful of times thought havent been in years maybe its changed and better now!Nope!!Never will be back in that place again and pay 56 dollars for food!I dont think i have ever left a review for anything but i absolutely had to this time!This had to be the worst experience my entire life!You got waitresses talking about tips in the food area but you can not expect to be tipped properly if your not attending to your tables!You have employees hollering at other employees that there isnt any food at the buffet and they getting mad cause they gotta cook it!Instead of arguing about the 56 dollars that we didnt eat i just took it as a lost and left there was no arguing with them people and trying to get them to understand this was absolutely ridiculous and mind blowing!!How people still sitting there eating that food is mind blowing to me!!I would love to be contacted by someone to get them to go in randomly and eat there to see for them self how bad it really is!To be honest i see that as stealing peoples money who come there to eat good food and cant but have to pay alot of money still!This place needs help that's for sure!Whoever is runnig this place needs help to think there isnt anything wrong with...

Wish I could give negative stars.

Wife and I ate here on our way through W. Virginia. I had a fond memory of eating at Shoney's as a kid with my grandparents so I thought we'd give this one a try as it's right off the exit. HUGE mistake. Walk in and wait several minutes to even be recognized. We sit down at one of the dirtiest and broken down booths I've ever seen in my life. The menus that were handed to us were sticky and gross. We decided to give the buffet a try rather than order off the menu since everyone seemed to be flocking that way.

We ordered water--it tasted like dirty pool water. We got up to the buffet and made plates...to be honest the food looks like what you would expect from a buffet, not appealing, but not especially inedible. Except the ranch dressing, which is clearly a powder mix. Hey guys, use a little less water next time. It looked like peppered milk. Gross.

We sat down to eat and...just...it was like eating House of 1000 Corpses. You know how sometimes when someone bakes cookies and you can taste their house when you bite in? Yeah, this was the exact same thing. The food just tasted like dirty carpet and sadness. I guess when you're serving food that's so bland, it's easy to transfer whatever flavors are nearby.

I was disgusted and had to use the restroom. That's where the magic was--I knew there was a problem when, before even crossing the threshold of the restroom door, I had flashbacks of my days working in nursing homes where the old men peed on the walls and refused to let anyone clean them. The restroom inside was worse than that. I did my business, wishing I could float to avoid touching the floor then walked out without touching anything. You know your facilities are truly the work of the devil when my crotch is cleaner than anything in your restroom.

We were ready to leave, but wanted to cleanse our pallets so-to-speak. My wife got some fruit and I got some mashed potatoes, but by the time we sat down, we were both too disgusted with what we'd let pass our mouths to eat what we got. I was horrified that I ate anything at this place and my wife was immediately starting to feel sick.

I paid, trying not to vomit the whole time, counting down the seconds until she handed my card back so we could leave. I literally bounded and sprinted to my car to GTFO of Shoney's and West Virginia.

We...

This particular location in Princeton, WV, is a disgrace to other Shoney's restaurants that I've visited. I'd actually eaten breakfast at this location a couple years back and was disappointed on that visit, but they've continued a downward trend since then and I don't foresee returning again. This location was fairly busy during this visit on May 4th, 2023, and there seemed to be plenty of serving staff on the floor, yet it took way too long to get our drinks after ordering and since we were having the buffet, we were only checked on one other time other than to bring us the bill, but I did manage to eventually get a single refill after requesting it. As far as the buffet, if you were only there for a salad and some fruit you were in great shape, otherwise it was subpar. The individual tending to the bar only brought out a small amount of the popular items at a time, while other dishes that no one was choosing remained full. The small "dessert bar" was completely empty with only a few crumbs of yellow cake until after we'd finished our meals and as I was taking a few photos to post, they only provided yellow cake with & without a chocolate drizzle and cookies to choose from. The ice cream cooler remained empty the entire visit and looked like it wasn't even being used. As we were departing, I stepped into the men's restroom and immediately saw the nastiest restroom I've seen in quite some time, complete with a large amount of wet/nasty toilet tissue in the floor. It was obvious to a blind man that it hadn't been cleaned in quite some time. Inexcusable! Not sure I've ever posted a restroom photo in a review before, but made an exception this time. Too bad the Health Dept didn't visit 'em on this afternoon. Do yourself a favor and visit one of the many other local restaurant choices if dining in the Princeton area. Would've been a ZERO star score...