Kula Revolving Sushi Bar

I went to Kula with friends the other day and we had one of the worst experience ever!!! First of all, they won’t seat you until all of your party arrive, which I understand. However, the hostess wasn’t nice when she informed our group that we won’t be seated until everyone is there. It didn’t matter if there was no one waiting for the table and there were empty tables inside. We already felt like wow she wasn’t friendly at all. After a few mins, we got the table since everyone arrived. A server came over to take drink order. Her name is Jenny. She came over with unhappy face like she hates her job and didn’t want to be there. No smile on her face that we could see. Another unwelcome feeling from Kula staff!!! We started ordering our drinks, which were soda and few glasses of water. She said «one at the time! I can’t hear!» There was no
«please» in her sentence and we felt like she was ordering us to do what she wanted. Ok!!! Are we here as customers or what??? She was mean. After that she could not get them right. There weren’t that hard just soda and water. There were only five of us. She left with a frustrating face after that. We were like ok. She was NOT NICE AND SHE DIDN’T KNOW HOW TO DO HER JOB. If she can’t remember the order, then she should write it down. But she didn’t write anything down and kept confusing with the drink order.
She came back with the drink and pretty much slammed them on the table. During that time one of us was getting a plate from the sushi belt, but it got stuck. She YELLED «WAIT, WAIT, WAIT» like YELLING!!! not saying oh just let it go and don’t pull. It was not like that at all. She was just SO RUDE to us. I mean she was not friendly, not knowing how to do her job and RUDE TO CUSTOMERS. What a combination of a bad server!!! That was the last straw!!! That’s it. One of our group told her in a calm voice «can you please not yell and be nice? Jenny argued and said she was not yelling, but speaking loudly. Oh no!!! She can’t think that speaking loudly isn’t the same with yelling. Another bad example of someone who doesn’t know what customer service should be. She should realize and say oh I’m sorry and I didn’t mean that, but she was just mad that we said that she was yelling. We were like enough!!! We weren’t gonna take any kind of shitty treatment from a bad server. She turned around and walked away with attitude after arguing that she was just speaking loudly.
After that we asked other server to get the manager. The manager came and asked if everything’s ok. We said no, it’s not ok. We told him what happen and he apologized and agreed that what Jenny did, was unprofessional and wasn’t the way to treat customers. We asked for a different server. A new server was fine. She was polite and did her job. The manager came to check on us several times. At least, he resolved the problem and made sure we were ok.
I think people go to Kula because of the atmosphere and it was different from regular sushi place that you place orders with servers, but the food quality is just whatever. Service is really bad if they keep hiring servers like Jenny. She doesn’t fit to work in customer service period!!! They will lose more customers because of that. I also think that we were not the first group of customers that she treated that way.
What happen ruined the mood of our dining experience. I highly doubt if any of us will go back to Kula ever again. BTW we were nice enough to leave a normal tip just because we didn’t want the new server to take the fall after what Jenny did and we appreciated that the manager tried to resolve the issue. This is the longest review that I’ve ever written, but it should show that it was that bad for me to spend this much time writing it because of the bad experience that our group had.
Think twice if you want to go to Kula! You might run into Jenny there and she might scream or yell at you and that will definitely ruin your meal right there.
Kula needs to have better staff, who really know how to provide customer service if they want to last in this business.

I really like Kula Sushi dont get me wrong. This is my 2^nd review for Kula Sushi. I’ve been there several times with my family and really enjoyed it.
On 21^st of January at 12noon I was there with my family, then few hours after I had sushi there, I started having watery diarrhea and since then for 5 days, I had more than 15 – 20 episodes of loose stools each day which I had to go to Sharp Memorial E.R. — Dx: Food Poisoning. I’m getting an IV but continue to have loose stool.
I will think twice before I go to Kula.

