plank

Excellent place for family fun! Celebrated a birthday there with family and friends. Great atmosphere and location. Something for everyone!

Plank sounds like a chill fun spot to hang out with family or friends.
We get there On a friday around 8ish PM so we waited in line for a bowling lane for about 15 minutes comes to find out the wait was 2 hours. It’s not that serious to bowl.
So we decided to get some seats on the patio & watch the warrios Its a party of 7 so finding seats on a friday night on a warriors game was hard. We finally find seats and a waitress comes and takes our orders We ordered an order of buffalo wings & garlic fries & a couple of drinks.
PRO: Food came out pretty quick, I’ll say 15 to 20 minutes
CON: Our drinks were taking so long we asked our waitress what was going on she said The reason why it was bc there was so many drink orders
I was so ready to get up and go to the bartender and ask for my drink. I’ve had it
So we finally get our drinks, & They weren’t that good. I ordered a Mojito & damm It was super strong, Mojitos aren’t ment to be so dam strong I didn’t want to drink
Our waitress got lost didn’t see her at all.
And to top it off It was for my birthday celebration
It was one of the worst
The only way I would come back is for the Wings bc they were super delicious.

Very crowded. It’s like a Dave and busters with a few less games and a lot more bowling. Bartender was surprisingly easy to get to and very quick. They have a nice heated outdoor area with large bar, however it appeared nobody staffed the bar when we were there about 930 on a Friday night.

We’ve been looking forward to trying Plank out since it opened. I’m on their email list, and kept planning it — we finally boarded a Ferry and visited this past weekend. I had to Unilocal about our experience:
We walked in and checked the place out. It reminded me of a cross between Chucky Cheese and a really nice sports bar… but the bowling alley drew us in. When we left our apartment we planned on eating and drinking… but after seeing the bowling alley, I HAD TO BOWL!
So we walked up to the desk we guessed would help us with bowling and watched as three women (approximately 20ish years of age) helped a group of 4 or 5 men. We waited patiently as they helped these guys, and to our surprise they ended up NOT BOWLING. After they walked away, we continued to wait for someone to help us. By this time there were two other groups of people behind us. Finally one of the three girls said, «Yes, how can I help?» and my husband said, «we would like to bowl». To which she replied, «you know it’s $ 55 an hour for a lane right?» Like we couldn’t read the sign above her head? My husband said he knew and would need shoes for him and myself. She hands him a piece of paper and said, «write down your shoe size and name». He did so and she replied to me, «sorry we don’t have 9s, but you can fit a 9−½». I said okay, and started to ask for a bin to put our shoes into (as I saw she gave a bin to someone else). As I was asking about the bin, she interrupts me and says, «WAIT» in the middle of my sentence. She was very loud and abrupt. So I waited. As time went by (5 mins?), she then said, «you were saying?» And I replied, «I’d like a bin to hold our shoes» and she said tossed over a bin a bit too rudely. I picked it up and walked to our lane.
We arrived the bowling area and were shocked to find a couple sitting on our bowling couch which was designated our lane. Who ever designed the bowling area does not bowl! There is probably a total of 18 inches you have to move/​shuffle/​share when you aren’t bowling. There is a very large communal table between both lanes to hold food. First of all, who eats while bowling? That’s filthy! I can understand drinking, but have you every ate finger foods while picking up a dirty bowling ball? No, so why do you need a table which could fit a good sized Thanksgiving meal in your bowling area? Second, the couch is comfy, but not what is needed for a bowling area. Because the way they are set up now you have to shuffle past each other to bowl — D U M B. We power bowled for our $ 55…three full games, and barely got into our fourth. We did not think the experience was worth $ 55. We ordered three rounds of cocktails and our server was very prompt and nice.
Finally, before leaving, we wanted to try the hot wings for they smelled so good while we were bowling. We ordered 1−½ pounds and ate them outside while the sun was setting. This was truly the best part of our experience — watching people play bocce ball and seeing the sun set on the water with the heat lamps on. The only negative here was the waiter was complaining he had no help and was over worked by having to take every one’s orders. He whined about it twice to us.
Overall, I’d say this place is run by people who know nothing about bowling. Also, there is a sign out front that says no «gang colors» or other affiliations are allowed — yet we saw people wearing shirts that were very questionable with young children around. That’s not Plank’s fault, but it would better their reputation to hire staff who care about their customers instead of flirting, more servers so customers don’t hear staff complaints, and re-​design their bowling area for actual bowling enjoyment. We will not return.

