Good riddance! It's about time.

I used to LOVE Hard Grove back in the day, and would go there weekly (sometimes multiple times) when they were actually located on Grove. I knew the waiters and waitresses and bartenders, and their food and drinks were top notch. It was by far my favorite JC restaurant and hangout spot back then.

I patiently waited and closely followed all their trials and tribulations trying to get up and running at a new location, and returned years later when they finally opened at their current, soon to be closed spot. Most of the faces from the OG place had been replaced, with only 1 remaining. While she remained top notch, all the other staff was sub par, with the manager being one of the worst. It seemed as if her only function was to slouch at the bar and gossip and complain about customers and people in her life. The last time I was there, I had to eat my meal while listening to her loudly make fun of the appearance of a customer who had recently celebrated her birthday there. She made fun of this woman to another customer who was eating at the bar. Truly disgusting and inappropriate behavior.

Aside from that, the food was not quite the same and the drinks went from AMAZING at the OG location, to just plain bad. I went from going every week to once every couple of months to a couple times a year. Every time was a disappointment. The final straw was when I went about 6 weeks ago, and despite the place being empty, the service was still horrendous, the food took extremely long to come out, drinks and appetizers were bland, and when they brought out the chicken entree which had always been my favorite it had a bizarre rubbery consistency that I had never experienced before. After 2 bites I saw that the chicken was COMPLETELY RAW on the inside. 🤮 The bartender apologized, acknowledging that they weren't even busy so that shouldn't happen and told the manager. The gossiping, lazy manager just took the dish and said nothing. I cancelled the order and asked for the check. They offered me nothing, charged me for everything I already had and at full price, and in that moment I knew I would never be back. I also knew their time was limited because how could a place survive that is barely open, has bad service, serves bad, raw food and bad drinks and makes zero effort to gain, retain and please customers?

Hard Grove, it's sad it came to this, but your demise was a LONG TIME COMING.

BYE. 🤷‍♂️

And NO. I won't be visiting your new location. For obvious reasons.