Vintage Inns pubs Avis 

I am giving this revue on behalf of my dear friend who has been trying to get a response from this company since December last year. She booked Christmas Day Lunch for herself and husband at a cost of £80 each and was so disappointed with the food which was in no way up to the standard of their Sunday Lunches. The food was over cooked and badly presented on the smallest of plates. She emailed the Vintage Arms twice to lodge her complaint and also the CEO of the Company and also wrote a letter to the Tame Otter. All of these have been totally ignored she did not even receive an acknowledgment. She had booked the table for 12 so all the food would be fresh unfortunately this wasn't the case. The whole experience ruined their Christmas Day and she would hate to think of others booking for 2024 and be subjected to inferior food. Gave one star because were very customer friendly.

Didn't start too well. Waitress didn't seem keen to seat us in the restaurant as we hadn't booked, even though there were lots of empty tables. Food was quite good, but very annoying bit was the website says to just download the app for a £20 discount on £40 spend on first meal. Why wouldn't you? Did exactly as it said, downloaded app and got code for £20 off but when we came to pay and showed the code, we were told you have to wait 24 hrs after downloading the app before you can use the code. Apparently it is in the T&Cs. Very misleading, no mention of waiting 24 hrs, implies you can just download the app and use the discount straight away. Be warned, felt conned. Won't be going back.

Went to the Fitzwilliam Arms, Peterborough today for my birthday lunch. What a lovely pub. Food was great & we didn’t have to wait long even though they were very busy. We were served by Graham. Thank you will be back

Date of 19th March 2024

Visited the Fitzwilliam Arms, Peterborough today for lunch. What a lovely pub. Very clean & tidy. Food was great & didn’t have to wait long even though they were very busy. We were served by Lynda. What a credit to the pub! She was very polite & friendly. Thank you

Fowlers Farm- Braintree Essex
Had a family get together with my brother and sisters etc 6 of us in total, plus Ted, my brothers dog.
Spent around £225, however for our first course there was a hair in my button mushrooms. At first I thought it was a bit of the melted cheese stringing along from one mushroom to the other but no, as I pulled it, it got longer and longer until it was about 3 inches long. I didn’t make a huge fuss about it and although the waitress did apologise and get me a fresh starter, I said these things happen. My brothers starter didn’t arrive and we had to ask where it was, so by the time it arrived we had all finished. And the 2 soups we had were luke warm. So not a great start. The rest of the meal went ok but the final bill made no reflection of the poor service/standard we had at the beginning of our meal not to mention the lack of a free drink, as part of the app, that wasn’t allowed as their machine had broken and couldn’t read the QR code! Yes maybe we could have made a fuss about the hair etc and got them to give a discount but I’m not one for causing a scene, but was just very disappointed with the lack of acknowledgment whatsoever! Maybe it’s normal to have a 3 inch hair in your food?

The pub
The food
The staff

Amazing

Best food I’ve eaten in a very long time
Worth the 90 mile trip to have it

The Cuckoo, 20 Oundle Road, Peterborough.

Annoying Service Charge of £36.20! Food was expensive enough! Do you not pay your staff the minimum/Living wage by Law?? - Nobody in my family get tips in their employment, what makes restaurants so special??

'IF' I want to tip, and I sometimes do, I'll pay the staff concerned cash from my pocket, I do not like service charges' cheekily added to my bill, especially this amount!

Food was good as I should Jolly well expect for the price, but this service charge was too much, I'm NOT a rich man.

Yes, I emailed the restaurant afterwards to refund this, but after a weak apology and promise of refund, I heard no more.

Had lunch here for my Sisters birthday with 10 other family members.
We had a friendly welcome and excellent service from our waiter Joshua.
All the food was excellent and were allowed to serve our own birthday cake.
I hope my thanks and gratitude can be passed on to the staff there.

Myself and 16 former work colleagues met at "The Crown" public house in Broxbourne last week for a lunch time meal together. To assist with the catering we pre-ordered our individual menu choices as requested. Consequently, our delicious meals were served simultaneously. The service was truly excellent as was the food, and the friendly welcoming staff. One member of staff (front of house) was Kirsty T. who bent over backwards to make sure that we all enjoyed our visit. Excellent customer care skills and nothing was too much trouble for her. We look forward to our next visit there in due course

The main restaurant was booked up so I booked in the dog friendly area - it was so pleasantly decorated, I thought perhaps we would have to wait for our food a bit longer but we didnt!! the food was absolutley delicious!! there were 5 of us in all - 2 of which have special needs and they wasnt made to feel 'different' which some places do! every thing came quickly and fresh - we have a vintage inn in our village they are good but this was great - we will be back, next time we come to visit the area - I cant wait - highly recommend the trio roast dinner!! Thank you for making our get to gether special

After a very distressing and disastrous Christmas Day meal, I decided to give The Kestrel, Harrogate one last chance……and I have to say….Brilliant food…Brilliant service!! Mathew gave us 5*service with a smile. My friends loved it too.

Jess an absolute asset to the team we love you love Lorraine and rob Tomlinson swanhome Lincoln pub your amazing Jess

Absolutely wonderful evening meal for our Sons birthday. Even the dog enjoyed it!
The staff were so friendly and attentive and the service was prompt even though the restaurant was completely full.
The food was presented beautifully and so tasty and fresh!
Faultless thank you

Had Sunday dinner and some drinks it was lovely Nick and the staff were very polite and food was lovely. I will be recommending to friends.

Great friendly atmosphere and great service.

The Badger, Ponteland, Newcastle.
We travel over 100 miles to take our son to the airport. The food gets better everytime. As a family we had the Sea Bass, Duck Confit and Venison Steak and the Sticky Toffee Pudding for desert. Delicious. The staff are always friendly and welcoming. The Badger is an ideal place to eat very close to the airport.

