CRANBERRY TOWNSHIP, Pa. (WTAE) -- As some restaurants across the U.S. start to reopen, they're learning to adjust to their new normal.
And that might mean a longer wait time for customers, especially on a busy day like Mother's Day.
Kevin Horne live tweeted his experience at the Cranberry Township Olive Garden on Sunday and it's going viral.
"My girlfriend's mom was craving Olive Garden, as one does. And so, we placed the order, and we were the ones who went to go pick it up. Had a 5 p.m. order time and we pulled into the parking lot and realized we were gonna have an interesting situation on our hands,” Horne said.
His tweets and pictures, liked thousands of times and shared hundreds, showcase the struggles the restaurant endured fulfilling orders on Mother’s Day.
"As one does in the burbs, when mom is hungry, waiting for food, they start losing their minds. And then they ran out of salad and breadsticks. And then the situation just got worse and worse and worse,” said Horne.
Horne says that it took 80 minutes to get his order.
Some others took two hours.
WTAE talked to the Olive Garden manager over the phone, but he declined to comment.
It's a challenge restaurants are facing after having to completely change how they serve customers.
Dive Bar and Grill and Grill in Wexford says it's been a learning experience.
"It's a lot more room and a lot harder to box everything, instead of pushing the plates out. And as people are pulling it out of the window, you kind of start losing track of what you're making because you're not used to doing it like that,” said Caleb Benvi, Regional Manager for Dive Bar & Grill.
The regional manager told me they've been getting slammed with takeout orders and his crews work as fast as they can to get them out.
Sometimes technology fails.
That happened yesterday, which caused issues taking orders, so they're asking for patience and understanding while they try to navigate the new norm.
"Of all days that you don't want something to go wrong, when it's Mother's Day and everybody's trying to feel normal. They were very, very understanding, which you can't ask for more than that,” said Benvi.
Horne says Olive Garden did offer him free soup and a gift card for his troubles.
ncG1vNJzZmivmpawtcKNnKamZ56axLR7y6iamqRfpa5uucCnqmannJ7DpnnGmqmdnZ5isrm8xKugnqaTmnqou8SsZK%2Bhopa5bq3SZp%2BeZaeWtrW%2FjKGmrqqjYsGwec%2BimqRlpaV6sL7Dnqk%3D