"I'm never shopping THERE again!" Share your story!

[Diane AKA Traska]

I used to love IHOP.  Then we discovered a great diner around here.  More expensive, but man, the food is light years beyond.

[ladyknight1]

Same thing here, also late nights at our IHOP locations involve car loads of teenagers who are not on their best behavior.

Our smoothie and sandwiches place (in my office building) had 6 people working today, with 2 at the front counter. Neither of the two at the counter would take my order, instead calling someone from the back to do it. 

[silvercelt]

All the stories about IHOP. Just chiming in to agree.  DH and I haven't been back there since we got married years ago. Every single time we went, they were understaffed and took forever to bring the food.

There is a reason DH started calling it the "International House of Patience".

[ladyknight1]

The only location I will visit is the one near my campus. However, there is always one server working the whole dining room. This is very strange to me.

[heartmug]

All the stories about IHOP. Just chiming in to agree.  DH and I haven't been back there since we got married years ago. Every single time we went, they were understaffed and took forever to bring the food.

There is a reason DH started calling it the "International House of Patience".

lol!  I do like their food, but yes, my local one is a nightmare as far as trying to get seated and waited upon.  We visited relatives in the midwest and when MIL asked for a table for 10 you should have seen their eyes bug out.  lol  (4 of us ended up sitting at the counter.)

[Browyn]

If you're in Massachusetts try hearth 'n kettle instead of ihop.  Better food, they also do breakfast all day and the service has always been good.

Went there Saturday for brunch (Attlebor).  Had the down'easter.  Poached eggs with cheese sauce served over fish cakes with a side of bacon and hash browns.  Awesome!

http://www.hearthnkettle.com/locations-directions.php

[iridaceae]

The IHOP across from Disneyland rocks; they understand you want to eat and leave.

The restaurant I tried twice before giving up on has closed; I'm wondering how many other people were not impressed that the staff- in their teens and early 20s- were more interested in interacting with customers their age than making food for those who were not.

[Miriam]

I'm never shopping at a certain textbook store after this semester.

I went in after placing a book on hold and waited at the counter where pick-ups are authorized. There were three employees, one dismantling a box, one in the background shuffling around, and one weaving throughout the aisles. I managed to make eye contact with the guy and girl behind the desk, so I smiled and offered "Hi, hello." but both averted their eyes and continued dismantling the box and shuffling around. Okay, so I'll find the person in the aisles to help me. She disappeared. Increasingly becoming confused, I went up to the check out lanes and asked if I went to the correct desk to pick up my desk book. When it was confirmed that I did go to the correct desk, I walked back.

When I get to the counter the box guy had his back to me, shuffling girl had her back to me. I saw aisle girl come up so I smiled and asked, "Excuse me?" She ignored me, and walked into the back room. I faltered, "Oh..uh, okay." Then the box guy turns around, furrows his eyebrows into and angry Spock looking face, and asks "Yes?!" Wow, okay.

"Hi, hello, I need to pick up a rental. (Gives info at this point)" Box guy throws box on the ground then walks to a pile of books, grabs one, then dumps it on the counter:
"Check and see if that's it," then walks back to the box. I see through the plastic wrap that it is the book I rented.
"Yes, this looks like what I ordered, thank you for your help. . ." then box guy interrupts,
"NO." He drops the box again, yanks book out of plastic wrapping and shakes a large piece of paper (the receipt) out of the pages. "Check THAT to see if it's correct." How was I supposed to know how to do that? At this point other students are wandering up and are frustrated by how aisle girl and shuffling girl are ignoring their pleas for service. Feeling very small I wrapped my book back in the plastic and wondered to the front to check out. There wasn't a manager on duty to speak to, so I just left with my book vowing to use competitor's.

[Piratelvr1121]

Holy cow they are rude!! And makes me so glad my days of buying/selling textbooks are behind me.

[norrina]

Well, I couldn't "shop" at this bakery again anyhow, because they've closed up shop, but the way they went about doing it, I will not patronize them if they reopen in the future.