Claire, Suz and Kelly looked after us so well at the Sovereign in Shepley. Had a great welcome, super service and delicious food. Looking forward to going back already. Thanks.

Happy New Year! We've been coming to The Lion for close on thirty years now, and can honestly say the food and atmosphere have never been better. All the staff are friendly and welcoming; our server was top notch, not hovering but always right there when we needed something - service with a smile; she gave us time when we needed it, but never left us hanging around waiting. Very friendly, the kind of welcome and attention you hope to receive, but are not always lucky enough to do so.
The food was fantastic, and reasonably priced - if we hadn't had the drive back to London ahead of us, it would have been very easy to curl up by the fire and make a night of it.
A great way to start the New Year, and we'll definitely see you all soon.

My partner and I went to the Rose & Crown Vintage Inn in Sevenoaks on Dec 28, after our walk with the dog. We looked it up online and the food looked fabulous. It was very busy in there, but they found us a table which was great.

I opted for the roast turkey roast dinner, and my partner had the pie. We had a starter to share, as my meal was a deal with the main - £33 for the two. The starter was unbelievably bland, and somehow quite without flavour, which for usually tasty foods such as prawns and scallop, was quite a feat of gastronomical failure! Impressive!

Then the mains arrived, and they were very average - especially my meal. The meat was tasteless, and the roast potatoes looked like they had been in the oven since Autumn; most of them has withered away inside, and one of them had nothing inside it at all, only air. It was just a sad, empty shell that once had the promise of flavour and comfort to which all roast potatoes aspire. I left it on my plate to show to waiter when he came to clear the plates - he agreed that it was not great and apologised.

To add insult to injury, the (male) waiter who was dealing with us, would barely look at me and would direct his answers to MY questions at my boyfriend instead! Then at the end of the meal he came with the bill which he had taken off the price of my boyfriend’s pint off as a sorry for MY meal being rubbish. Lol *eye roll*.

It would have been funny if it weren’t so horribly cringey in these times. I paid for the meal (with my own money - wow! How modern!), and he then shook my boyfriend’s hand and apologised again. To him, not to me. It was honestly just so ridiculous and insulting I could hardly believe it.

However, I now know my place! Thank goodness. It was stupid of me to think that I could expect respect in British rurality, and I shan't be so foolish as to try anything so daring as to pay for a meal, or to ask a question without the answer going through my male superior first. Phew! My feeble female mind can rest easy now.

Some advice for Vintage Inn - perhaps some training for your staff in how to not be outdated patronising misogynistic cliches? Just a suggestion.

Oh, and sort out the roast potatoes. They deserve better too.

Will not be going here again. Soz.

I would like to update you regarding my previous posting and the generic reply received from a Vintage Inn ‘BOT’ it would seem.

This review was relating to the regulars of 35+ plus years being barred from the Peacock Public House, Crewe Road, Willaston, Nantwich. To be barred for merely vocalising their discontent with the bar being closed on a whim, by acting management, well before the advertised closing times, on numerous occasions, when the Manager Claire has not been on the premises.

As anticipated, we never received the promised call, from the Regional Manager, when we complained to Vintage Inns head office. We were told this was the procedure and all we got was a ‘generic’ email from Nick Colyer (RBM).

We did however get a scripted formatted email confirming we were all barred. To highlight and give credence towards our frustrations, we have friends who, unaware of our banning, have booked to stay on New Years Eve at the Premier Inn which is on the same site as the Peacock. They believed the closing time would be 11.00pm (as advertised on the website) only to find out when they phoned the pub, and spoke to the assistant manager, they were told the bar would be closing at 9.45pm. Then, to add insult to injury, they were advised their 8.00pm booking for a meal would have to be changed to 7.00pm. I understand from other people in the area that the festive spirit was also ruined on Christmas Eve when again the pub was closed earlier than the time advertised.

To give further credence to our experiences it seems that when reading the reviews posted from various people’s experiences, dining at the Peacock on Christmas Day, nothing has changed at all even though the ‘fake’ reviews, claiming Ryan is the saviour, has done nothing to help the business. When reading real, first-hand reviews, from other clientele, over the last 7 days, it seems the new Team Peacock are worse than ever.

We have advised our friends from afar, as well as business colleagues, who stay in the Premier Inn to go and eat/drink elsewhere. We will also be giving the same recommendation going forwards with the many people we know in the area.

Going back to the comment made by the present manager regarding not wanting our money, it would appear, based on the figures of the holding company, ‘Mitchells and Butlers’, that to have made a 2022 profit of only £8 million from a revenue of £2,208 million then they could do with locals and regular customers in many of their eateries. With the money spent over the bar by the people barred, plus further monies from visiting friends and business colleagues, I would suggest the best part tens of thousands is spent annually. Multiply that by the 1,700+ pubs and restaurants under their differing subsidiaries then you are looking at tens of millions. If I had a manager that said he did not want £20,000 being put in his till annually, especially with the hospitality sector struggling since covid, I would have him / her consider their position.

Our experience at The Curlew in West Parley, Dorset has been amazing. Sarah and her Team are highly trained, attentive and extremely polite. This is not the same experience we have had in other Vintage Inns unfortunately. We regularly visit The Curlew and are treated by Sarah’s team as locals which makes us feel very special, they even remember our names and drinks despite not visiting every month. Our local Heanton Court Vintage Inn in Braunton, North Devon is not the same, it doesn’t make you feel welcome and staff are certainly not up to those at The Curlew, and a recent trip to The Swan in Horning was a similar experience to that of Heanton Court. Certainly a 5+ for The Curlew and a very basic 1 for Heanton Court and The Swan.