NO
Nolan O'Reilly
Oct 16, 2025
As a Canadian, Panera is a must stop for me whenever I am in the US. The food is always great, and generally so is the service. My most recent time however, they went above and beyond.
Two of us had come in to the restaurant and got a salad for takeout, along with some drinks. When we got back into the car we realized they had forgotten the salad dressing. No big deal, it's fast/semi-fast food and mistakes happen. We then went through the drive thru and mentioned it to them, where we were served by Haley. She was super apologetic for the mistake, and then offered us a free pastry as an apology. I didn't even want to say yes but decided why not, there was a halloween pumpkin cookie that looked great while we were in there. When she came back she had put two cookies in the bag, one for each of us.
Each of these cookies were like $4 each (also 400 calories). So $8 in free stuff all for forgetting some salad dressing. Even with just how apologetic and nice Haley was when giving us the salad dressing is the type of thing that guarantees I will come back, but going above and beyond like this to me shows that she actually cares, and takes pride in running a good restaurant. Im not saying that they will do this every time, and wouldn't even expect it myself, but I have gotten great super friendly service every time I go here, including the woman who initially served us inside as well. Haley was above and beyond, and has the type of attitude that working in customer facing roles requires. If this is the experience they are trying to cultivate for their customers, even Chik-fil-a may need to watch out. Also, the Harvest Medley Salad was crazy good, will definitely order again.