Went to Farmer Boys on a recommendation of a co-worker who always goes to the Decatur location. Since the Rainbow location had just opened (2 weeks prior to my going there) decided to give it a try since it was closer to my work & I also had to run another errand that was close to the Rainbow location. I had high hopes for this place as my co-worker talks it up quite a bit but unfortunately they fell flat on their face. I do not understand how they can be 4.5 stars with 16 reviews.
Went in around 12:20pm on a Friday. There was a little bit of a wait which I understand & was OK with that since it was lunch time & a Friday. They do not have good system for moving people to to the registers in my opinion. As we waited our turn to be called to the next register some customer that came in after us barges in front of us going to what would have been our register. There's not a large enough area in front of the counter before the 1/2 wall that separates the tables to have lines of people waiting at each register so that's why we as well as others were waiting at the last register to be called up to the next available register. Luckily the last register next to the drive thru opened & the cashier came out to get us & we did get to order before the jerk that budged in front of us & others. My lunch mate ordered her food & all was fine. I then placed my order & tried to pay for my order with my Amex card (I get airline miles for every penny I spend.) My card was declined & I knew it was OK as I had just used it @ Sam's Club for gas that morning. Since it had the chip in it I asked the cashier to key it in manually. She looked @ me like I was speaking Greek. She finally figured out how to do it & still declined. Then she got a mgr & apparently the corporate store has not set them up yet with their Amex card so customers cannot pay with Amex. Seriously? You're a chain business that's been in business for at least 2 weeks (according to what Yelp says as I write this). I could give a little wiggle room if it was a mom & pop place that didn't have it set up but a chain restaurant that has 6 other locations in the valley? Anyway I used a different card & payment was accepted. After our orders were placed (@ 12:32pm as our ticket indicated) we headed off to a table & waited for them to bring our orders out. We sat & watched as diners that came in after us & ordered after us received their food. Finally @ 12:51pm we stopped one of the cashiers that was delivering food & asked him what was taking so long & just then the cashier that actually took our order came by with food but it was not our order. By then we were getting irritated since we were hungry & were on a time limit to get back to the office. All the cashier could do was say "I'm sorry." & she took our receipts. After a couple of minutes she returned telling us that the workers in the back never had our order up so they never made it. My lunch mate was angry as it had been over 25 minutes from the time we ordered food at this point. We got the manager & asked what was taking so long & he told us that the workers in the back were too nervous & making mistakes because the "big boss" was back there watching over their shoulders. I am sorry but if your workers are that incompetent to work with someone watching you need new workers. Finally after about 28 minutes my burger (Farmer Burger) came out with it's french fries & 2 large onion rings. I immediately had a french fry & they were soggy & cold. My lunch mates food was still not at the table & she had ordered before me & finally she received her cheese burger. I then asked the cashier for new fries as mine were soggy & cold. She did oblige & brought me out a new order on a separate plate as I told her I need to eat my burger so I could get back to work. The new fries were hot at least but no flavor what-so-ever. The onion rings also had no flavor in the batter on them. I did like that they were not greasy. They would have been awesome had they had some seasoning in the batter. The Farmer Burger had now flavor either. And the bun was dried out & the bottom bun was tore so my burger fell apart as I tried to eat it. I ended up just using the large piece of lettuce as the bottom bun after the bottom bun had fallen apart. The manager had taken our receipts to get the order #'s from them & we asked for compensation as it took 25+ minutes to get a burger. It should not take 25 minutes to get a burger especially in a place that specializes in burgers. The manager did comp us each a free meal for the next time we come in. At one point before he had decided to give us a free meal ticket I had told him I wouldn't be coming back based on the experience today so I think that's why he decided to give us the free meal ticket. This was the 1st time I have ever been to a Farmer Boys & quite honestly I will not be going back. Maybe just to use the free meal ticket but we'll see about that.