Dobbies Garden Centres Arvostelua 

Today, I was appalled to find the Carlisle branch in such a disgusting state. The restaurant still makes a lovely cup of coffee, the crockery and cutlery spotless, but the restaurant itself was filthy. The wicker chairs had food crumbs sticking to the seats. The tables had not been cleared for hours, congealed food on the plates, they still were not cleared after we finished our coffee. In the corner beside our table, was an arbor on display, it had two hanging baskets hanging off it full of dead brown ivy. There was a huge siders web in the window, and dead flies and bees everywhere. Outside the weeds growing in between the pavers at least 3" tall. An elderly lady with a water spray was watering the plants (including the dead ones). I spoke to several other customers, who agreed with me, that they couldn't believe the amount of dead and dying plants. The poor girl (the only one on the till) deserves a medal, she was run ragged, she called for help, but no one appeared. She could only apologise to us for having to stop serving, while she got the signing in book for a member of staff, they keep away from the till. She was back almost immediately, but another 6 customers, had appeared by then. Despite all these complaints we did however spend over £100, but we will not be going back. I will send for my plants and pots over the internet, as this is an experience that has been most enjoyable in the past, was ruined by lazy people not doing their jobs probably, and not being supervised properly.

Needs TLC. Toilets are very tired. Air Conditioning on during our visit on a cool day. Cafe was too cold. Seats were dirty & need cleaning.

Toastie’s only available on white bread, where normally other cafe’s offer brown/wholemeal.

Not a great experience and I would not recommend

I wanted to use birthday offer which is 2 pieces of cake (stopped drinks with it!)
No gluten free cake so could not buy just 1
As need to get 2 pieces at same time.
Ordered chai latte told no chai powder!
So not able to have my drink that I wanted either!!

The cafe is very popular and there was a queue when I arrived. I want to praise the bearded assistant who despite being understaffed with a new recruit on the till was very hard working, professional and supportive of the young man at the till who was trying hard but making mistakes. The bearded guy sorted the mistakes, dealt with customers who had the wrong order, made the coffee with a female assistant’s help and just about kept the show on the road.
The queues were long and they needed more help though! But well done to this person !

As mentioned before, quite a few plants did not survive??
No response from Donnie?
What’s the point of feedback?
Won’t be ordering again from them.

First time of visiting the cafe here after being put off with huge queues on previous visit.
Will be our last one now as this is the quality standard of there tea pot and don’t even get me on the cup!!!

The cafe has gone down hill. Poor service no cream scones when the offer is on. Only 2 girls serving , tables not cleared, no restaurant anymore. We used to love a trip up. But unless we are getting our free monthly coffees we go else where. Sorry to say this.

Had to stop here on way home from family emergency to get food the cheese and ham toasties we order were filled with thick mustard which we were not aware off I like mustard but we were unable to eat the food due to the amount in them a waste of £11 person over priced over seasoned totally over rated

I re-registered for a Dobbies card during a visit, which became live at the end of April. Shenstone has been a really nice destination in the past for myself and my family, particularly the restaurant. My first revisit was with family and a baby. Honestly, the food was as good as I remember but the furniture is really very dirty and I really don’t understand why. The staining looks historical, not from the last 24 hours. I would definitely return for the food (if cleanliness is improved) but I really wouldn’t recommend the destination to anyone else at this point in time.

Close down - please . Hold my refund over 4 days and keep seying will take 14 days to get my money back, only because they can't provide product on time. Staff there don't know what they doing.

As a regular visitor to Dobbies until December last year I was shocked to read the reviews about the food there. That was until yesterday. Hubby and I visited gor breakfast, arrived before 10.30am to be told that the agency chef on duty hadn't set up yet for breakfast. By 11.00am he still wasn't ready!!! At 11.15am we were told we could order either a bacon or sausage roll but no breakfast. I ordered one of each, the sausage one was okay, unfortunately, the bacon was absolutely rock hard I thought I was in danger of losing my fillings.
One bright thing the young man on the till Aaron is an absolute asset to the company, polite, friendly and helpful. I felt sorry for him having to keep asking the chef when he was planning to start cooking.

Dalston near Carlisle: Terrible food again, fish although in a 'warmer hood' was cold, this was unpleasant and a health risk. Again the shrubs on display were disgusting many of them dead, frosted or deseased, they should not be on display who in their right mind would buy them? This branch should be shut down.

4 ladies had a wonderful afternoon tea on saturday May 2nd which had been prebooked, and so avoided any queues. It was good service, lovely section of cakes and sandwiches and great value for money. The experience was made better by strolling round the garden centre choosing lovely plants. We were spoiled for choice but after joining the loyalty club a discout was deductd from the bill. However I must state that people applying to join after us caused massive queues and no more were allowed to join after a while. Overall a super afternoon out.

Visited the cafe on 1/5/2026. I was really disappointed with the food. I had a fish bun and salad, more batter than fish and the salad had large chunks of what looked like cabbage not really edible.I was unable to eat a large part of this unappetizing meal.I noticed a lot of salad left on plates. This really spoilt my visit.

I ordered a patio set from Dobbies Website on 19/4/26 and received confirmation of order and shipping and said would be five working days as I lived in Northern Ireland it said to allow a few more days for delivery. After 12 days still not got delivery. Contacted Dobbies about my order was told it should have be delivered by now and they would look into it and get back to that afternoon or next day. Did not get phone call so contacted them again to be told they had escalated my issue and it would take them 3 days for the delivery team to chase this up. Asked to be put through to the customer complaints department and told they didn’t have one. Can you believe that. I requested to be fully refunded and cancel order was told it would take 3 days to process the cancellation. The number 3 seems to be common for every issue. Would not recommend Dobbies to anyone as they don’t want to take ownership of any problems that you may have. Have sent a complaint to the CEO Mr. David Robinson of Dobbies since they don’t have a complaint department.
Can’t wait to see his response.

Ordered a cheese and onion sandwich cold panni arrived alos ordered beef burger with bacon bacon was ready onion rings overcooked and hard as a brick

Paid £42 very expensive quality of food appauling looking from every ones else plates this was the general opinion.

Has dramatically declined very disappointed the person who brought the food grey haired wasn't very polite at all

Very disappointing

Restaurant using paper cups for drinks - not nice at all as could only taste the cup and not the tea which used to be lovely served in a pot and a china cup.

Fantastic custer service very helpful will return

Usual weekly trip to Dobbies for lunch this week, as the menus have recently been changed, decided to opt for a chicken & bacon sandwich, oh dear! The chicken was the horrible from frozen kind and it tasted the same, didn’t eat it , come on Dobbies surely you can do better !

Came today for, what used to be, a famously good breakfast.
I stood in line at the hot breakfast section behind two couples who all said they had been there more than 5 minutes with no staff. After another 5 minutes they all left to go to IKEA or McDonalds.

I stayed to see what happens. Someone came after about 10 minutes and when I asked about substitutions for the breakfast, I was then given a long list of rules and regulations. I went for the Traditional Breakfast and added 2 items.

Sausage - clearly overcooked and burnt
Bacon - wet and soggy
Beans - fine but too many as they covered most things.
Lorne sausage- cold and oily
Potato Scone - overcooked, rubbery and hard to cut through
Toast - cold
Egg - I wanted a fried egg but those available were hardened and actually grey around the yolk so I chose scrambled which were crusty and barely warm.

With a small bottle of water, this came to £13.80 and was probably the worst breakfast I have had in many years with absolutely nothing to recommend.

I gave 2 stars for the staff friendliness but there is clearly not enough as there are multiple dirty tables with some tables being used by customers to pile old trays on.

Avoid eating here.