The sushi here can vary from aggressively mediocre to surprisingly delicious, but the main pull of Kula is the spectacle of the conveyer belt, which rewards decision making with instant gratification.
Among a sea of ‘mostly the same’ sushi joints in San Diego, this stands them apart from the pack, in addition to a couple other features. The wasabi is house-​made and is excellent. The service is also extremely fast.
Booths sit up to 7 but since the conveyer belt is accessible only to the closest seats, it creates a funny team dynamic at your table to make sure everyone gets what they want when they want it. You don’t have to simply pick off the belt, though. A handy iPad-​based menu will send specific orders directly to your table if you’re impatient and a few menu-​only orders like the Ramen or Takoyaki or many of the desserts makes browsing very interesting.
A similar iPad is hitched to the front door to streamline the queue for getting a table. Kula is an extremely popular destination but you can check with a glance how long the wait will be and you’ll be notified via Text as your table approaches availability.
The machine will keep track of how many plates you eat, and $ 2.25 flat per plate is a great deal as long as you don’t get something like Watermelon. You even get a prize every 15 plates! Great for kids or millenials.
The venue is medium-​sized but the restaurant almost always has a line out the front. They don’t take reservations and the wait, at times, has been as high as 4 hours. Try to go at awkward times or later/​earlier than you’re used to get a table easy.

BE PREPARED FOR LONG WAITS!!! Just saying. It starts getting busy around 4PM usually, so don’t be surprised if you end up waiting for +1 hr just to get into this place. Luckily for you, there is a lot of interesting businesses around the area worth checking out while you wait for your queue to FINALLY be announced. Trust me though, once you get in– you’ll see what the hype is all about.
This revolving sushi bar is a fantastic place to go with friends or family to entertain. While the rolls and offerings are pretty standard of most Japanese sushi restaurants, the prompt service, neat and high tech environment, and cute animations that play on the overhead screen every 5 plates you enter make the experience! Once I was actually in and seated, a waitress came to quickly go over the plates system (you lift up, then out) and get our drink orders in.
The small bites were already coming around on the conveyor belt, and to my pleasure, everything looked relatively uniform and absolutely delicious!
Don’t see something that you want coming around on the belt? NO FEAR– The overhead menu is touch screen and you can order whatever you want! I just had to wait a few minutes and walah– a friendly ping announced the food coming my way, followed by a fast slide of a plate of what I wanted in my direction. How technologically forward!
Would I come here again– YES, but a hesitant one. Though I loved the whole experience once I was actually in the restaurant, the wait is pretty painful to bear through since you are just sitting outside, watching everyone who is inside have fun. The food, as I said before, is your typical Japanese sushi fare. In comparison to your typical Japanese restaurant, your total will probably end up being more expensive here (every plate when I came was $ 2.25, and some plates only had one piece of nigiri on it). But then again, theme park ride logic applies here: perhaps the longer you wait for something, the more you treasure it in the end?

What a fun joint! What a pain in the ass for the line! When did the idea of conveyor belt food become some cool and trendy when I remember it was so full of disdain? Why would I care for this?
Because the idea has been improved with sneeze shield guards.
Because you can order real food in real time.
Because your kid will want you to order 5 plates at a time so he can watch the little cartoon of the little samurai guy taking steps of 5 plates at a time to defeat the bad guy boss! Every 15 plates, the kid gets a toy. Lovely. Talk about positive reinforcement.
If my kid likes it, I guess I will too. HA
This is a fun place for smaller groups that fit in a booth. DON’T BRING YOUR POSSE.
As with any popular joint, go earlier which lends to the smaller group. LARGE POSSE MEANS YOU’LL BE LATE.
Try to go during the week as it’s easier to schedule with a small group. LARGE POSSE MEANS MORE INVITES WHICH MEANS WEEKENDS ARE BAD.
I can’t speak for the quality of the sushi since it is edible, but the plates at $ 2 a piece add up quickly.

