on previous visits to loftus, i have always enjoyed stopping in at trademarx for a beer or two before the game (and avoiding the traffic) so naturally, after buying tickets to yet another game at loftus this year, they came to mind for the sa vs australia game on the 1st october. i then emailed through a booking request for a 12pm lunch at this restaurant and some pre-game beers.
sadly, though on this occasion, in all my dealings with adri-mari harrington, not only have i found her to be unhelpful but also quite arrogant and rude. today, after yet another follow-up call to her regarding my email trying to make a lunch booking (both telephonically and by email), she then informed me that due to the popularity of their establishment on the 1st october, we now need to pay r250 per person just to book a table there on game day! this kind of fee i can understand if we wanted to block up a table and just have drinks, but i think it is complete daylight robbery when we are a table of six wanting to eat lunch.
oh and the kicker - she then told me that parking tickets to park outside will only set all of us back another r200 each.
- r1500 before our table has even ordered our lunch or we have covered our parking..
- just add another r1200 for the six of us driving from johannesburg and wherever else we live if we would like to park outside the restaurant.
clearly, spending our hard-earned money to eat lunch at their restaurant is not good enough!
*recommendation: aint nobody got time for that kind of arrogance and customer-service with a restaurant who are clearly preoccupied with milking their location rather than gaining a loyal customer base. we will all be eating elsewhere where our money (and the attitude to service) is at pretoria's wonderful standards that i have come to know and love.