| rev:text
| - If you'd asked me my opinion of the Bedford a year or even a few months ago, I'd probably have given you a different appraisal. I am a fan of their patio, the location's great, and the service even at peak hours has been for the most part quick and genial. I've probably brought this place hundreds of dollars of business over the many years I've been coming here.
That said, I was seriously upset by my experience last night. I am not the sort to write a piqued review on the strength of a single bad experience, but I feel like my patronage over the years entitles me to say a thing or two. I'm giving it 3 stars because I think it's still fine for a pint on the patio, but I do not recommend having any kind of larger event here -- they don't seem to be up to the task.
We placed a reservation for a group of 12. I showed up half an hour early. The place was about 2/3rds empty. I told the two maîtres d' that I was there for the group of 12. They acted confused and officious and copped what I can only describe as a "suspicious" attitude. I'm a clean cut, well dressed, and polite guy who hardly looks like trouble in my blazer and dress pants, but they refused to seat me upstairs, made me wait at the bar, and told me they'd come tell me when my party showed up. Lighten up, guys -- this is a college-budget pub on a Thursday night, not the Russian Tea Room on a Saturday where I'm going to be running up to VIPs and demanding autographs. Given my long history with the place, I really didn't like being treated like riff-raff -- especially when the place was otherwise mostly dead and I wasn't making any requests apart from being seated.
Sure enough, my party showed up and they *didn't* tell me, but luckily I spotted one of my friends out of the corner of my eye, and I guess then they deigned it was "safe" for me to go upstairs to the pub's inner sanctum and I was no longer likely to, I don't know, jump behind the bar and start pitching liquour bottles at other patrons.
Once upstairs, we were constantly pushed and jostled out of the way by servers coming out of the kitchen, and the server kept trying to force us to sit down. I appreciate we were in traffic, but that should have been obvious to any staff member with some situational awareness so I don't understand why they didn't just move us to the other side of the room (which was empty) where we'd be out of the way. It was obvious we were mixing and mingling and having a good time catching up (while also buying plenty of food and drinks from a bar that was otherwise totally deserted) and it wouldn't have been hard to think a little creatively and have us move over, but no one seemed to bother. It would have been a different story if we were on the main floor, but we'd reserved the upper level for a large group and I'm not sure what they expected us to be doing other than drinking and talking and milling about. If there was some miscommunication, it wouldn't have been hard for the front-of-the-bar staff to come have a chat with us and sort things out.
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