Is Olive Garden Becoming the Disney of Restaurants?

I've been meaning to write up this post for weeks now. Our favorite family restaurant is Olive Garden. Not only is the food great, I can honestly say I've never received bad service in any Olive Garden we've visited--ever!

The last time we visited our local Olive Garden, it was just the hubby and me. This rarely happens, but it was school vacation week and the girls were sleeping over at their grandparents' house. It was after normal dinner hours--probably close to 7:30 PM by the time we arrived, but the place was still fairly busy. The hostess greeted us within moments of our arrival, took our name, and gave us a pager.

We probably waited about 5 minutes, and a gentleman, who appeared to be the manager on staff, apologized for our wait as the hostess guided us to our table. Our waiter, I think his name was Owen, arrived moments later.

We had a wonderful time. Owen took our drink order first. When he returned with our drinks he took our meal order. If I remember correctly, I had the Mixed Grill, which is, "skewers of grilled marinated steak and chicken with a rosemary demi-glace, served with grilled vegetables and Tuscan potatoes." The hubby had the Venetian Apricot Chicken. This dish featured, "grilled chicken breasts in an apricot citrus sauce" and served with broccoli, asparagus and diced tomatoes. We rounded our entrees out with a house salad and breadsticks.

The food, as always, was absolutely amazing. It arrived in record time, and Owen checked on us from time to time to see if we needed anything. We decided to forgo dessert, but after we paid the bill and several members of the staff wished us goodnight, I got to wondering if Olive Garden was quickly becoming the Disney of restaurants.


The training program at Disney is unmatched, from my understanding. One of my college classmates gave a presentation for our public speaking course on their training program, which she had attended when she worked there.
 
If you've ever been to Disney, you'll know just what I mean. They have been trained to excel at customer service; to anticipate your needs before you even realize you need anything; to fix any problem that could possibly arise--and do it all with a smile.
 
That's how I felt that evening as we strolled out of Olive Garden, my belly full of great food after a relaxing and enjoyable dinner out with my better half. I don't know anything about their training program, but I know we'll keep going back to visit as long as they keep up the great work.
 
 
Blogger's note: These are my honest opinions. I was not compensated in any way for sharing these thoughts.