Free Food and Drink

Ever since I got my snazzy new Fisher business cards, I’ve made a habit of leaving them in the “fishbowl” that frequently resides near the register at diners, eateries, watering-holes and restaurants. My persistence finally paid off: I had a pretty lucky weekend. Today, a couple of my starving MBA friends (including fellow Fisher Grad Life blogger Robin Jenkins) and I enjoyed a meal on the house at Noodles & Company. Also, taking a note from my Johnny-Appleseed-esque business card distribution scheme, Emma won a happy-hour (free drinks for her, and discounted drinks for her friends) at McFadden’s Restaurant and Saloon in the South Campus Gateway. These two freebees were of differing value.

If you’ve never been to Noodles & Company you are missing out on some good and reasonably priced food—I recommend the Whole Grain Tuscan Linguini with Parmesan Chicken which you get in a few minutes for 7 bucks. The freebee, which they called a “tasting,” consisted of a family style meal for six. As a group, we picked a dish from each of the noodle menus (Asian, Mediterranean and American) and they though in a few salads, desserts and drinks. Although, their Pad Thai is far from the best I’ve ever had, it was a pretty low key and fun way to cap off the weekend.

The McFadden’s experience left a bit more to be desired. To their credit these complementary “happy hours” seem to be a pretty effective way of getting people in the door. As far as I can tell, they had 10-12 people on Saturday night that were hosting a happy hour for their social circle. The strategy probably does a reasonable job of compensating for the abysmal customer experience. When we arrived, we got a table by the window. At about 10:30, a McFadden’s employee came by to ask to us to get up so that they could “clear out” the table and chairs. In fact, by that time every table was taken and they asked everyone to get up. I’m not an expert in the restaurant business, but I would think that you would start removing tables like at 6:00 PM as the dinner crowd left—not at 10:30 when the restaurant if full. Besides that, the incredibly understaffed bar (3 bartenders to 150 bar goers) and the Howard-Stern-brand-of-inappropriate DJ, everything else was awesome.

Reposted from Fisher Grad Life blog.

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