I wasn’t going to mention in too much detail about our birthday meal out for Jimmy but felt I absolutely had to because we received such excellent service! We decided we were going to go to the Eastbourne branch of Pizza Express on our journey back to Pontins from Drusilla’s Zoo. It was kind of on the way and when reading about where each one close to us was located it sounded the nicest. It’s in an old art gallery on the high street whereas the next nearest one is in a shopping centre.
We love Pizza Express because the food is easy for children and the kids menu is very good value but I do always think they can be a bit hit and miss. I asked in one recently if they are concessions because we do have such differing times in them but apparently not… I find that although we always have a nice meal, in some the food is just loads better than in others and I always find the staff to be very different between restaurants!
The two in Norwich, for example, I try to avoid like the plague! When I visited one recently I had to walk out the manager was so rude to me and we went to the other one instead where although they weren’t rude they just weren’t really on the ball. The one we visit most often is in South Woodford and I always find the food and staff there are lovely. Central London ones have been good and not so much in equal measure though so I really didn’t know if Eastbourne would be on the better or worse side but when I rang up to book it gave me an indication.
I spoke to a guy called Steve who advised me that for the time we wanted it was very unlikely that we would need to book. This was good because I only knew roughly what time we’d be ready. I mentioned we were coming from Drusilla’s, didn’t know the area and could he advise where to park. He was SO helpful. Firstly he told me which route to take from the zoo and gave me an idea of traffic and times and then he said if I rang him back in five minutes he would pop out and find the name of the roads that were permit free meaning we could park! How lovely is that? I called back, wrote down the road name and was disappointed to find that he would be off the next day when we visited.
When we walked through the door however, a chap immediately said ‘have you been to Drusilla’s?’ and knew exactly who we were. It turned out that Steve had worked in the end anyway and weren’t we lucky because he did everything he could to make our trip lovely. When I asked for a pizza that was no longer on the menu he and the chefs did their level best to say how they could re-create it with the ingredients they had and in every way, he was helpful! They obviously cared about the service and the food and I’m not sure this is always the case in places. We were brought everything we asked for including boxes to take the children’s left over meals home in, he put our candle on Jimmy’s cake and even sang happy birthday with us. Without even asking and as soon as we sat down the children had menus and crayons and hats – lovely attention!
The food was the best we’ve ever had in a Pizza Express and our meal there was fabulous! I’m so pleased we chose to go there for Jimmy’s birthday. I am the sort of person who ALWAYS complains if something is wrong so by the same token I MUST say when something is right and it absolutely was here – well done Pizza Express, Eastbourne and thank you to Steve and the rest of the staff who were all just as pleasant and helpful! If only we lived closer and we’d be back more often – Norwich, you need to up your game considerably!
I was not asked to write this or paid to do so in any way. It really was worth writing about as it made our birthday trip so much more enjoyable and this is why I have chosen to post this.
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