Rhode Island Coffee is a small coffee chain, with a few stores around Greater Manchester, including this one in Oldham. After 2 pleasant experiences here, I thought the third time would be a charm, and just add to my great experiences here, but I was wrong.
The store was quite busy on my visit, probably with people sheltering from the drizzle, and wanting to grab a hot cup of coffee in the meantime.
I ordered a Ham and Cheese toastie Gluten free, with a Vanilla Latte and little did I expect what was to come.
The service was pretty slow in getting my order, and when my coffee eventually arrived, I found her to had made the drink wrong, I asked for a medium vanilla latte and she brought me an iced one, I find this to be stupid really, I didn't ask for an iced coffee, when I say latte (and I'm sure everyone else does) they mean a hot coffee, unless requested otherwise. The "barista" talked about making this mistake numerous times, in the reverse order earlier today. I feel that she is just wasting products here, and to be honest it is unfair on the chain, and the customer having to wait longer for their drink, as well as costing the company in the wrong run, it also costs them customers, like it may well have with me.
My coffee was eventually served, and you could see where they tried to start latte art, and it looked like it failed towards the end. My latte was not stirred, hence I had to stir it in, which for a vanilla latte is ridiculous, as they should stir in the vanilla.
After the incident with my coffee, I thought that they wouldn't mess anything else up, but once I again I was wrong... I ordered a ham and cheese gluten free toastie, and my server (someone else) made sure what I wanted on it, and I told her "ham and cheese", so it makes the mistake of bringing me, just ham even worse. The toastie did take quite a while to come, hence I was expecting everything to be right, however I was shocked when they had forgotten the cheese, as ham solo on a toastie isn't a popular option anyway, never mind considering I told my server a good 2-3 times that I wanted "ham AND cheese"
By the time my toastie had came back, everyone else in my party had finished their food, and I found the presentation to be a little sloppy, with the cheese overloaded, stuck to the bread and coming off the sandwich.
I do like the idea of a coffee shop offering gluten free food, other than a wrap but based on this experience, it doesn't seem like they can handle doing it when they are reasonably busy, hence struggling to take the full order, and complete it to a good speed.
The pricing here is quite expensive too, and reminds me more of a Starbucks/ Caffe Nero, rather than a chain of independent coffee shops.
I am even struggling to give 2 stars to Rhode Island, and after my praise of this store and great experiences in the past few weeks, it is quite upsetting to see a change like this (especially in such a short period) and the only reason, I feel saving them from a 1 star ranking, is my past experiences here. I will be calling back soon to claim my free coffee for "buying 9 drinks", so hopefully an updated and better review will follow. read more