Anne E.
Yelp
I have been a customer of The Icehouse for the past 8 years and had always had a good to great experience, until today. I was meeting up with a large number of friends (20, give or take, all older women). We had planned this for several weeks, had contacted the IceHouse a couple of weeks to let them know our plans. This is not the first time we have gathered at The Icehouse. We know they do not take reservations. We know seating is subject to availability. We know we will probably not be served our food at the same time. We were good with that. We called the day before, were reminded members of our party would probably need to wait to be seated, no reservations, etc. And we were good with that.
I arrived early to start securing a table or two. Told the hostess how many I was expecting, again told they could not seat 20 at one time, but could seat up to 10 at one time. Fine, will work with that, we will just request tables as people arrive. People start to arrive, we send people in to request a table. They come back out, and we are enjoying ourselves. There were no other patrons on the patio with the exception of one table that was finishing their meal. They were NOT busy based on the traffic I saw entering the restaurant and the vacant tables on the patio. We are having a good time chatting, the wait staff is very pleasant and helpful, and did not appear put out at all.
Then a woman who identified herself as a manager comes out to tell us we cannot be accommodated. She was unwilling to work with us, and was willing to turn away 5-6 tables of people who want to enjoy a cold beverage and lunch. She would not listen to the fact that we were not in a hurry and did not have to receive our meals at the same time. She kept saying that we were told when we called that they could not accommodate us, which is not what was communicated. What was communicated was we could be seated in small groups, but may have to wait for service. She was calling the individual who had spoken to her a liar to that person's face. She stopped serving us and told us to leave.
We settled up and went to Carolina Ale House, who was more than happy to accommodate our group. And more than happy to collect more than $400-$500 in sales on a slow Saturday, not counting the tips we left for our server.
Icehouse really needs to get their act together. If they cannot accommodate 5 tables of 4 patrons each at lunch on a Saturday, people who are buying food and beverage, how long will they be able to stay in business? And how much business are they losing due to a manager with anger management issues who cannot figure out how to manage an influx of patrons needing service. And how much are their wait staff losing out on in tips?