I wish we lived closer because I would love to have my 30^th birthday here!
As usual, I have to preface this review with the fact that I have to be biased because if an establishment offers bocce ball, I’M SOLD! Plank has bowling, billiards, an arcade, bocce ball, a beer garden, 2 bars and a restaurant. They also have a couple areas big enough to hold private parties.
I was surprised to see in other reviews that they had sub-​par service. During our bowling game, we had at least 3 different servers check on us and refill our drinks several times. We also happened to visit while one of the bars happened to be training a new bartender. This allowed us an opportunity to try all the house cocktails for free! The JL sweet tea and the coconut strawberry Mojito were my favorites.
This place is

I have been to this place a total of 4 times. The first time it was excellent, packed, and a place I thought I would frequent on the regular with family and friends. However this place has gone into a steady decline with TERRIBLE customer service, incompetent management, long wait times, and/​or no service from subsequent visits. This last weekend was he final straw for me when I went there to have some food and drinks with friends and after waiting 20 minutes to be seated, our waiter never came over to our table. After waiting another 20 minutes we decided to just get up and leave. This establishment could be a great spot for Oakland, but if things don’t change and fast it will cease to exist by the end of this year.
Please contact me if you’d like consulting on how to turn this place around.

This place it definitely one of the places to stay away from. It may look fun and a classy place to be, but when you add the hood rats and degenerates as the employees of the venue (specifically the wait staff and security) that don’t know customer service as well as respecting the law of how to approach my girlfriend that obviously has an ADA APPROVED SERVICE DOG WITH A VISIBLE VEST THAT SAYS SERVICE DOG/​DO NOT PET WORKING DOG.
The staff needs to learn better customer service as well as notify themselves of the ADA rules. It’s a FEDERAL OFFENSE!!! Be ensured that it will be reported.
Not to mention know how to treat a high paying group as you will possibly never have that again.

Wait staff was horrible. We kept having to search for them to order, even with being a group of over 20 we still couldn’t get service, but that wasn’t the worst of it. By the end of the night we spent upwards of $ 1k here between food, drinks, and bowling, at least we had fun. That all came to an end when their unintelligent ape of a security guard started badgering me about if my Medical Alert Service Dog was even a service dog. My dog at this point had caused NO scene, and did nothing to draw attention to himself other than stand by my side like he’s trained to do. He had been by my side here for over 3 hours at this point so why he just now decided to badger me I have no clue.
OH did I happen to mention he was wearing a bright red vest labeling him as a service dog and his service dog ID around his neck? I will never be going here again, nor will anybody else in my party.

Pros: great ambience, good food (from what I’ve eaten)
Cons: loud, very overpriced and incredibly frustrating being told to wait 2 hours for bowling when there were 8 lanes free for over an hour. Politely asking the host 3 times why we couldn’t bowl yet, he says he’s too busy to call people to get them into the lanes. Seriously?!

I like this place, it really stands out. The lighting is great, the alleys, the balls, heh… balls, the seats are really comfy like a couch. Theres even a beach close by that I made out with this girl at.
Its a pretty romantic spot, the bar serves drink perfectly.

Jack London Square’s very own mini-​Dave & Buster’s, but with a bowling alley. I came here for the first time this past weekend. On a Saturday night, the crowd was pretty poppin’. Because there are arcade games, you will see parents and their many many children running around. Some of the games vary from basketball, to skee ball, or football (toss). I ordered two beers and a mixed drink for about $ 25, so pretty normal for these types of places.
I’ll be coming back for a game of bowling in the near future!

I didn’t order food so I didn’t run into the issues with horrendous customer service like a few other folks reviewing, but lemme start with this:
I FREAKIN LOVE THIS PLACE! I live in walking distance and I’ve strolled by plenty of times, always assuming it was a boring ass, dry restaurant named plank, that served things like oyster platters and sea kelp salad. I was not expecting several bowling alleys, massive projected screens, a bar with beer on tap, and an arcade! I spoke to the arcade guy, who was probably the most passionate arcade guy I’ve ever met and he told me that its usually packed, and that because it was a sunday night, it was a bit calmer. PSH, OKAY.
My friend (now my best friend after tonight) brought me here and for the first five minutes, I whispered, «it’s lit, fam, it’s so fucking lit right now» — I only hope I can convey to you how very legitimately lit the situation was. I got my Drake’s Hefeweizen, my $ 10 game card, and proceeded to shoot invading aliens for like 30 minutes.
Sunday: 0
Me: 1

Attended a company holiday luncheon here and the food was absolutely horrendous. I had ordered a cuban sandwich with coleslaw and the sandwich was chewy, I could not even bite through the «pancetta» on the sandwich, the flavors were completely sour, the pork was dry and the pickles were cut in a way that they were falling off of the sandwich and I couldn’t even eat them.
It was DEFINITELY NOT a Cuban sandwich in any way shape or form, other than they had pork and pickles on it and those were not good. The bread was too thick (ciabatta I believe) and I was hoping to be surprised, as the crab cakes are good.
I did not like the wings either. The iced tea tasted old and it took forever to get my drink at the table I was sitting at. Other than the crab cake, nothing was good. Several people ordered the personal pizzas and didn’t finish them either. The coleslaw I had with my sandwich was about a tablespoon worth of slaw and it was not good. It tasted like shredded cabbage with a little teensy bit of mayonnaise on it. BLECK!
I am giving the place 2 stars because the bowling alley was fun. Even that though, was a bad layout and the tables and lanes were too close to each other and you literally have no space to get around each other when trying to move to the front of the lane to take your turn. It was not comfortable. Very cramped space.
I get the idea of where they were going with this concept of a place, but it is not executed properly to what I would want a fun comfortable environment with some munchies to be.

