The failings of chains

With our economy on the brink of another recession, we will inevitably see more and more local businesses and services folding. However, what I have noticed is that people are still going out to eat and socialise over food and drink and where chains tend to withstand difficulties, independent restaurants always have to up their game to survive. The service has to be top notch and the food has to be above average. And it shows. However, are the chains over-confident and taking their customers for granted? Perhaps.

In the last week I have been able to experience three big chain restaurants and to say I was disappointed is an understatement. Last night, with a pizza craving, we headed to Pizza Hut on the Aspects Leisure Park. Just driving past we could see it was busy- it is school holidays, but that didn’t worry us. However, walking in we were firstly unable to even get inside owing to the pile up of people in the tiny waiting/ take away area who were waiting for orders or to be seated. We stood at the front desk where you wait to be seated and we were not acknowledged for over 5 minutes even though we saw three members of staff standing around chatting for a couple of minutes. It was also awful to see they had a table of 2 literally in the doorway although at the back of the restaurant there were many empty tables. We noticed the floor was covered in pizza, napkins and cutlery and the salad bar looked as though a bomb had hit it. When we were eventually seen to, we were told it was a twenty minute wait and so we left as we had already gone off the idea. It’s a shame that in this day and age, huge businesses such as the Whitbread Group who are lucky enough to be able to withstand these worrying times and have such a large market captured, are unable to meet basic customer service standards.
Sticking to the chains, we headed to Frankie and Bennies. We were served as soon as we got in, although by the door where the front door is always open and so there is a draft, but the staff were very friendly and polite. We were served quickly and ordered chicken wings to share to start, a New Yorker burger each and then pancakes to share for dessert. Unfortunately, in true chain- standard the wings were quite fatty and burnt and the burgers were dripping in fat and grease. Maybe we were expecting too much?
However, with these big eatery companies and names, is good food too much to ask? The dessert was nice but we were left waiting for it and the bill for nearly 20 minutes. The polite female member of staff explained they were very short staffed and apologised for the wait- a shame as we saw three sets of people walk in, fail to be acknowledged or seated and instead left to go elsewhere.

Lastly, the worst experience was last week. I went to Pizza Express with a friend and we went earlier at half past 6. Again, we realised it was school holidays and so there were many kids with parents. However, once again we were sat in a rather awful place- a table for two right by the cutlery and so you are constantly battling over the sound of the knives and forks to be heard. Literally as soon as we were sat down and given the menus, a female member of staff (who we found out to be new) asked us what we wanted. We kindly explained that it might be nice to have a few minutes to have a look at the menu and so she stood two steps away and waited for us, whilst watching. In a bid to end the awkward moment, we quickly chose olives and dough balls to start and a pizza each. For 20 minutes we chatted and then we realised we had not had our starters- we understand it was busy but the problem was we could see them sitting on the side along with 4-5 pizzas with no-one taking them out. However, the new member of staff was standing around doing nothing and another came and stopped to talk to her. We had to ask for them to bring them over.

Whilst eating them we were constantly faced with children running passed our table- not the restaurants fault but annoying at the same time as the gap between us and he table next to us was around 1 foot and so the table was nudged every time. We also noticed a back member of staff continually take a full dirty rubbish bin from the back through the restaurant to the outside bins- which smelt and was quite unhygienic.

By the time we got our pizzas, nearly an hour had gone and mine was dry with the cheese hard where it had been sat out. I didn’t want to wait another half an hour and so I notified the waitress and said it might be worth keeping an eye on others. I then heard her tell a manager who said ‘if she doesn’t want another one that’s good and we don’t have to give anything away free.’

In the meantime, the new member of staff attempted to carry a tray with 4-5 bottles on it which then were dropped and glass was shattered all over the floor and by our feet- this then took around 20 minutes for them to clear up.

I was quite keen on leaving by the end- luckily we had vouchers (which Pizza Express is very good at) and so we didn’t spend much.

I look forward to visiting more independent restaurants now- I’m quite happy to give the chains a rest.