Texadelphia Responds
Yesterday I wrote about how some Bricktown restaurants and bars seemed to be playing into the stereotype of Oklahoma City as a town that shuts down at 10 p.m. The following is a response from the owner of Texadelphia:
My name is Manny Leclercq and I am one of the owners of the Texadelphia in Bricktown. I want to first apologize to Steve and the customers who had this experience in our restaurant. It is our policy to keep our doors open to customers past the normal closing time when there are special events that might dictate that, and this should have been one of those events. We are fervent supporters of the Oklahoma City Thunder and have been as excited about the current state of our team and our playoff run, as most of you all are. We are even a proud advertising partner with the OKC Thunder through the Bricktown Association. In the past, we have hosted official Budweiser Thunderstruck Event watch parties, which we promoted through social media, and although this Tuesday’s game was not promoted as one of these events, we should have remained open.
Unfortunately, a critically poor decision was made by someone on our management team in closing down before the end of the game, and we have already address the situation with our team.
As some of you might already know, on many of the evening Thunder home games, we are open 2-3 hours past our normal closing time (as late as 1am at times). With many of the away games, especially during the playoffs, we have remained open past our official closing time when there are customers still enjoying the event. We want to promote the Downtown/Bricktown area as the fun, family-friendly social destination that it is. Texadelphia is uniquely fortunate to have world class sporting events in it’s backyard, and we try to celebrate that with the other Oklahomans who enjoy it as much as we do. Please understand that the poor decision by one of our staff members does not reflect on our true sense of civic pride, and our genuine excitement to actively support our home team and the wants/needs of our customers. We are local owners with strong ties to this city, and we are excited to be doing business here.
I can assure you that this sort of occurrence will never happen again, and we hope you will allow us to prove it at some time in the near future. Our goal is to provide our customers with great food, drinks and customer service, in a fun, social setting, and we fell short in this instance. We are looking forward to watching the Thunder play again this Thursday (and we will be staying open for the duration of the game!)
Sincerely,
Manny Leclercq
Texadelphia Social Grill
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Comments
To prove it they will need to change their name to Okladelphia (City?)….jk.
All seriousness; a great response. I love Texadelphia!
Manny sounds like good peoples. Thanks for addressing this Steve, and thanks Manny for your response.
Go Thunder!
I’ll go one step further … there are much bigger companies in town that could learn a lot from Manny on how to handle a negative story.
I was a cook for years, and I have a feeling that I know exactly how this debacle played out…the manager didn’t have the stones to step up and/or pay overtime, so they took the easy way out, which almost always results in bad things for the customer. Props to Manny for staying on top of his business. Too many restaurant owners think they can just hire someone and step away, but you have to keep after it…that’s why 60% of restaurants close in the first 5 years. Based on this timely and tactful response, I don’t think this will be one of those.
Class, pure class. Steve’s right. Mr. Leclercq’s straight forward approach example is one many in the metro should emulate.
An absolutely beautiful response from Mr. Leclercq. I look forward to compensating them for their hospitality in the very near future!
Wonderful response from Manny. I’ve had the opportunity to work with their management team – and they really are very professional and passionate about being in Bricktown.
I also thought I’d let the readers know – that we reached out to our restaurants/clubs and heard back from several – stating they were open and busy – and plan to be open again for the games. Mickey Mantle’s, Bourbon Street, Melting Pot, Bricktown Brewery, Toby Keith’s, Abuelo’s, Purple Bar and of course Texadelphia- are just a few. Realize that most kitchens close before 10 – but the bars will remian open.
Go Thunder!
Very nice…. look forward to supporting Texadelphia in the future. Great response which illustrates how to turn a negative into a positive.
Good–and wise– response. Let’s see if they follow through.