Applebee's Grill + Bar image

Applebee's Grill + Bar

Restaurant Cafe Bar Hamburger restaurant Family restaurant American restaurant Diner Bar and grill Steak house Traditional us american restaurant

One of the Most Reviewed Bars in Grand Island


Address

721 Diers Ave, Grand Island, NE 68803, United States

Website

restaurants.applebees.com

Contact

+1 308-398-5100

Price rating

$$ $$

Rating on Google Maps

3.60 (1.2K reviews)

Open on Google Maps

Working Hours

  • Thursday: 11 am to 12 pm
  • Friday: 11 am to 12 pm
  • Saturday: 11 am to 12 pm
  • Sunday: 11 am to 12 pm
  • Monday: 11 am to 12 pm
  • Tuesday: 11 am to 12 pm
  • Wednesday: 11 am to 12 pm

Featured Reviews


Frequently mentioned in reviews: minutes (19) table (17) asked (17) service (15) waitress (15) ordered (14) wait (14) drinks (13) tables (11) people (11)
Reviews are sorted by relevance, prioritizing the most helpful and insightful feedback at the top for easier reference.
  • 5/5 Barry H. 1 year ago on Google
    This chain is always a great place for service, quality and portions, not necessarily speed. That's kind of the draw, though; to sit down, relax and enjoy. Bourbon chicken and shrimp was excellent, as were the beef nachos and spinach artichoke dip appetizers. Never been disappointed at Applebee's and the Grand Island location is no exception.
    4 people found this review helpful 👍

  • 2/5 Robyn L. 1 year ago on Google
    We went here on a Friday night about 9:30. Only a few tables were occupied. We stood at the door while several employees walked by us and finally we said we would just sit at the bar. It took a while to get a drink (and were never offered a 2nd one). The bartender didn't seem too interested in helping us. After a while she offered us chips and salsa, which also seemed to take a while to make it to us. We ordered food - I had nachos, which were ok, but my husband ordered the mac & chz with honey pepper chicken tenders. The mac and chz was cold, the chicken barely existed and the breadstick was so hard we got a good laugh out of it. The menu picture did not match what he got for for $14.99. We have been turned away on 3 or 4 other Friday nights, stating they were closing early, so we were happy to even get in. Then we were greatly disappointed. Will probably not be back to this location.
    3 people found this review helpful 👍

  • 4/5 Rachel Z. 2 years ago on Google
    Pretty darn good! I was craving wings but BWW was closed due to staffing difficulties and I remembered that I used to have wings here. They were great! Service was fast, the place was clean and efficient, overall a pretty great night.
    2 people found this review helpful 👍

  • 5/5 Zoe R. 1 year ago on Google
    I work here at Applebees. I’m not going to say we have the best service or we are the best restaurant however some of you tend to think that us as servers make your food or it’s our fault you had to wait so long. Or some of you may not realize how you treat your server. I’ve had multiple occasions where as soon as I greet a table I get a nasty look. Or an attitude. Most people don’t even know how to tip anymore! How can you expect greatness without giving any back? Or purposely destroying the area around a table by ripping up tiny pieces of paper or flinging your food on the ground. We as servers can’t serve excellence without receiving excellence
    1 person found this review helpful 👍

  • 1/5 David Brindisi (Cosmic W. 1 year ago on Google
    Pretty rough service. Came in earlier tonight. Hostess said there was a 15min wait as they were busy. Not a problem. It is Friday night. We asked if we could go wait at the bar and have a drink while we waited. Host said that was just fine. The bartender greeted us. Said she'd be with us to take our drink order in a moment as she was serving someone else. That's fine too. ...... 30min later our name hasn't been called for a table. Not sure what was happening with that, but we also had not yet had a drink. The batetender was working right in front of us looking directly at us bit never asked us what we wanted. Finally we gave up. As I was leaving I passed the hostess who was looking at us. I said in an unhappy tone, "goodbye," and she said, "okay have a good night." As if everything was okay. We had been ignored and then forgotten. It was very bizarre. I totally understand they were busy and I could see the staff were trying to move as fast as they could, but this was ridiculous. I won't be returning.
    1 person found this review helpful 👍

