Kyle W.
Yelp
It brings me great sadness to leave such a negative review about what used to be one of the best wine bars on the Upper East Side, and potentially in all of Manhattan. Let me preface by saying after living in Lenox Hill for several years, I moved to the West Village about a year ago. After I heard that Vanguard had re-opened after being closed for so long, I was so excited and made a special trip uptown to visit. What a mistake that turned out to be...
Upon arriving at Vanguard (around 11:30 p.m. this past Saturday night), I proceeded to the bar to order a glass of wine. I politely asked the bartender if I could try a taste of two different wines before deciding which one I wanted to drink. He rudely replied with, "Well, are you going to buy a bottle?" and I responded by saying I wasn't sure yet. After my girlfriend also asked to try two different wines, he looked at us both and said, "You know, you really aren't allowed to just sample multiple wines. If the manager or owner were here, they would not allow this." I was pretty taken aback by this comment, considering I have come to Vanguard more times than I can count, and the bartenders are always willing to recommend a wine and allow customers to try a taste before deciding what to order, especially considering everything is offered by the glass. At this time, we also ordered a charcuterie board. We knew the kitchen closed at midnight, so we purposely ordered when we first arrived.
After getting our wine and sitting down, the bartender came over to our table and said that we needed to either 1) move tables or 2) move the chair so that it wasn't blocking the walkway, as that was a "fire hazard." He also called me an "obstruction." There wasn't another table that would comfortably sit our group, so I simply moved my barstool out of the way, as he had asked.
After we had been sitting for about 25 minutes, I went up to the bar to ask about the charcuterie board and the other employee (not the bartender) informed me that the kitchen was closed, so they couldn't accommodate it. I told him that we had ordered it from the bartender nearly 30 minutes ago, which he didn't realize, so he said he would check with him. I overheard the bartender say, "Oh shoot!," clearly indicating that he forgot to put our order in. About 5 minutes later, the bartender came over and said that he purposely didn't bring out the charcuterie board because, "we hadn't moved to the larger table like he had asked, and the board wouldn't fit on the table." Imagine being out to dinner, being sat at a small table, ordering multiple appetizers, and then being told mid-way through your meal that you had to "move" because the restaurant couldn't fit any more food on your table...
Next, which is really what shocked all of us, the bartender went back behind the bar and started talking poorly about us to other patrons that were sitting at the bar! He said things like "I told them to move tables and they didn't listen" and "The holidays always bring in these kinds of people." After my girlfriend called him out and said there was no need to talk ill about us, he quickly denied this. About 2 minutes later, we heard him saying other condescending and inconsiderate things about us to additional patrons at the bar.
About five minutes later the other employee brought out the food and, needless to say, it fit without a problem. At this point, we were so fed up with being talked about and treated poorly that we asked for the check. When the bartender brought the check over, he very rudely said, "I feel like there's an issue here, so I don't even want your tip!" Made the decision that much easier for us...
Needless to say, I will not be visiting this location of Vanguard again. I have told many of my friends that still live in Lenox Hill about this experience, who have also said they won't visit here again. Vanguard was closed for a long-time as a result of the pandemic and I can't imagine they'll be able to keep their doors open for much longer if management continues to hire staff that treat and speak to their customers in such a condescending, demeaning and inconsiderate way.