Let me preface this by saying I have been a big Moon River supporter since they opened. I have referred many a person there.Tonight I had an experience that may cause me to never go back. Let me explain.
A group of friends and I watch movies once a month. We always meet at Moon River since it's a central meeting spot. My wife and I got to Moon River late, and as you know at dinner rush, the line can wrap outside the door. We understood this going in. My wife and I get there around 6:20 and by around 7 we are 3 back from the register. As we are standing in line a couple comes in and one of the waiters comes up to them personally and begins taking their order. I asked the waiter why they were serving them ahead of us and he rather nonchalantly said, " They work here," and then he proceeds to walk away to get their order. I just sat there kind of stunned that they would have this policy as the line now was even longer than when we first came in. I finally got to place my order and as I am waiting for it to arrive, I see that the employee is already being served his meal and is at his table. This really starts to irritate me.
Finally a young lady gave us our order and I asked her if I could speak to a manager. She said she was the assistant manager. I explained why we were upset. She said she apologized as it wasn't her that did this. By this time, the original waiter that had allowed the employee to skip the whole line was leaning over asking what this was about. We told him it was about him allowing the other employee to skip. He then says " what about it?" I asked him if it was policy that they allow employees to skip if the line is out the door. He said it depends and they occasionally do that. No other explanation was offered. Meanwhile the other girl was getting our money back. We didn't ask for that, and she was generally nice. The other waiter is now saying he sees nothing wrong with what was done. My wife point blank asked him if he cared that he allowed the employee to skip over 20 paying customers and he said no. He then started asking us rather loudly to leave. The assistant manager had to hold him back. I got upset, admittedly and called him some names on our way out. I do not like people yelling at my wife. We both felt intimidated since the assistant manager did not ask him to be quiet or apologize to us or anything. She simply said it was best if we leave.
I have never had an experience where we were just trying to bring up an issue we thought management should know about and the waiter cops such an attitude that he has to be held back as if he was about to jump us. Needless to say I am not going back. I also had issues with their line management. I did not bring that up. I have never seen a line handled more inefficiently.
I know we have a few restaurant owners on here. First of all, would you have let your employee talk to us like that? Second, don't you think you would know how to better manage a line than having one person take orders, take payment, get your drink, etc? If anyone from Moon River wants to respond to this and explain your self, I welcome that as well. I am talking to our movie group about meeting somewhere else that actually cares about its customers.