  • 2/5 Dorinda H. 11 months ago on Google
    We went to Applebees last night for supper. It was not busy, maybe 8 seated tables. We have not been there for 3 years because of past poor service, but I had recently been to another Applebees in IA and had delicious food so we decided to give them a chance. First red flag. Even though more than 2/3 of the resturant was empty tables I overheard the blonde (manager?) Tell the host to not seat anyone for at least 10 minutes because they had a large carside order come in. If I came into a resturant that was that empty and they wouldn't even seat me and get drinks I'd walk back out. Sure enough two different partys, one with an infant carrier, stood waiting to be seated with all of those emply tables. Poor management I felt. Then our food came out. My food looked fine. However, my husband had ordered the double cheeseburger and fries. What they sat in front of him looked like a kids meal. He had about half the fries that I had and his burger was more the size of a slider. He immediately questioned the wait staff, then asked for the manager. Same blonde at the bar came over and tried to reason this small double burger was in fact what he ordered. My husband demanded she compare it to the picture on the menu. She flipped attitude and finally got the menu. "Well yes it does look smaller, but its probably just the way they smashed it" she literally didn't care. I gave him most of my fries and had to talk him into leaving a tip since it was not the wait staffs fault. Not happy. Will never go to Applebees in GI again. They just don't care. Last time it was cold food because the oven wasn't working right. Shouldn't a resturant close if they cannot cook the food right?
    1 person found this review helpful 👍

  • 3/5 Rick H. 4 months ago on Google
    I understand how many of the Applebee's restaurants are going out of business. This restaurant is very poorly managed, the staff members seem to be in constant turmoil with each other. The only reason I am giving this restaurant a 3 is because our waitress given the work environment she was working in was amazing. Someone needs to take a long look at the staff of this restaurant if they truly want to stay open, plus the place needs a thorough cleaning as the restrooms were awful.

  • 1/5 Lisa C. 4 months ago on Google
    We came here on Thanksgiving evening. The place was not busy & my fiancé wanted to watch the football game while we were there. Staff told us to sit down & they would be with us shortly. We chose a table that worked for watching the game, but the hostess promptly told us that this section was closed even though there were other people dining in the section. We politely moved to another table. The waitress was kind & switched a tv to the game for my fiancé. Due to their limited menu today, we ordered burgers & an appetizer of nachos. During our wait, the waitress advised they ran out of nacho cheese for the nachos. She was pleasant & apologized for the wait. After 40+ minutes of waiting without any food, others were seated in the section we were not allowed to sit in & 2 other tables received their food before we did. We asked the hostess about our food & she didn’t know what the problem was. We paid for the drinks and decided to leave. On the way out, my fiancé and myself asked the hostess what happened to our food, why we couldn’t sit in the section we chose, and why 2 other tables got their food before we did. She had no answers about anything. I asked her if the section we were not allowed to sit in was for whites only. She advised she was not racist however I again asked her what the problem was & of course she had no answer. It should be noted that another couple who were people of color were not seated in that section either. Not only does this restaurant have big problems with serving people the food they ordered, they discriminate against people of color. I am doing this review from the IHOP parking lot, which brought our food to curbside in 15 minutes. Never going back to Applebees ever!!!! Also my fiancé is handicapped & does not like to eat out due to obvious barriers, so getting him to go out was a huge endeavor that ended very badly in every way, except for IHOP.

  • 1/5 cassandra j. 10 months ago on Google
    I was meeting a family member for lunch to plan my mothers birthday dinner in grand island, approx 18 of us, my mother loves Applebee's. I ordered an alcoholic beverage and witnessed the bartender make the drink but made extra. Then I watched the other waitress drinking that drink. Which angered me, $8 for a drink and don't get the excess? I pointed it out to my family member and was informed this is the same waitress that was pouring shots in her yeti about a week ago! Needless to say we will take our party elsewhere. I will not allow my mother to be served by intoxicated waitresses. And what kind of establishment allows this to happen? Very disappointed.

  • 2/5 Todd D. 11 months ago on Google
    Manager was very rude to her own staff. The gentleman that seated us was great but he was treated very poorly by the female in charge. She also was our server and she was not good at her job. She was short staffed and 20% of the tables had customers so she should have been ok. But we had to ask repeatedly for refills and finally left by leaving cash and no tip after waiting for her to take our card to pay for 10 minutes.

  • 1/5 Shelby C. 10 months ago on Google
    Wasn't busy but we weren't allowed to set at a booth. We had to tell them twice what we wanted to drink ( we all had water) It took 10 minutes for them to bring the water. We didn't order any appetizers just our meal and it took almost an hour for our food ( my mom timed them from when we ordered. Ten more minutes and we would have left). I ordered the gluten free salad, but they gave me a breadstick, and no it wasn't gluten free. My chicken tasted like lime for some reason and I didn't order any chicken with lime in the meal. Waitresses did nothing but talk and were on their phones only the busboy was working hard. Poor service will not be back, not a gluten safe restaurant.

  • 1/5 Kyle Z. 9 months ago on Google
    No greeter at the door. Came in and sat and a mostly empty bar. Dirty dishes all over and so sticky. It has a weird stench too. Completely ignored for like 10 minutes and when the bartender finally came she said she would help me soon. She never did. I'm on my lunch stop and don't have all night to sit here. Walked over to Sonic. Thanks for nothing but wasting my time.

