Toby Keith's Reviews
Okay, if you've been to Toby Keith's I love this Bar and Grill, it's time to rate it. We'll start with downtownguy's view from his daily blog.
"Toby's
Enough with the hype. I’ve been to Toby Keith’s I Love This Bar and Grill, and I have both praise and criticism.
What’s wrong:
You may think the line outside is an indicator of how bad the wait is. So maybe you wait on line, and it seems to be moving fast, and you’re inside within 30 minutes.
Not bad, right? But wait, once inside, you get your name on the list and there’s another wait. Ask the hostess how long the wait is, and she’ll tell you she’s not allowed to say.
Now that’s a bit unusual, you think, but you’ve already waited 30 minutes, and things seem to be moving quickly, so you put your name on the list. Now for the truth: you’re still facing an hour-long wait, and the people at the bar are also waiting. The backlog is a lot worse than it appears. You can get frustrated seeing some tables go empty – maybe a sign that the restaurant isn’t as well staffed as it should be.
So you wait another 30 minutes. Ask the hostess how many names are in front of you: she shows you the page and says there are just two in front of you. Another 15 minutes pass, you see five more tables seated, so you go back and this time the hostess is a bit more honest with you; your page hasn’t even started yet. But hold on, she says… there are only five more tables left to seat on the page before your’s, so it won’t be too much longer.
While you wait, the privileged few can be seen in a classy glass encased second floor dining room that overlooks the rest of the restaurant. During the first few minutes of the wait, you wonder who these people are. A half hour later, you begin to hate them. After an hour, you want to storm the booth and steal their appetizers.
An hour and a half after first arriving, you’re seated. You wait about five minutes before the waitress gets you your drinks.
What’s right:
Once seated, and once you get your order placed, the pace quickens. The prices are on the high side, but the portions are huge. (samples from the menu: Cheeseburger and fries, or a chicken sandwich and fries, $8, BBQ chicken, $13, 16 oz chicken fried steak, $14)
At least while you’ve waited, you’ve had a chance to survey all the odd décor that’s to be expected in a theme restaurant. Country music plays over the speakers (no live music until long after the dinner hour), while redneck programming (NASCAR, sports, country music videos) play on several televisions.
The food is damn good. And it should be for the price. Service improved dramatically once seated.
What needs to be fixed:
Don’t abuse your customers, don’t lie to them. It’s a rather simple concept for restaurants to follow. Would I have left if I had been told the wait would have been an hour? Yes. But I would have come back. Despite the good food and service once seated, I left still upset over how I was treated at the start. And it’s still very upsetting that the hostess deceived me on my place on the list. As a customer, I should be allowed some control over how long I’m willing to wait. If I want to wait an hour, I will do so and I won’t complain. But it’s wrong to take away from me the information I desire to make that choice.
And while the lines are winding around the outside of the building, I strongly suggest having one of those cute hostesses offer some water to avoid people developing heat stroke. It diddn't seem like they had anything better to do.
The good news is the problems with Toby’s would seem to be easy to fix. They’re at least getting the important points right.
- The Downtown Guy
www.downtownguy.blogspot.com"
Originally Posted by fromdust
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