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

[zyrs]

Speaking of salads, there's a restaurant in my home town that we'll never go to again. 

I asked to go there for my birthday, which is on July 22 (this becomes important in a minute).  My older daughter, who's a vegan, took a look at their online menu and found a very nice-sounding salad that she wanted to order.  When we went there for my birthday, Daughter asked for the salad - only to be told "Sorry, we're not serving that until the summer."

I repeat - this was JULY 22.   

Maybe they meant 'next summer'... 

[Lauds]

Speaking of salads, there's a restaurant in my home town that we'll never go to again. 

I asked to go there for my birthday, which is on July 22 (this becomes important in a minute).  My older daughter, who's a vegan, took a look at their online menu and found a very nice-sounding salad that she wanted to order.  When we went there for my birthday, Daughter asked for the salad - only to be told "Sorry, we're not serving that until the summer."

I repeat - this was JULY 22.   

Maybe they meant 'next summer'... 

Or maybe they forgot what hemisphere they were in.

[mumma to KMC]

I don't think I'll ever be going to the Shoe Dept. store in the town north of us. Last night I walked in, looking for a pair of dress shoes for my dd and it looked like all the staff members were standing around the front of the store (I had to say excuse me to get by them.) chatting and no one was on the floor helping customers. It wasn't a store meeting, as far as I could tell either.

I didn't find dress shoes for her. I suppose I could have asked if they had anything in back, but I didn't want to interrupt their important conversation.

[Virg]

cwm, I have to agree with other posters who said that your trip was probably doomed from the start.  If the smell of jalapeņo peppers makes you feel ill and you don't generally like spicy food, then Chili's is not the place to go for dinner.  It may be in the same family restaurant segment as TGIFriday's or Applebee's but it's got a distinct Tex-Mex tilt and a lot of their menu is spicier than average.

Also, next time you get a meal you can't eat, tell your server or the manager.  I know that it can seem petty to send a meal back when there's nothing "wrong" with it, but it was an unclear menu description that caused the problem in the first place and every restaurant manager I know would rather have a chance to get you a meal you'll like than have you vow not to return.

Virg

[Dindrane]

If you have such a strong reaction to spices, perhaps a place called chili wasn't a best choice for food. I am not familiar with the restaurant but it conjures up an image of food which is hot.

I'm sorry you had such a rotten experience but in hindsight I think sending your bf to speak to the bartender to ask for a waiter would have been the best thing rather than try to suffer through a meal you couldn't eat at all.

Despite the name, Chilis aspires to be a moderately-priced "family restaurant" with a variety of American fare - other similar chains are TGIFridays and Applebee's.  I happen to agree about their menu, though - for all their "varied" menu choices, almost all of them have things I don't like (mostly peppers or cilantro) and/or just aren't very tasty.

As Joeschmo said earlier, Chili's is a mid-range family restaurant, but it doesn't really serve a variety of American fare the way TGIFridays or Applebee's does. Chili's serves Tex-Mex influenced food, almost exclusively. Most things on the menu contain spicy ingredients in some form, although in many cases you can request to have them left off.

I really like Chili's, even though I don't really like overly spicy food (my tolerance for it is pretty pitiful for someone born and raised in Texas). So I am in the habit of ordering just about everything with the spicy ingredients removed. My favorite thing to get there is a chicken sandwich with ranch dressing and wing sauce, but I always get it without the wing sauce. My husband and I sometimes order their cheese fries appetizer, but we get it without jalapeno (or pick them off if we forget to ask the server to leave them off). Etc.

As an aside, most (if not all) salsas contain raw onion. It's kind of a key ingredient. Some salsas are chunkier than others, but even the ones that are sort of pureed probably still have raw onions in them. So anything in a restaurant that says it has salsa on it has a way better than average chance of that salsa including chopped up onions.

[rose red]

I can't shop here again because they are closing, but if they weren't, I sure as heck won't.

A chain supermarket is closing all it's stores.  I went and the only thing left worth buying were boxes of Jello.  The price tag says .49 cents, but when I went to the self-checkout, the price rang up as $1.39.  OK.  The store is a mess and maybe I was mistaken about the price tag.  I canceled the transaction so I can go back to the shelf to check.  All of a sudden, an employee yelled and berated me in front of the entire store about how I'm using the self-checkout to check prices and I can't do that and I'm tying up the machine, etc. etc.  Before I can correct her, she turned to another customer and I didn't get a chance to say a word.  I wouldn't even have minded if she said "please don't use that to check prices" so I could have told her the real story, but she had to embarrass me and made me (wrongly) appear like a jerk in front of all the other customers.  I had been sorry the chain was closing and all those people losing their jobs, but that's no excuse to be mean.  Way to make a *wonderful* (sarcasm) last impression. 

