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Hi Everyone! Angela Caskey from the Banana Bean Cafe. We are pleased to announce the purchase of Tavern on the Lawn. We have looked at several locations around town and couldn’t have found one more perfect for us. Through the hard work and effort of Tavern on the Lawn, Jill McDonald has transformed this location into a beautiful destination. This expansion gives us the opportunity to create a new menu and atmosphere that has been stifled due to lack of space and not having a liquor license. Additional information will be posted at a later date. Thanks to the Columbus Undergound community for you support, your suggestions, and being honest when we have fallen short of your expectations. We look forward to this next challenge and growing with Columbus.
Thanks!
Angela Caskey, VP Manager
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when is a good time to call for saturday reservations?
Hi Elaine, and thanks for keeping us all in the loop.
How long do y’all figure it’ll take to complete this expansion?
You could move to German Village or one of the other many urban walkable neighborhoods in Columbus. It’s not Brooklyn, but it’s more like Brooklyn than Powell. I live in GV and walk to brunch all the time.
You could move to German Village or one of the other many urban walkable neighborhoods in Columbus. It’s not Brooklyn, but it’s more like Brooklyn than Powell. I live in GV and walk to brunch all the time.
I walk almost everywhere in GV, and in fact did 6 months without starting a car once last year. Of course, I work at home, so that helped, but grocery is walking, several drinking/eating establishment is walking, the park is walking, even things like a post office and library.
One of my friends in GV is a woman who’s probably in her late 60′s? who is originally from Greenwich Village, and moved out of U.A. when she became an empty nester to one of the houses on the park by the pond (so BIG money)…and you can see her walking across Schiller with a couple Giant Eagle bags a couple times a week because she loves feeling like she lives downtown again.
You could move to German Village or one of the other many urban walkable neighborhoods in Columbus. It’s not Brooklyn, but it’s more like Brooklyn than Powell. I live in GV and walk to brunch all the time.
I walk almost everywhere in GV, and in fact did 6 months without starting a car once last year. Of course, I work at home, so that helped, but grocery is walking, several drinking/eating establishment is walking, the park is walking, even things like a post office and library.
One of my friends in GV is a woman who’s probably in her late 60′s? who is originally from Greenwich Village, and moved out of U.A. when she became an empty nester to one of the houses on the park by the pond (so BIG money)…and you can see her walking across Schiller with a couple Giant Eagle bags a couple times a week because she loves feeling like she lives downtown again.
I really, really miss living in GV. Walking to the Easy Street, the grocery, the park. Man…
Hi Elaine, and thanks for keeping us all in the loop.
How long do y’all figure it’ll take to complete this expansion?
Hello Bear!
Have noticed you are a great customer at the Banana Bean and we appreciate your support! We are starting the work this coming Monday. With a few code inspections in place we should move along quit quickly. We will be posting opening dates and all the details that the Banana Bean will be offering along with our Keys Bar. I am excited for our customers they have been asking for something like this for a long time and now we can give them what they have been wanting….. the whole thing is just FUN!!!!!! We never set out to be anything other then a laid back Key West Feel with unique and different food, you should be able to enjoy good food either in a tie or flip-flops We look forward to seeing you there.
Congrats to all at Banana Bean! My sister and I have been coming in since you first opened and it was certainly bittersweet when we couldn’t get a table for brunch. We can’t wait to try the new location!
I’m certainly hoping that opening a second location will help the attitude we’ve gotten the last couple of times we went there to get takeout.
If you want to keep your customers, don’t refuse to take their order when they call and tell them to call back later. And when they do call back later, tell them to give you another 15 minutes before you’ll even take the order. Especially when said person says “it doesn’t matter if the order isn’t ready for an hour, we’d just like to *place* the order. And when we do get there, on time for when you say to pick it up, keep a person waiting for another 15 minutes because you haven’t even begun prepping their order – all this on an $50+ order for two people (for two entrees and one dessert). And on top of that, the food was not very good that night.
I used to love Banana Bean, but I think they’ve let their success go to their heads and the service and the food have both suffered. I haven’t been back since. Hopefully opening a second location and taking some of the pressure off the first will change that.
We acknowledge that as a small business there have been occasions where we simply did not execute the service standards that we measure ourselves by. We absolutely at times have given priorty to our dine-in guests as our seating at our Whittier Street location is very limited and it is often very difficult to obtain a reservation; therefore to maximize their dining experience we have declined to accept call-in orders for carry-out. In addition, many of our menu selections simply do not travel well and are dramatically affected in quality when taken off-premise, and we try to advise our guests as such. We certainally are most apologetic for these few occurances. Moving forward, at our new, larger location carry-out orders will only be accepted during specific dayparts and for specific menu items to recitify these potential service issues.
Hi there! Why be jealous? Join the darkside.
I really appreciate BB’s diplomatic response to your myriad complaints, but I wonder. When you telephoned for carryout and learned they were too busy to accommodate, why continue to call? This approach seems designed for failure.
Yeah, I always try to give really small and tight spaces a little leeway. I’ve worked in some small kitchens but Banana Bean’s is about the smallest. Also, if they are too busy to accommodate another table, then they are probably too busy to make a to go order.
The first time I went there, a few years ago, I got something to go and I could tell hit had suffered from travel, so I never wrote about it because the chef I was working for told me it was really really good. sometimes you just have to consider the circumstances. It happens in even the best restaurants.
All of that to say, I am super excited for the new location and only wish it were closer to Hudsonville.
