I went out for dinner locally with some friends over the weekend. The part of town we went to is known for independent restaurants and bars, with new ones appearing quite often. I haven’t always experienced the slickest of service in these places, but more often than not it’s been decent.
The group included my friends Matt and Jen, who only know one another through me. Jen is a very big fan of supporting new local businesses, will often like and share posts etc.. Matt is quite black and white about restaurants and bars - if they’re not up to scratch first time, there’s no second time. While I can imagine Jen saying “Let’s try Casatino again; maybe they were having teething troubles”, Matt would just think why bother when there are dozens of other places to try. (I’m not saying either approach is wrong, BTW.)
The place we went to is the kind of place where being able to see the food being cooked is part of the experience. However, the layout was completely wrong for it and you couldn’t actually see anything - it all happened in the kitchen and you basically had to assume they’d followed the process they were promoting. So that was a disappointment to begin with.
However, there were more practical issues with the experience. They offered five different starters, but had run out of all but one by 7pm. Also they forgot my main course, which, considering there were only two other tables on there at the time, was pretty poor. I ended up getting half of my main boxed up because I felt like an idiot sitting there eating while everyone else had finished.
Anyway, Matt left a two-star review addressing all these issues. Jen has seen it and is up in arms about it. She’s saying “The poor restaurant; they’re so new and they’ve had this terrible review, it’ll be awful for them” - and then said to the rest of us “We all need to leave five-star reviews to counteract it”.
I’ve said I don’t want to do that. Jen is acting disappointed with me, saying it’s a new business and deserves a chance. I’ve said I have no intention of leaving a bad review, but don’t think it deserves a good one either. I don’t feel Matt has been picky - all the issues are real. But frankly I’m not that fussed, and would rather not review it at all; I just won’t go there again.
Obviously Jen is entitled to leave any review she likes, but I don’t see why I should be expected to do the same. And given that the problems were real, I don’t think it’s Matt’s review that’s going to be their big issue going forward.