Updating my experience this evening from 5 star to one as we were attempting to celebrate my…read moremother's birthday.
I have been visiting the 1905 restaurants and their family of brands for over 25 years. I've been to the Columbia so many times that I could probably draw you the layout from memory. That history and loyalty is exactly why yesterday's experience was so disappointing.
Yesterday, we were celebrating my mother's 64th birthday, and I chose Casa Santo Stefano because of the superior service I've received in the past, the excellent quality of the food, and because my company,, typically books Casa Santo Stefano for events and has never given me reason to doubt the brand.
Unfortunately, my experience with my family yesterday was more than disappointing.
Valerio dropped the ball in so many ways at our table. We repeatedly went without water, at times for more than 10 minutes, and I was constantly looking around for him. My mother's Moscow Mule took approximately 20 minutes to arrive. When I jokingly asked if he had gone to Moscow to get it, he told me they "didn't have any cups." That was difficult to believe when the drink was clearly sitting there long enough for the cup to become heavily sweated and the ice to melt.
I also began noticing that Valerio seemed far more attentive to a table of 10 young women who had just arrived. He was taking their photos, laughing with them and engaging with them, while our table was repeatedly forgotten.
The situation with dessert was particularly upsetting because it was my mother's birthday. Valerio asked whether we had seen a dessert menu, and I told him we had not. As I got up to speak with the manager, a kids' ice cream dessert was brought to our table instead. We wanted to look at the dessert menu, order a few things, and have the restaurant sing Happy Birthday to my mother. That simple experience was completely missed, and it was something we had genuinely been looking forward to.
On top of everything, the air conditioning was not functioning properly in the restaurant, which made an already uncomfortable experience even more difficult.
I appreciate the manager Ty, giving my mother a box of cookies and a handwritten card from the staff as we were leaving. Unfortunately, by that point, the damage had already been done. What bothered me most was that Valerio never seemed to appreciate the significance of the occasion, never apologized for the repeated service issues, and ultimately dropped off the check and walked away.
I simply do not understand how this happened, particularly on a day when the restaurant was not even especially busy. I believe Valerio needs additional training and guidance, particularly in the level of hospitality and attentiveness expected from a restaurant carrying the 1905 Family of Restaurants name.
I want to emphasize that I am not writing this because I have turned my back on the brand. Quite the opposite. I am writing because I have been loyal to this brand for more than two decades, I genuinely believe in what the 1905 Family of Restaurants represents, and yesterday's experience fell so far below that standard that I feel compelled to say something.
My mother's 64th birthday only happens once, and unfortunately, instead of leaving with another wonderful 1905 memory, we left disappointed. I sincerely hope this feedback is taken seriously, not simply as a complaint about one server, but as an opportunity to make sure another family celebrating an important occasion does not have the same experience.
