Willimantic Brewing Company — Restaurant in Windham

I am not one to write reviews, but I am SO upset about my past 2 experiences. As someone who visits willibrew often, before and after COVID, I have been extremely disappointed with my experiences within the two times I've visited in the last week. Last Sunday I went in with a group of 7, tried ordering waters for everyone although not everyone was arrived yet, and the male server that we started out with responded "ill ask them what they want when they get here I'm not getting them in advance" he had an attitude the entire time he was serving us, although we were polite and actually not very needy. Then our waitress switched to a young women and we proceeded to order where she didn't write one thing down. I even commented on how good of a memory she must have because as a waitress myself I would NEVER risk not writing down modified orders for 7 people. I ordered a steak Medium Rare and when my steak arrived it was well done. I commented on the fact that it was very overcooked and her reaction was "I don't eat red meat so I don't know what its supposed to look like" she didnt offer to send it back to the kitchen and I made another comment, where she offered me 20% off the steak. Basically a slap in the wrist, I had barely eaten it. My friend ordered a Caesar salad with chicken, and it was obvious she hadnt put in the chicken part as the chicken didn't come out until 10 minutes after she brought it to the waitresses attention. We left and that evening I proceeded to call the restaurant and spoke with the manager who was very nice and finally offered to send me a gift card as some sort of compensation. A week later a different group of friends and I decided to give it another chance. Again TERRIBLE SERVICE. 95% of the times I have been to willibrew we have been given a basket of bread, something many restaurants do as a courtesy. This time we hadn't received bread and I got soup, so I asked if we could get a basket for the table. Not only was the service terribly slow but we asked 3 times to please have bread for the table, and it came out only 4 minutes before our entrees. I ordered a special, tortellini with spinach onions and bacon in a creamy pesto sauce. I asked for the bacon to be SUBSTITUTED with a bit of extra spinach and onions. I was the only person at the table who modified my order. As the waitress, Tara, was taking our order she was extremely rude. She stared at us, wrote our order down, and didn't say a word and basically ran away the second we were done ordering. My tortellini was served with a few extra pieces (probably 3) of RAW spinach, and there was absolutely no pesto taste to it, it tasted like I was eating thick cream, not much flavor. What was appalling to me was when I received my bill where I was charged for extra spinach (I GOT RID OF A MEAT - BACON- and SUBSTITUTED spinach) I should NOT have been charged for that. On top of it, I was charged $3 for bread. I asked why I was charged for both, and her response was "ITS ONLY ONE DOLLAR" and ran away once again. She also mentioned she had been working there 16 years, which was extremely surprising due to her lack of friendliness and customer service skills. Completely rude and non attentive. Joel, an apparent manager then came over to explain why we paid for bread. It is not only ridiculous to be charging for these things but the lack of communication in letting the customer know they are extra initially was NOT there. I am so disappointed. The 'manager' Joel was so rude, refused to take the bread charge off the tab and basically didn't care that we expressed we were upset and disappointed. He did not try in any way to assure we would be ever coming back. As I said I never write reviews, but this is necessary. I am a server myself, I know people have bad days, but these experiences were unacceptable on both the servers and managers parts. Hopefully they can get it together and hire some...

Went with a group of 8 on a friday night. The waiter, Jake, was rude and berated us for not calling ahead. He deliberately waited to cash people out and got many food and drink orders wrong. He was rude to other staff members and made our experience miserable. If you go here, do NOT sit in Jake's section. He claims to have been working there for over twenty years, but if he had that much experience, he would know better than to touch a customer without permission. The food and drink menu are great here. Before this night, I have never had a problem with this place. One bad apple spoils the bunch, though. If he is still working there after all of the complaints that we put in as a group and my complaint, I will never step foot there again. The rest of this post is about the physical harrassment from this waiter I experienced when cashing out.

When he was cashing me out, he put his arm around me and pulled me towards the computer. I pushed him away and he laughed and asked why I was so awkward. I told him I didn't know him and I didn't like that he hugged me. He told me it was harmless and he was sorry he made me "awkward". I told him I appreciated the apology but not to do it again, it wasn't my thing and I don't know him like that. He repeated that it was harmless and I told him it still made me uncomfortable and repeated that I don't know him and it wasn't my thing. I asked then if he would check me out. He began to but stopped and said that people made him feel "awkward" all of the time and it made him feel good to make other people feel "awkward". "It's not like revenge, because I'm not making those people feel awkward, but it feels good when I get to do it." He asked if I still felt awkward and made it into a joke that he just makes people awkward. I told him I was still uncomfortable and asked again if he could cash me out. He did and then as I was signing asked if he could give me a hug. I told him no, thank you for asking this time but I don't know him and I don't want a hug. Another patron offered to take the hug for me but he insisted that the hug "was special for me". I told him I didn't want it and started to walk out with my friends, who were watching this unfold. He asked me again if I was sure I didn't want a hug and I told him no and walked out, telling my friends that I never wanted to see this man again. I was in tears and panicking at this point.

Karen (the hostess, who was fantastic) followed me out because she saw that I was upset. She heard me out and asked if I wanted a manager. I spoke to the manager and he agreed that it was unprofessional and disgusting behavior. He said there would be consequences and that he would make sure my friends, who were still in the bar, weren't in his area anymore and he would speak to him directly after I left.

I checked in with my friends and they said no one spoke to the waiter (that they saw) and Jake spent a few minutes after I left telling them how unfair it was that I...

Yesterday I left $5 on a $64 tab and I just want the young male waiter to know why. I was a server for almost 10 years of my life at two of Connecticut's finest restaurants, and I was very good at my job. Sometimes I'm a little judgy, however a spade is a spade.

I was greeted promptly by the 3 young female hostesses and immediately sat with no issues. I made them aware my buddy was on his way in smoking a cigarette, in which at the same time I used the restroom.

After we sat, we waited about 15 minutes before a waiter/waitress spoke to us. No menu's ... no water's, just two guys at a table talking about college football... Waiter arrives and stated his reason for being late was because another table was completely forgotten about on the other side. While I applaud his attempt at honesty, sometimes it's better to lie. As a server IYKYK.

During another long wait for our appetizer, the waiter came up and asked us if we wanted any other drinks than water, to which my buddy replied no. I was never asked, as the waiter immediately turned away with an attitude giving "they are only drinking water" trust me I get it. However if you had taken a second to ask both patrons at the table if we wanted a drink you would have sold a drink. You assumed I was not going to buy one, why you assumed that I'm unsure. (Cus im young, and im black, and my hats real low? Do I look like a mind reader sir? I don't know!)... anyways.

A 30 minute wait ensues as we watch tables who arrived after us get their food. Eventually we finally got our nachos which were phenomenal. In the middle of eating we asked for more salsa and it arrived after about 7 minutes of waiting to which we decided to just box the food. Had we had gotten the salsa earlier we would have kept eating.

The wait for 24 chicken wings after the app came out was almost an hour total with time stamped Snapchat photos to prove it, and at this point I was ready to give up lol. The waiter explained the wings take 30 minutes to make, but the wings came out 53 minutes after we got our app. It was egregious. We wanted all the food together and never specified the nachos to be an app so it confused us overall but we just went with it.

Wings arrive and taste phenomenal again as well. So it's like "alright whatever."

We get to the final boss, the check. We call the waiter over and discussed the entire situation to him. We asked him to split the check into two paychecks for us. At this point he was going to get $80 on $64 despite the long waits. He walked back with 1 check, completely opposite of what we had JUST asked him 5 SECONDS AGO, and then he ignored us when we tried to get his attention multiple times.

cheers from, A guy who never...