  • 1/5 Moccasins17 (. 5 months ago on Google
    Took almost 10 minutes to be seated, 20 to get drinks and order. Took 4o min to get side salads, 45 to get food. Food came out cold, and hamburger was raw in the middle. Tried to reorder hamburger and left before it came out. Had to walk to bar to get check. Was ignored for 5 min. Saw at least 5 other parties leave because they were not greeted at the door. One waiter with beard walked around like he was a bouncer at a bar. Horrible experience.

  • 1/5 Craig 9 months ago on Google
    Absolutely disgusted by the treatment our Male host received by some woman behind the bar at 3:23pm Wednesday the 28th. We asked him to ask a question to leadership and when he was on his way she berated and insulted him. He may have been special needs and it is m absolutely unacceptable to treat this man the way she did. I defended him and she laughed at me. I'm a customer and she laughed at me. Do you really treat your employees with such disrespect? I will never return until I know your host receives an apology.

  • 1/5 Sarah B. 9 months ago on Google
    I went to eat at Applebees with my family on the 27th and it was chaotic. We heard yelling coming from the kitchen so we asked our server if everything was okay and she explained how a manger was arguing with an 18 year old cook. It was unprofessional and my kids were there. I will never be coming back due to this. And don’t even get me started with the food. Everything came out cold and it looked absolutely disgusting. Our server was very polite about it all and it was trying to fix as much as she could. Do not recommend eating here ever!

  • 1/5 Hillbilly G. 4 months ago on Google
    My wife got food poisoning. The health department needs to go in and shut the place down until upgrades are made and people are not upset about having to do their job. Bathrooms were nasty. We don't eat out much and now I know why!!!

  • 2/5 Stephanie Z. 7 months ago on Google
    Waited for a long time for the waitress to first appear at our table. (Wasn't busy at all)..I ordered a salad with no cheese (not hard) they couldn't even get that right. Got the food and it's small portions. Ribs over cooked and to much sauce on them. Had to stand and try to gain the waitress attention for a refill on our drinks. (Not once did she come back to the table to see if we needed anything). Will not visit this location again. Poor food quality poor service.

  • 5/5 Adam D. 4 months ago on Google
    We went in very close to closing time because we spent the evening at the hospital with family. We acknowledged that they were closing soon and asked if they minded and not once did they make us feel rushed or like we were burdening the staff. The staff went out of their way to make sure we just took our time and enjoyed our meal. The food and service was perfect and I couldn’t have asked for a better way to end a stressful day. Thank you!

  • 1/5 Nicky M. 1 year ago on Google
    Service was so so. Had to wait an hour to get our food. Ordered a 8oz med rare sirloin..got a 6 oz well done steak. Send it back and it was 8 oz but again not med rare. Once again we send it back. 10 min later finally got a med rare but it was the same steak that was on our plate. One thing is for sure, we will not return! Super disappointed!!!

  • 1/5 sarah J. 1 year ago on Google
    We waited for an hour and 30 minutes for our food. Tuesday, July 19. We received our drinks and appetizers. No salad or main course was served. There were 8 other diners (Who came in after us) that received there food. There were only 12 people in the whole place. We had to get to work, so we left.

  • 1/5 Lucas G. 1 year ago on Google
    Awful. The waiter did not give us a name or even check on us once during the meal. We had to flag him down for water. The drinks took longer to get than the food which is ridiculous given that there were only three other tables occupied in the restaurant. I ordered a beer and apparently Applebee's has certain names for their glasses. I wasn't sure which was as I hadn't ordered beer from there before which so I asked him and he gave me a blank stare and said one was big and one was small. I said I'd have the small. I got charged for the bigger one on the bill, either that or the price on the menu was incorrect. My girlfriend and I both had the$14.99 chicken tender four cheese mac and cheese. The chicken was sickly sweet, the flavorless mac and cheese sauce was like water, and the pasta was so overcooked it was difficult to get it to stay on the fork. Then the waiter comes by 10 minutes later and slaps the bill on our table and disappears, without saying anything or asking if we would have liked anything else.

  • 5/5 Tyanne J. 1 year ago on Google
    One of the best Applebee's around! I loved their half price apps. It was very refreshing to eat here after a long hard day of walking at the state fair. They do have a long wait time, but the wait is worth it.

  • 2/5 Crystal Pickering P. 1 year ago on Google
    We had to wait for a table for about an hour. Then we had to wait for our drinks for about 15 minutes. The waitress was great. The bartender however was mor concerned about the people at the bar then the one's who were wanting the drinks at the tables.

  • 1/5 Kasey O. 2 years ago on Google
    Horrible service. We waited 30 minutes to get a table. Then we had to wait another 20 minutes just for drinks. We ordered chips and salsa at the same time we ordered drinks because we knew service was slow. A servicer tried to bring us just a cup of salsa for our empty table…. We waited another 25 minutes with no food, so we asked for the check to just pay for the drinks. The server came back and said “…well your food is ready already so would you like it to go?” I said “we haven’t even gotten the chips and salsa!” Her response was “I know”. ARE YOU SERIOUS. We will never go back to this Applebees.