This particular bakery made some of the most phenomenal cheesecake I have ever had, so DF and I were keen to order a couple of their cakes for our wedding. (It's going to be a very small affair, so we just needed 2 cheesecakes, and then I was going to arrange some edible flowers on them myself.) We found/heard about them because they supplied deserts to a restaurant we dined at sometime during Autumn 2012. I looked them up online and drove over to the address on their website but it was locked when I got there and looked like it was just a kitchen, not a storefront. So DF and I decided we would have to call the owner at some point to discuss an order over the phone. Meanwhile the company was posting photos to their facebook page of their scrumptious deserts, and the owner posted to the facebook page from her personal account asking everyone to "please share with your friends".

Things got kind of crazy with the holidays, so DF and I decided we would wait and call after the first of the year. Our wedding isn't until August, so we weren't too worried about the timing if we waited a bit. Around January 5th or so I tried to call, and the line just rang through, no answer, no voicemail. I figured maybe they were on an extended holiday, so I waited a few days and called again. The same thing happened. At that point I tried their website to make sure I had the right number, and the website wouldn't load. Next step, I went to their facebook page, and the last update by the bakery was November 2 and a number of people were posting to their wall asking what happened to them, were they still in business, etc.

At that point, I thought something horrible must have happened to the owner, for them to just disappear like that. But when I clicked the owner's personal page, she had posted a status on January 9, "I am officially RETIRED and it feels so good." Well, okay, fair enough, she gets to retire. It seemed sudden and unannounced, but I figured she had wrapped up her affairs. DF and I had never actually commissioned her to make our cakes before she closed up shop, so she didn't owe us anything.

But today I checked her Facebook page again just curious to see if she had ever shut it down or responded to all the people asking after the business, and saw that someone had posted now that they were trying to reach her about their wedding cakes, please respond! So, I'm really, really, really glad that DF and I hadn't gotten around to placing an order with her yet, since it appears that she just bailed on preexisting orders when she decided to retire. 

[mmswm]

My mom and I decided to stop by Wendy's today.  We had three kids with us, and they have a decent value menu, plus we have a bunch of coupons for free Frostys.  Our order was mildly complicated, but not too bad.  We needed one Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger, add ketchup, another JBC with *only* ketchup, a value chicken sandwich add pickles, chili cheese fries, two orders of regular fries and one Diet Coke, 3 regular Cokes and 1 Sprite. I also asked them if they could make my chicken separately and change their gloves before making mine, as I have a severe tomato allergy. You would have thought I'd asked them to raise the Titanic. The manager and the woman making the sandwiches started speaking loudly and in Spanish, and throwing me dirty looks.  Now, I'm very obviously not Hispanic, but I do speak enough Spanish to manage. The things they were saying were not nice.  I told them to forget the chicken sandwich and give me my money back, as I no longer felt I could trust that it be done in a manner which would not be life threatening.  More insults and dirty looks.  The poor woman at the counter was visibly embarrassed and apologizing profusely while she handled my refund.  Then my mom and the kids get their food.  The two JBCs were totally wrong.  When my mother brought them back up to the counter to have them done right, the sandwich woman literally THREW them into a wall and started cursing in Spanish.  I'd had enough.  I went up, asked for a refund for all the food except the chili cheese fries (not the drinks, as those were correct) and went to a different Wendy's. I'll never go to that location again. I'm also going to call corporate when I feel like I've calmed down sufficiently to not come across as an unreasonable witch.

[ladyknight1]

Oh my goodness, that is absolutely unacceptable.

[BabyMama]

Well, I couldn't "shop" at this bakery again anyhow, because they've closed up shop, but the way they went about doing it, I will not patronize them if they reopen in the future.

This particular bakery made some of the most phenomenal cheesecake I have ever had, so DF and I were keen to order a couple of their cakes for our wedding. (It's going to be a very small affair, so we just needed 2 cheesecakes, and then I was going to arrange some edible flowers on them myself.) We found/heard about them because they supplied deserts to a restaurant we dined at sometime during Autumn 2012. I looked them up online and drove over to the address on their website but it was locked when I got there and looked like it was just a kitchen, not a storefront. So DF and I decided we would have to call the owner at some point to discuss an order over the phone. Meanwhile the company was posting photos to their facebook page of their scrumptious deserts, and the owner posted to the facebook page from her personal account asking everyone to "please share with your friends".

