We haven't visited Substation in awhile and on our recent visit, we did not feel welcomed at all. I use to live in this neighborhood, so we visited more than we do now. The place hasn't changed much and it's not hard to find. Just know Substation is in a very busy area, so good luck during lunch time.
As soon as we walked up to the door, there are "enter" only and "exit" only signs which is a good sign they are practicing safe/social distancing measures. It wasn't busy at all. There were 2 people eating in the patio and no one inside but us. They had two workers. When we walked up to check the menu on what we would like, we took a little while since they have a variety of sandwiches on their menu.
While standing there trying to decide what we wanted, we felt rushed. The lady taking our order was extremely rude and not welcoming at all. My first question was, "what happened to your tritip sandwich"? Her response "we have never had a tritip sandwich." I continued with "oh, the one downtown has a triptip sandwich." Her response "we are not affiliated with downtown, we never have been."
Okay so I moved on from that and while I was trying to figure out what I wanted my husband ordered a sandwich for my son, then realized after they have specialty sandwiches and he would probably want that instead. So he asked her to change the order from this to that, which she was fine with. Then he ordered his sandwich and her response "so then you don't want the other one?". He said yes, I'm ordering 3 sandwiches in total. She was not pleasant at all, very pushy and not happy to be there. I ordered the brisket sandwich and you can either get it with sriracha Mayo or bbq sauce and I asked for sriracha Mayo with bbq on the side and to add lettuce and tomato to my sandwich. When we got the sandwich, no bbq sauce on the side. I think she was already annoyed that she didn't care.
I can definitely understand if it was a full house and we were standing there holding up the lines, but we were literally the only people there. Then to top it off, we waited 45 min just to get our sandwiches. After she took our order she moved over to the counter where the other lady was building our sandwiches one by one while the other one that was rude just kept chatting it up. She didn't even help the other girl. Not sure what their protocol is there, but I sure hope she was not the owner and just a random worker, because if that's how business is being ran during these hardships during COVID19 then they must not like business.
With so many different sandwich places in Bakersfield, this one is definitely not on my top 10. There are so many other local sandwich spots that are extremely friendly and happy that you're supporting them during these crazy times. I won't be coming back. The sandwiches were mediocre and the attitude is definitely not worth the visit. We didn't come to ruin your day, we came because we were hungry. Hope this was just a one time incident. I think you should definitely check Substation for yourself because it's nice to support local businesses, maybe you'll have a better experience than me. Good luck! read more