Jim!

On New Year’s Eve, 2005 my wife, kids, and a number of family members were gathering at The French Laundry in Fenton, Michigan. The experience was, to this day, the worst restaurant service I have ever had. Below is a letter that I wrote to The French Laundry, in its entirety. I shall soon scan and post the response I received.

Why do I post this now?

Simple: I hate that place and have to drive by it on a regular basis.

Please Note: This is a recounting of a single experience and is not meant to be representative of the service experience that is standard at The French Laundry. Many people speak highly of this eatery, but I’ve never had that kind of an experience there.

To The Manager/Proprietor/Owner,

I don’t go to the French Laundry expecting bad service, it just happens…

I’ve never been a frequent visitor to The French Laundry because I feel that its reputation is largely undeserved and far too trendy.  My feelings aside, I’ve tried a number of times to figure out what the strange fascination with your establishment is, so I hazard a visit every now and again to see why people pay such high prices for such average, over-priced food.  The reason, repeatedly, that keeps me away is the service is so blatantly bad.

On a number of occasions I’ve decided tried your eatery with absolutely no preconceived notions whatsoever, and each time the Terrible Service story writes itself.  My most recent – and decidedly last – visit was the end-all/be-all visit that will keep me, my family, and my friends away from the most over-hyped/under-delivered restaurant I’ve ever visited in my life.

On Saturday, December 31 we were meeting with some friends and relatives for lunch.  We arrived at noon and took our seats at the end of a number of tables that had been strung together because of the size of the party.  As it turns out there were a few more visitors, resulting in the addition of more tables to our party.  At 12:05 our server took our drink orders, saying she’d be back with them in a moment and then take our food orders.

An amazing one-half hour later our drinks finally arrived.

Let me say that again.

An amazing one-half hour later our drinks finally arrived.  Please, tell me one restaurant where the standard service time for drink delivery is ½ hour.  These were neither specialty drinks nor alcoholic drinks.  They were water, tea, and Coke.  By the time the drinks did arrive the ice in my tea was almost completely melted, meaning that it was prepared and sat on a counter for what I’m sure was most of that one-half hour period.

At this point we were about to put our coats on to leave.  I don’t believe in paying for service that I don’t receive…and why we stayed is even a bigger mystery.  But we’re nowhere near done with this dining fiasco yet.

The time was now 12:35…And We Hadn’t Even Place Our Food Orders Yet.

During that half hour my wife asked about appetizers because we hadn’t eaten today and we hadn’t even placed our food orders.  The options that we were given were an $18 cheese sampler (did I not mention over-priced food in the opening paragraph of this letter?) and a couple of not-so-appetizing sounding, similarly over-priced items.  The server left to do something else (of course, she hadn’t taken our food orders yet) and didn’t came back until 12:40 to take our food orders.  We Were Going to Order an Appetizer, but she never came back!  As a result my wife went into the bakery/deli and got us a large pretzel stick for the five of us to share.  Your restaurant lost the sale of an appetizer instead.  Funny thing is, it was never offered as an option.  At no point did she ever say “I can get your some bread from the bakery” or some such similar gesture…as if to say “you’re limited to what’s on the menu” or “Pay no attention to the food on the other side of the door”.

It was about this time that a couple of other things happened, the Bad Service story writing itself in ways that the best author never, ever could.

As I mentioned before, the ice in my iced tea was nearly completely liquid when it arrived in front of me.  We asked a passing server/busser/employee if she could get me a glass of just ice, so that I could add it to my tea.  She said “Sure, I’ll be right back”.  Imagine our surprise when that didn’t happen.  When the food was delivered we asked the man (presumably a manager) who brought the food for a glass of ice.  Shock and dismay, it didn’t appear again!  He returned to the table for something else and we asked him again for a glass of ice…and he turns to the woman who we originally asked for the ice…and asks her to get me a glass of ice!  What on EARTH is so difficult about such a simple task that it has to be handed around 4 times before I finally get it?

When our server DID bring our drinks I made a comment about it taking an unbelievable half-hour to get them.  It is here that she started to apologize, but not the sincere kind of apology that should have tried to make things better.  It was the “we had two people call in and you have to realize that” kind of apology.  The name for that is “Making Excuses”.  This is an issue I take very seriously.

Having spent over 9 years in the food service industry myself there is one thing that you must always remember:  The Customer Doesn’t Care if someone called in…or is late…or hasn’t returned from their lunch break yet.  The Customer entered your establishment to pay (in the case of the French Laundry, to over-pay) good money for efficient service, quality food, and a pleasant eating experience and that’s what should be delivered…not excuses.  Internal issues are exactly that – internal – and should be completely transparent to the customer.  The server we had, however, wanted to make absolutely certain that this point was made because she made a point of bringing it up every single time she returned to the table.  The funny thing was, she was no longer helping to turn this debacle around.  It was too late.  The damage was done and she was going in after a battle and bayoneting the wounded.  I agree that the way our party kept adding diners was rather haphazard, but if she would have treated the party like several small parties instead of one large party she’d have made the experience incredibly better and chances are you wouldn’t be reading this letter.

Someone in our party was wise enough to have a “rush” put on our orders.  That’s also a rather subjective phrase, because soup and sandwiches and a salad took 25 minutes to deliver.  That’s “rushing” our order?  In one of her attempts at apology our server said “We’re sorry, Sir, for all the problems.  We don’t want you to go away unhappy.”  It was faaaaar to late for that line, as there was nothing on earth she could do to turn it around.  In fact, her clichéd lines had become more annoying than *almost* anything else.  I’d like to add that whenever our server came to the table to ask questions or to gift us with one of her rhetorical apologies she looked at and spoke to our kids and never, not even once, looked at my wife or myself.

After finally receiving our orders I can honestly say that they were at least correct.  Someone, however, left the word “warm” out of my sandwich that was supposed to have Warm Pastrami.  Again, however, it took several attempts to get my tea refilled.  You could probably save a lot of service issues by making the drink station available to customers, since it seems to be a difficult concept for your servers to get a hold of.

When she brought the bill to the table my wife asked if she took care of it or if we had to take it to a cashier.  Her reply was “We’re full service now; I’ll take care of that for you”.  We were mystified by that statement, because it surely didn’t have the feel of Full Service…or at least any experience I’ve ever had that was supposed to be Full Service.

At 1:25 we completed our meals (notice I didn’t use the word “enjoyed”) and got up to leave.  ONLY THEN did the food for the remainder of our party start to arrive.

Even looking through the rosiest of glasses no one could call this a pleasant dining experience.  From the inattentive service and the incredibly slow food delivery to the oh-so-grating apologies offered by our server, this was one of the absolute worst dining experiences I’ve ever over-paid for.  I know a number of other individuals who visit The French Laundry often and they, too, bemoan the level of service that they receive.

I’ve given The French Laundry far too many chances.  What possible reason do I have to return when there is only bad service to look forward to?

A copy of this letter is being sent to the Tri-County Times and, depending on the response I get, posted on my website for a much larger audience to see.

Thank You very much for your time,

-Jim Ferris!