  • 1/5 Brian Orwig I. 2 years ago on Google
    Wait for table was not bad, once we got a table, it took about 10min to receive drinks. We also waited on appetizer for an hour, just to find out it was not even “put in”… several other tables around us with the same waitress had missing food, didn’t have service for 20-30 mins.. ALSO, utensils had food on them still.

  • 1/5 William t. 2 years ago on Google
    Stood there for 15 minutes waiting to be seated. Finally asked someone if we could be seated. Only to be told it would be another 20 minutes. Place was only a third full. Well won't be back

  • 4/5 Cecelia G. 2 years ago on Google
    The service was wonderful. Our waitress was attentive and friendly without being pushy. Food was okay but not great. But, I attribute that to supply chain issues and lack of available staffing. I think they're doing the best they can considering the service interruption issues almost every business is having.

  • 3/5 Cindy M. 2 years ago on Google
    We went to Applebee’s today at 11:45 and never received our appetizer till 12:35 then our lunch 25minutes later. The waitress first said the kitchen was backed up but seems funny others that came in after us was getting there food. Then she told us there was a glitch in there system but once again other people were getting there food before us that had came in after us. We ask for a second soda and never got it till she came to give us our ticket. The table was dirty and I had to ask for it to be cleaned before our food came the glasses all had a bad film on them as well as the silverware. I understand hard water but should be cleaned better than they were.

  • 5/5 Jason B. 2 years ago on Google
    I love this place!!! The food is tasty, I love the baby ribs dish with sweet BBQ sauce on it 🤤🤤🤤. Customer service excellent, from the door until the table, during the dinner and after it the Waiters team will be pending to you 👏👏👏 Also the ambient is friendly and clean. I love the bartender and how she do the margarita drink, my favorite. A+++ for Applebee's crew!!!! 👏👏👏

  • 1/5 Joseph E. 2 years ago on Google
    Don't work here, don't take their food or drinks. This franchise deserves to suffer until it can from the top down begin to treat its workers right. People deserve to live off their full time work. Regardless of the job.

  • 1/5 Maci G. 1 year ago on Google
    This will be the last time that my family and I eat at Applebees. The service was absolutely AWFUL, the waitress never checked on our table and walked by it many times. The manager took our meal, and I specifically asked if it was going to be a long wait, he told me no it wouldn’t be over an hour to get our food. Again waitress walked around and talked to the tables around us, but not once ours. 50 minutes later she finally came and asked us if we were doing okay. We said we were wondering where our food was, she told us that our food was all “green” but only one person was running food, so it would still be a bit. We watched multiple people take out food, so I’m not sure if she just didn’t want to run food or what. 60 minutes later we finally got COLD food, all of it was cold. We were very unhappy. We talked with the manager who in the beginning reassured us that we wouldn’t be waiting this long. We explained that his waitress never came to our table, we further explained that as customers of food is backed up we should be informed but there was absolutely nothing. They asked if we wanted our food warmed up, and we told them no after waiting for over an hour we had two very unhappy cranky kids. The waitress ended up throwing the ticket at us. We refused to pay after such horrible experience. We will not be back to Applebee’s in grand island! The service, and expectations for people have went downhill so bad.


Call +1 308-398-5100 Open on Google Maps

Amenities


  • Parking
    • ✓️ Free parking lot
    • ✓️ Plenty of parking
  • Payments
    • ✓️ Debit cards
    • ✓️ Credit cards
    • ✓️ NFC mobile payments
  • Offerings
    • ✓️ Beer
    • ✓️ Wine
    • ✓️ Coffee
    • ✓️ Alcohol
    • ✓️ Spirits
    • ✓️ Cocktails
    • ✓️ Quick bite
    • ✓️ Comfort food
    • ✓️ Small plates
    • ✓️ Happy-hour food
    • ✓️ Healthy options
    • ✓️ Late-night food
    • ✓️ Happy-hour drinks
  • Popular for
    • ✓️ Lunch
    • ✓️ Dinner
    • ✓️ Solo dining
  • Accessibility
    • ✓️ Wheelchair-accessible toilet
    • ✓️ Wheelchair-accessible seating
    • ✓️ Wheelchair-accessible car park
    • ✓️ Wheelchair-accessible entrance
  • Dining options
    • ✓️ Lunch
    • ✓️ Dinner
    • ✓️ Dessert
    • ✓️ Seating
    • ✓️ Catering
    • ✓️ Breakfast
  • Service options
    • ✓️ Dine-in
    • ✓️ Delivery
    • ✓️ Takeaway
    • ✓️ Kerbside pickup
    • ✓️ No-contact delivery

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