The design and concept of the revolving sushi at Kula is very interesting. In addition to watching the food revolving in front of you. Every table gets a ordering monitor you could just order there. It also plays little cute ninja skits if you reach certain levels of plates (I believe is multiples of 5). And my favorite part is that you get a small toy whenever you order 15 plates!
Despite all this, the sushi quality itself is very average. Sushi are not made very well since rice falls apart easily when picked up by chopsticks. The fish isn’t the freshest. The ones that taste better are the cooked ones like eel. Don’t bother getting toro if you’re a fan like me. The quality is seriously not that great.

Love coming here with a group of friends or family. Even tho sometimes we would have to wait for awhile to get a table. It’s worth the wait time. Our waitress was very friendly, nice, and funny!
For every 15 plates you get a prize and for every 5 plates they show you a video on your screen which is very cool.

Oh my Kula. Showed up on a Sunday night with a couple friends and put our name in for a 75 minute wait. As stunned as I was that this was the wait time on a Sunday, the wait time grew to 2 hours and 20 minutes by the time we got seated… so we were actually fortunate.
LOVE the idea of this place and the cool little nuances that make it seem very authentic. The food on the other hand, left a lot to be desired.
The sushi is on a rotating belt that moves slowly and without stopping. Above it is a fast belt that delivers food to exact tables that has been ordered direct from the kitchen. You order from an ipad and plates go down a chute that counts them for pricing and for special prizes when you hit plate goals (quantity people, not quality).
The sushi on the lower belt was not fresh looking or tasting, despite being under «Mr. Fresh»… the plastic contraption that keeps bacteria from getting on the sushi as it rolls past sneezing children and gawkers.
We tried all the rolls, as well as the nigiri and the salmon cheek. The salmon cheek arrived in huge chunks and was not even warm. It looked and tasted greasy and a bit off. The rolls with any sort of crunch or sauce had lost their textural quality and had pretty much coagulated in a blob of sauce, rice, soft tempura crunchies and fish.
I was super bummed on the food, but the atmosphere and the experience were awesome. I would say give it a few more months and try it out for lunch. Make sure you get to 15 plates so you can take home a really cool sushi magnet.

Pretty fun place to grab a bite to eat and a great place to try a lot of different things! I love that once seated you can eat instantaneously since you can just grab what you want off the belt. All plates on the belt are $ 2.25. You can order additional items such as appetizers, soup, hand rolls, dessert on the iPad (prices vary). You can also order sushi from the iPad if you’re too impatient for an item to come back around or don’t see what you want on the belt. If an item «disappears» from the iPad, it means they’re out of that item.
My absolute fav is the seared scallops/​salmon with a bit of Japanese mayo — it melts like buttah with a hint of sweetness. Other than that, the sushi is pretty straight forward and decent quality depending on what your in the mood for. They also have 2 different types of beef and call me crazy but the one with oil reminds me of Korean BBQ… probably bc of the sesame oil.
Don’t forget to get to at least 15 plates. Every 15 plates you get a prize!

SO MANY OPTIONS TO CHOOSE FROM!!!
This place is amazing. I had so much fun watching the conveyor belt go around the entire place.
Worst part about this place is that there are no reservations, and the wait is about an hour. That is the only bad thing about this place and there is a reason for it, so I can’t really fault them for it. The place is amazing and worth the wait time.
I am not an expert in Sushi, so I did not know what half of the items were at all. My honey tried nearly everything, I did not. When I saw the items I like, such as the rainbow roll, the philly roll and edamame, I grabbed mine from the conveyor belt. I had to order separately, miso soup and my dessert of green tea ice cream, which comes above the normal conveyor belt on another type of apparatus that the chefs send directly to your table. It was AWESOME!
The food tasted good and the service was low key but still we were taken care of.
When you are done eating, you throw each plate you have taken from the conveyor belt into a trash slit at your table, which then calculates all you ate and plays a game on tv of your order. It was funny. We «won» a mini sushi toy because we ordered more than 15 plates, which was cute.
I would not suggest coming here with a big crowd, but four to six people might be a nice outing for anyone who likes Sushi.