No use calling the manager since they are closing anyway.  But I wish I had just interrupted her so she can learn a lesson about assumptions for the future, but I just wanted to get out of there, I was shaking so much.

[gramma dishes]

Dominick's?

[rose red]

Dominick's?

Yup. 

I had my first job there and it was wonderful way back when.  I even learned confidence to interact with people after being bullied in school.  It started going downhill when Safeway brought them out, but I still shopped there frequently.  It's sad that's going to be my last memory of them.

[gramma dishes]

Dominick's?

Yup. 

I had my first job there and it was wonderful way back when.  I even learned confidence to interact with people after being bullied in school.  It started going downhill when Safeway brought them out, but I still shopped there frequently.  It's sad that's going to be my last memory of them.

My son worked there for a couple of years in high school.  At the same time one of my daughters was working at Jewel.   We had no choice but to shop equally at both stores.   

[Stanwyck]

Speaking of Chicago-area grocery stores, I'm never shopping at Jewell due to their horrible parking lots. If they aren't difficult to get in, they're impossible to get out of.  And their produce is mediocre.

[Redwing]

Well, happily, Mariano's has purchased the Dominick's stores, or at least the majority of the remaining ones.  Mariano's is great!  Huge selection of produce, deli, bakery, cheeses, canned and boxed food, and very competitive prices.

[Reader]

Petco.com.  My old watering system for my dog had a hole in the upper bottle (whole another story to how it got there)  So I go to petco.com to find a replacement system.  Find one I like, it's on sale and site says in stock.  Because I hate filling a dog bowl every day (3 dogs in the house) I clicked the 2 day shipping.  On the day it is to arrive I receive an e-mail that it's back ordered!  I go to check on it and the link doesn't say when it will be in stock.  So I open live chat, to ask if my 2 day shipping charge will be refunded and to ask if the item was back ordered why didn't the site say so when I placed the order, and when will it be in stock.  Get told by a representative that the item is being pullled and I won't be charged till it ships.  We kept going round and round till a phone call had me end the session.  Waited a day, rechecked my order status, still backordered.  Try to do live chat and the feature is down.  For a entire week.  Finally get e-mail the following Monday that it has been shipped.  Total time from ordering to arrival 7 business days, and 2 weekend days, for a total of 9.  Was charged for 2 day shipping, and my e-mail to the company has gone unanswered.  I could understand back orders this close to Christmas but I ordered this product right after Thanksgiving.  And my friends wonder why I prefer to shop in person. 

[mumma to KMC]

Petco.com.  My old watering system for my dog had a hole in the upper bottle (whole another story to how it got there)  So I go to petco.com to find a replacement system.  Find one I like, it's on sale and site says in stock.  Because I hate filling a dog bowl every day (3 dogs in the house) I clicked the 2 day shipping.  On the day it is to arrive I receive an e-mail that it's back ordered!  I go to check on it and the link doesn't say when it will be in stock.  So I open live chat, to ask if my 2 day shipping charge will be refunded and to ask if the item was back ordered why didn't the site say so when I placed the order, and when will it be in stock.  Get told by a representative that the item is being pullled and I won't be charged till it ships.  We kept going round and round till a phone call had me end the session.  Waited a day, rechecked my order status, still backordered.  Try to do live chat and the feature is down.  For a entire week.  Finally get e-mail the following Monday that it has been shipped.  Total time from ordering to arrival 7 business days, and 2 weekend days, for a total of 9.  Was charged for 2 day shipping, and my e-mail to the company has gone unanswered.  I could understand back orders this close to Christmas but I ordered this product right after Thanksgiving.  And my friends wonder why I prefer to shop in person. 

If you paid with a credit card, would you consider doing a dispute of the charges through them?

[jayhawk]

Sounds like a lot of folks are done with Target.

[Piratelvr1121]

Sounds like a lot of folks are done with Target.

If you're referring to the whole card thing, I'm not.  Mind you I'll be hesitant to use anything but cash but I just like some of their stuff too much to write them off entirely.  I do think they're going to have a really hard time getting folks to sign up for their redcard now though. 

I have the Target debit card and will be watching my account to make sure no mysterious charges are made but I don't really blame the store.   I got a long email from them this morning even, apologizing and explaining what they're doing about the problem. 

I just like their store too much to swear them off entirely.