Wood Fire Grills and Lobster Tank Diving

It was against my will.

Just the thought of it made me weak in the stomach.

Images of evil robots and flying lobsters haunted me.

My wife told me I would sleep on the couch if I went through with it.

On Tuesday, my friend Christine some how convinced me that I needed to give Red Lobster another chance. I was on my way to Orlando on Wednesday afternoon and she persuaded me to give it one more try with two compelling reasons:

1. She was buying.
2. This Red Lobster had new wood fire grilled steak.

I know what many of you are thinking. How dare I. Had I completely lost my mind? Yet some place deep inside me an ounce of curiosity still remained. If everyone's experience was as horrifying as my last one, how is Red Lobster still in business?

We arrived at the lobster in Orlando for dinner. Unlike my last visit, it was significantly less crowded. Non crowded restaurants result in one of two things: 1. Better Service because you get attention or 2. Worse service because the servers are bored and mentally checked out.

We sit down and I begin scanning nervously around. How would I be verbally attacked this time?

Our robot errr server greets us with Cheddar Biscuits. I immediately turn and look around.....have I been set up? What the heck is the server doing bringing me the infamous Cheddar Biscuits without me even asking!?!?!? Like true champs, we woof them down in a matter of moments.

I ask for an iced tea and we order an appetizer. In true drinking fashion I pull the ultimate server test and suck my tea down as fast as possible. Good service can be judged on one thing and one thing alone: a full drink. If it's empty or half empty you're not getting good service.

Our server, right on que promptly fills my glass back up again. Test passed.

The struggle began when we tried to order dinner. First, let me begin by saying that he was not nearly as horrifyingly rude as our robot last time. BUT. He did challenge us on our ordering methods.

I opted for broccoli instead of rice with my wood fired grilled sirloin and grilled shrimp. Christine, a poor youthful hotel worker simply wanted a baked potato instead of mashed potatoes. The good robot pushed back. Saying, "If you get a baked potato instead of mash they are just going to put the lobster and shrimp on top of the baked potato like they're supposed to with the mash."

Why. Has Red Lobster sucked the innovative juice out of every employee who works there. Do the cooks not know how to move there hand 2 inches to the right to put the topping NEXT to the potato instead of on top!?

Christine, thinking wisely simply declined the baked potato and stuck with the mash to avoid confusion and heart ache in the back.

We have enlightening dinner chit chat awaiting our food. Then, finally it arrives.

My wood fire grill steak looks like it was cooked over the wood fire grill, well kind of. In my mind I imagined a deep, passionate woody taste to the steak. Full flavored, and memorable. What I received was far below my expectations.......just plain steak. No flavor, it just happened to be cooked over a wood fire grill. Their new sensational grill appears for all intensive purposes to be a marketing strategy to drive fat white Americans like me to try their new cooking technique. They get one point for a good idea and no points for good food taste.

I do not need to go in to great detail here as you know how I feel about Red Lobster food: it's bland. Nothing anyone ever tells me will make me feel otherwise. Speaking of lobsters and bland food.........I have neglected to mention that we witnessed a murder while eating dinner.

I have always noticed the lobster tank at the front of Red Lobster. I will be the first to admit I have been rather naive in thinking that they didn't actually use those lobsters for cooking...I was dead wrong. As we were eating our meal I watched in horror as a cook came walking out of the back, went up to the tank, fished for a lobster and then carried to the kitchen. It may seem silly, however for a $20 a plate dinner restaurant it still seems barbaric in a way. Lobster tank diving in the middle of a restaurant!!?!? That makes me want to eat a lobster!

I choke down my food, however our good robot kept my drink full the entire time. Upon preparing to give us the check he gave us a hand held machine. We swiped our own credit card, then he instructed us to enter our tip and leave it on the table when we were done......interesting concept. The question here is: Am I relieved that I'm doing it myself so I'm in control or am I getting poor service because the servers now don't have to take my payment?

You may have noticed there were significant differences here from my last visit. Was it outstanding? Definitely not. My experience was exactly what I expect from a national chain that is charging me top dollar for eating in their restaurant. Was it outstanding compared to my last visit? Absolutely. In both situations, the server made or killed the overall experience and impression we had. The food wasn't any better or any worse from one visit to the other. Service is more important than food!

However there is a bigger lesson to be learned here.

Lesson: Consistency is King.

In order to keep us coming back restaurants must be consistent. Chances are, if Christine wasn't paying for the dinner I wouldn't have ever come within 15 feet of a Red Lobster again.

Sad news for Red Lobster is that even after this normal experience, I'm still not coming back because I will never forget what happened the first time I was there. Experience must be bridged by consistency in order to drive repeat business.

The foundation of consistency is built by a remarkable first experience. As consumers we judge everything based on our first contact with the business - then we expect the 2nd, 3rd and 4th visit to be identical or better than our first one.

Remember your first visit to Starbucks? Chances are, it was amazing. You went back. Then after awhile the experience started to become watered down. It was no longer meeting or beating your expectations. You, like many people probably stopped going.

The same goes for Red Lobster. The ironic part is that they clearly have worked very hard at streamlining their service style to make everyone the same. By doing that they sucked the heart out of every employee there. Corporately trained uniform service styles poorly executed on the front lines is a recipe for disaster.

If you want customers - be consistent in everything you do. OH and don't have your chefs come out from the back and publicly dive for lobster to cook up in the kitchen.