Things got kind of crazy with the holidays, so DF and I decided we would wait and call after the first of the year. Our wedding isn't until August, so we weren't too worried about the timing if we waited a bit. Around January 5th or so I tried to call, and the line just rang through, no answer, no voicemail. I figured maybe they were on an extended holiday, so I waited a few days and called again. The same thing happened. At that point I tried their website to make sure I had the right number, and the website wouldn't load. Next step, I went to their facebook page, and the last update by the bakery was November 2 and a number of people were posting to their wall asking what happened to them, were they still in business, etc.

At that point, I thought something horrible must have happened to the owner, for them to just disappear like that. But when I clicked the owner's personal page, she had posted a status on January 9, "I am officially RETIRED and it feels so good." Well, okay, fair enough, she gets to retire. It seemed sudden and unannounced, but I figured she had wrapped up her affairs. DF and I had never actually commissioned her to make our cakes before she closed up shop, so she didn't owe us anything.

But today I checked her Facebook page again just curious to see if she had ever shut it down or responded to all the people asking after the business, and saw that someone had posted now that they were trying to reach her about their wedding cakes, please respond! So, I'm really, really, really glad that DF and I hadn't gotten around to placing an order with her yet, since it appears that she just bailed on preexisting orders when she decided to retire. 

We had a local coffee shop/bakery like that. Their franchise with a small coffee chain ended, and instead of renewing it, they decided to just change the name and some of the drinks. Their new signage was pretty ugly, they really didn't make much announcement about just the name changing, and some of the drinks I liked there were no longer served, since they belonged to the franchise. I used to stop there every morning for coffee, but it got to the point where it was an 80% chance that whatever I ordered would be wrong. (Mainly they kept making my skim drinks with sugar-free syrup, which I can't stand. On a couple occasions I contacted the owners and let them know. Once they told me they'd comp my next order...and then it was a big-to do the next time I went in and tried it because the wife hadn't told the husband and of course they hadn't given me any kind of physical proof that my order should be free. Eventually I just stopped going and found another place to get my morning brew.

After talking with some friends, I discovered I wasn't the only one. And eventually they closed. Around that time, the main road outside their establishment had been under construction (but not super detrimental in re: to allowing people to get to the shop.) They left a bitter, angry message posted outside their front door, explaining that the construction had forced their closing and how the city should have been more mindful of local businesses before approving it, etc. Nevermind that there were probably other reasons for it.

THEN I found out that a number of brides hadn't been notified that the shop had closed. Not only that, the owners decided they were no longer able to commit to making the cakes. One bride didn't find out until the week before her wedding that she had no cake. A local baker got a TON of new business from grateful last-minute brides.

[ladyknight1]

We had a great local restaurant and brewery, Hops. There were two locations, both along major roads.

They had these melt in your mouth croissant rolls drizzled with a honey glaze. You could get four different beers, and food that was very good. They even brewed their own root beer. Suddenly, the location closest to us closed, and the other one was a significant distance from us. We did stop there a few times a year when we were passing by that area. The third time we visited that location, the upholstery on the booths and seats was torn, the menus were stained and ripped, and they only had a few items from the old menu.

When we asked about the direction of the restaurant, we were told it was being turned into a sports bar. A month later, it was closed and remains closed.

[Diane AKA Traska]

We had a great local restaurant and brewery, Hops. There were two locations, both along major roads.

They had these melt in your mouth croissant rolls drizzled with a honey glaze. You could get four different beers, and food that was very good. They even brewed their own root beer. Suddenly, the location closest to us closed, and the other one was a significant distance from us. We did stop there a few times a year when we were passing by that area. The third time we visited that location, the upholstery on the booths and seats was torn, the menus were stained and ripped, and they only had a few items from the old menu.

When we asked about the direction of the restaurant, we were told it was being turned into a sports bar. A month later, it was closed and remains closed.

New Name:  Off-Season