Buck Nekkid BBQ
Located: 3825 N. Shiloh Drive
Fayetteville, AR
(479) 966-4337
Need directions? CLICK HERE
Type of dining experience: Casual / BBQ
Updated - 5/9/2012
Consistency. That is the word of the day.
I have dealt with numerous owners and managers of restaurants over the past couple of years, since launching this site. That in combination with my own experience in business ownership and management has lead me to believe that one of the major factors in the success of a restaurant is consistency.
Whether it is consistency in the way their staff interact with their customers, or the consistency in relation to quality of food offered to their customers, both are very important factors in the success of their restaurants. In fact, consistency is so important that I have seen it make or break a restaurant.
Customers just will not put up with a lack of consistency. And pretty soon it will show in a restaurants bottom line. That till drawer just will not open and close as much by the end of the day.
Before I get to the "meat" of the review, I want to talk about a couple of other areas in regards to Buck Nekkid BBQ. And those areas are staff and facility.
In regards to the facility, I really do love it. I think they have done such a great job in regards to the build out, it is apparent that they have put allot of time, money and effort into their facility. When you go in, you will find that it is always clean. The interior is expansive, and very "roomy". So you do not feel like you are ever crowded. It is large enough to accommodate large groups, and I would imagine could host a rather large event without issue.
When you go in you will find that they serve you "buffet style". Originally the menu was a bit on the complicated side to understand, so if you went there then and not since, if you go back you will see it is much better to figure out. Also, you will find that they have a fully stocked bar.
Now in regards to the staff, all in all I have to say that the staff has always been inviting and friendly. I have even seen staff that were put into rolls that they might not should have been, work very hard to take care of their customers, so I definitely give their staff a lot of kudos for their hard work! There was only one time that I felt I was a "bother" and that was when I was speaking to one of the owners. I had revisited them, to try out their offerings again. After a previous visit there I had given them a fairly harsh review in regards to that visit, which they had taken note of. So during this visit I had a couple of the staff members come up to me and we were talking about the previous visit and how my visit was there that day. One of them was their new general manager, whom I found to be very pleasant and open to hearing my thoughts, suggestions and hearing the feed back I had gotten from the viewers of my web site and review. Then I got the opportunity to talk to one of the owners, a young lady. The vibe I got was very "stand offish", in fact she was quick to point out when I was discussing what I had been hearing and trying to stress the point of getting back some of those customers that have been lost, her reply was basically "we aren't living in the past". I finally just stopped trying to give suggestions, as I felt she was rather annoyed by my "presumptions". Which is a shame, because the statements I was making to her and her staff were to help them, not belittle them.
On to the food!
I was recently checking out the Urban Spoon and Yelp pages for Buck Nekkid BBQ, and noticed that one of the users of those sites had recently mentioned the consistency issue. And I have to agree. When they do their food right, it rocks. And I have had some good food there. But then the flip side to that coin is that when they do it wrong, it just plain sucks. In regards to what they charge you for, in comparison to what you get when they first started out it was far too expensive for what you got. Currently, you will find some decent pricing, but there are also still some items that they just charge too much for. Especially when you get one of the hit and miss times, where the product quality is just not quite there.
I could go over and over so many examples of when they have done it right as well as wrong, but I wanted to rewrite this review and clean it up, as it had gotten very long winded. They are one of the few places that I had an initial bad visit(s) and have consciously tried to go to over and over to see how they were changing and progressing. So needless to say, the original review with its updates got to be very long.
To summarize what I have experienced thus far with my visits, and from what I have seen on urban spoon, I would have to say that they still have some work in regards to consistency. If they can make sure to put out quality product, for a decent price and do so consistently, they can do well. Personally I just am not sure anymore. To me it feels that the management and ownership to a degree are not "pushing" the areas that they should be as much. You can have the most beautiful facility around, considerate and good staff, but if you can not create a good product consistently none of that will matter.
So I guess my suggestion to folks wanting to try them out would be to go ahead and give them a try if you are so inclined. And hopefully very soon down the line we will hear tons of accolades, and that their food is good, all of the time!
You can view our original review HERE
You can view the "update" to the original review HERE