1^st stop on our Monday night adventure. We opted to sit outside because, it was a bit noisy indoors. Thank goodness for the heaters that kept us warm enough to watch more than half of the basketball game and chow down on our vittles which consisted of.
Hummus and Pita Chips
Fries topped with bacon, green onions, and buttah milk ranch for dipping
Chicken wings, buffalo style and spicy garlic bbq mango habenero
Pepperoni pizza
Curry chicken pizza
The food wasn’t bad tat all
The drinks were on point to, you have to try a glass of the Oak Town
If you’re lucky Fe will be your bartender, because she was the best, even though she was the only one working the whole bar, she was very attentive and made sure my group was well taken care of.
Not sure why a gentleman came out and had her call last call, especially because the game wasn’t even over. A thang that made me hmmmmm.
Whatever tho, I will probably go back when the weather gets warmer and hopefully Fe will be there again!
I give this place 4 yums up!

My first visit in the East Bay: as good as it gets. There’s not too many people outside on Saturday, but going inside the bar-​bocce-​bowling is what I call entertainment!
First off, I wanted to have something to eat since it’s 2pm. My server today is Savannah; she is one of the nice waitresses who makes good service. Though most of the drinks are alcoholic, I rather go for Sprite instead. For lunchtime, I go for «The Greek» sandwich followed by a coleslaw. I had to go for veggie selections than meat selections like chicken wings. Upon arrival, everything is perfectly plated, short and sweet. It’s pita bread was a bit torn when I hold it, but it still taste good. Coleslaw: no further comment. After I finished the Sprite, chunks of cutely shaped ice stays the same.
On to the Beer Garden, there are many games to play. It’s too bad that I can’t play bocce ball since I need at least two of us. And I hardly spend $ 55 for one hour of bowling. Therefore, I spend $ 10 for the game card for over 50 credits. First off: Boxer. Before I get a shot at it, that man so strong punched a glove for 700+ points! He could be close enough to be a great boxer. To be honest, I should have exercise often since I scored 200+ points. Next up: typhoon. I love the simulation ride! I like how this machine rumbles. After spending a little more than one hour, I had so much fun, I might come back for the second time.

Plank offers 2 very different experiences. The outdoor area is super relaxing and grown-​up, with a huge bar, lounge areas, TVs everywhere, bocce courts, and heat lamps. A chill playground for adults.
The inside is insane. Carnival games, bowling lanes, a restaurant, and sports games projected on the wall. Not really my style with all the arcade lights, sound effects and children running around.
So — something for everyone! The outdoor bar is where you’ll find me though. They have a huge beer selection, well priced wines, and decent cocktails (not craft cocktails, but boozy concoctions served in tall glasses). The energy is great, with people watching sports on the 20+ TVs, or watching the sunset over Jack London Square. It’s tough not to enjoy yourself here if you’re just having a drink with friends and enjoying the al fresco ambiance.
FYI, for parties you can rent out a private mini bowling alley, separate from the main bowling area. Pretty swank!

Looking for a good time?
Bring your friends to the Plank.
The former Barnes and Nobles turnt into bowling alley x arcade x restaurant bar is definitely as lively as any part of Oakland on a given weekend.
An outdoor patio with heat lamps and a fire pit?! What more can you ask for in Jack London.
The food isn’t the most awesome, but are you really coming for the food? Come for a good time and have some silly fun. Great addition to the area and things are looking good!

Service sucks, nice idea, but service sucks! The End
2hours to get nachos and a salad? Who does that?

A group of us came on a Sunday. Everything was fine except the service.
I ordered garlic wings but was given buffalo. Now, this was my first time there so I really don’t know what the garlic wings were supposed to look like but I know for a fact that what we were given were buffalo wings.
I flagged down the waitress to fix the error. She looked at the plate of wings perplexed but took them back to the kitchen.
She returned with an attitude, put the same buffalo wings back on the table (which were obviously cold now at this point) and with an attitude said, «These ARE the garlic wings,» and walked away.
So between the waitress and the cooks in the kitchen, you can’t figure out what you serve on a regular basis that what you served us was clearly buffalo wings? Pathetic to say the least and rude.
Otherwise, the games were fun which brightened our mood. We had a pretty epic air hockey tournament!
1 star service + 2 stars for atmosphere and activities.
*Also, $ 55 for a bowling lane is outlandish for two people, which is why it’s better to go in a large group to split.
*Also, to the people working in the arcade game section, you’re working, not at a club. Even if the business is a party/​bar atmosphere, you still need to be professional, not twerking and hugged up on each other when customers are trying to ask you questions or need assistance.

From the location, to the food, to the drinks, to the arcade, to the bowling, to the TV’s this place has it all. Located in the heart of Jack London Square, both indoor and outdoor seating, full bars, fast servers oh my. Nice Happy Hour menu and regular menu.
Has both a casual and upscale feel. You could truly spend the whole day here. I can’t wait to go back and do just that.