It was actually pretty much empty when we got there (just one couple in the restaurant, and one four-top on the patio), but that’s beside the point. My issues was with the nasty attitude that we got over the phone – if you’re not willing to do takeout, just say so, instead of making people jump through hoops and call back multiple times and then act like you could care less about their business when they get there. It definitely could have been handled a lot better. After all, I’m paying just as much for my menu selections as someone who eats in, and should be treated with just a little more respect.
As I said, the concept of your restaurant is excellent, it definitely fills a niche that’s needed in Columbus and when it’s spot on, it’s great – but your success has made the restaurant suffer in a few other ways – food not as good as it used to be, and the stress of dealing with a demand that stomps on supply definitely shows. As I said, I think expanding by adding a second location will help take some of the pressure off of the Whittier St. location, and will hopefully improve things for you there.
I really appreciate BB’s diplomatic response to your myriad complaints, but I wonder. When you telephoned for carryout and learned they were too busy to accommodate, why continue to call? This approach seems designed for failure.
And we would understand if they had a “no takeout” policy – but to refuse to take an order for over an hour in the future? And then tell us to call back at a certain time, then put us off again? Forgive us for wanting their food. I think it’s sad that when a restaurant falls short on customer service, you’re blaming the customer. So I made the mistake of wanting to eat there, I guess? BTW, reservations were available for that night – we just didn’t want to spend 1+ hours eating in. Happens from time to time.
I wish them nothing but success, but just wanted them to know that they managed to alienate a few loyal customers while climbing that ladder to get there. Hopefully they’ll be able to get something positive from the criticism, which is the way in which it was intended.
The first time I went there, a few years ago, I got something to go and I could tell hit had suffered from travel, so I never wrote about it because the chef I was working for told me it was really really good. sometimes you just have to consider the circumstances. It happens in even the best restaurants.
All of that to say, I am super excited for the new location and only wish it were closer to Hudsonville.
The point is, they weren’t too busy to accommodate another table – there were reservations available that night. And I just wanted to be able to *place* the order (we were up in the Polaris area when we called – we tried to explain that we didn’t need it for more than an hour, we just wanted to get the order in, but were pretty much snapped at pretty rudely). The food hadn’t suffered from travel – the flavors (at the base level) were way off that night. I would have completely understood and ordered from elsewhere if they had just been polite about it. As it stands, I felt like they wasted my time and cell phone minutes asking me to call back over and over and then still not even thinking about prepping my order until I got there. Being busy is no excuse for rudeness. You’ve been in food service for years, how have the restaurants you’ve worked at handled take out orders when you’re busy? I’m sure getting an attitude with the customer wasn’t SOP.
That being said, I’m hoping for nothing but the best for the new location. I just know that I probably won’t be returning to the original (or recommending it to anyone), which saddens me because it used to be in my top 10 for Columbus.
This is outrageous. You’ve now made four long posts trashing a well-liked local small business. If you have a bone to pick over one bad experience, take it up in private with the proprieters.
This is outrageous. You’ve now made four long posts trashing a well-liked local small business. If you have a bone to pick over one bad experience, take it up in private with the proprieters.
Trashing? No, not at all. Just writing about my particular experience – which got three distinct replies, which I then replied to to explain my original position further.
Writing reviews is something I do. I’ve written a positive review about Banana Bean in the past. However, when things change my impression of the place to the point where my experiences are more negative than positive, I owe a responsibility to the people who go there based on my original review to let them know that – hey, things aren’t as great as they used to be. It is my hope that the proprietors of Banana Bean will use this information in the way in which it was intended – to identify a shortcoming and use this information to improve. Trust me, my comments noting my concerns won’t make or break the place – I don’t, and never will, hold that much clout.
Unfortunately, part of being a restaurant reviewer is that I lay it all out on the table in a public arena, good or bad.
I don’t see it as trashing either. I can understand what SK wrote and understand why she would feel the way she did. I’ve had very similare experiences at other restaurants/bars where they make you feel unworthy/lucky to have them serve you. Trashing, no. Essentially as i read her experience I read it as:
“Call ahead and get reservations so you can go out and eat at this restaurant. I don’t recommend getting takeout from here, it can be a hassle to get and it does not travel well at all.”
which is all totally understandable given the response from the restaurant.
“Call ahead and get reservations so you can go out and eat at this restaurant. I don’t recommend getting takeout from here, it can be a hassle to get and it does not travel well at all.”
which is all totally understandable given the response from the restaurant.
Actually, it’s more like “Some of the things that made the place great have fallen by the wayside as they’ve experienced the stress of growth – hopefully the expansion will alleviate the pressure of trying to deliver consistently good food with consistently good service to more people than the location and staff can support.”
The second location is a good thing, as far as I’m concerned. I’m hoping that it will allow *both* locations to thrive and prosper and get back to the roots of what made them great. Having said that, given my past couple of experiences with takeout, I would advise them to either bypass doing takeout entirely, or having an extremely limited (maybe sandwiches only?) takeout menu that they can execute fairly easily during prime dining hours and then have at least one staff member to handle takeout business if it turns out to be something that’s brisk.
This is outrageous. You’ve now made four long posts trashing a well-liked local small business. If you have a bone to pick over one bad experience, take it up in private with the proprieters.
If only positive opinions are to be aired here, perhaps the site should be renamed shinyhappycolumbus.com?
For what it’s worth, I’ve always had terrific food and very friendly service at Banana Bean. But I hate getting take-out, so I always dine in. Just my two cents.