Dear Kula,
You’re my favorite sushi restaurant! I apologize for not giving you 5 stars in my initial review, but I’m hoping that I can make it up to you now. It’s difficult to express in words how thrilling it is watching the rotating sushi belt and ordering off the touch screen. I get the biggest joy watching the freshly made hand rolls, karaage, and Japanese soy milk donuts fly down the conveyor belt to magically find me.
If I had to pick just one favorite thing on the menu, it would be your salmon skin hand roll. At only $ 2.25, it’s a great value and super tasty. It puts many neighboring sushi establishments to shame. Everything that I’ve tried on the menu is delicious, which is why I keep on coming back.
My favorite part of visiting is the «bikkura pon» game. Getting to 15 plates is a must! After three visits, I am the proud owner of three 携帯電話 (cell phone) charms and I’m hoping on my next visit I’ll get a magnet. I hope the future holds more cross promotional opportunities, like when the Hello Kitty prizes were available in September/​October of 2015. (This was an absolute WIN!)
Hoping you continued success with additional locations in San Diego!
Until we meet again,
Lauren T.

I went into this Eyes Wide Open. No, no, no. You’re thinking «Eyes Wide Shut.» I know some of my fellow Unilocalers have stated I look like a young Tom Cruise (specifically Maverick days) but please, please, please, that is where the similarities end. What I meant is that I pretty much knew what I was getting into when we came to Kula. I read all of my Unilocal friends reviews of this place so yeah. Okay, maybe even good but not great sushi. There was nothing there that came down the pipeline that I wanted a second serving. I mean I’m no know-​it-​all like Mission Impossible’s Ethan Hunt but I like to think I know OMG-I’m going to jump on the couch and scream I’m in love– type sushi. Alas, nothing for me to say «You had me at Irasshaimase!» The fish I’m sure was fresh (better be considering how they have to turn over the inventory so quickly) but idk, somehow the prep just wasn’t what I wanted. Maybe it’s the Food Network in me but I really do believe in the «love is the secret ingredient» theory when it comes to fantastic bites. I think it’s hard to do that when you are in a mass production system. I did try a lot but it was more because of «the experience» and my search to find that one redeeming sushi plate that would make me scream «Wizard! I’m coming back for more!» Sorry no such exclamation.
It was fun watching the kids though. We sat them next to the conveyor belt so they could grab the plates as well as dispose of them. Closest thing to cooking and doing dishes all week for them. They had fun with the iPad and the animation shorts were a cool treat. They were so excited when we got to plate #15 and the prize came. I seriously wanted to push the plate count so they could get another but as the plates just rotated by I just couldn’t bring myself to. I even noticed my wife was picking at her sushi and at one point mused out loud that we should just stop and get some XLB from neighboring Dumpling Inn.
Service was tolerable. It’s a dining pet peeve of mine if I have to flag the server down for refills even though they pass by your table frequently without checking in on you.
Is it something to try once? Yeah. Just once though. Kind of like watching a few of Tom Cruise’s movies. Eyes Wide Shut, Far and Away, Days of Thunder, Cocktail… wait I think I watched that twice.

Kula is a trap.
$ 2.25 per every and any plate sounds cheap at first. (I’ll take a piece of Chu-​Toro for $ 2.25 any day). However, the quality of the fish is very low (for example, the Chu-​Toro tastes just like regular Tuna (Akami).
However, nothing tastes bad. So I’m always tempted to keep grabbing plates after plates. after plates.until I realize I’ve had 15 by myself.
At that point, I spent the same amount that I would have paid if I had eaten at an AYCE sushi restaurant and also ordered a cheap bottle of sake.
I’ll come back when I learn more about self-​control.

This is a fun place for groups! Well maybe 4 – 6 people if you can fit in the booth!
I recommend going early and make sure everyone is present. Otherwise they will not seat you until everyone is there. During the week days is good. Weekends if you want to wait!
The price is good for the quality of sushi and rolls. Especially for Uni! Saba! Toro! Yum! The spicy shrimp taco is good too, so don’t forget to try that.
Beware though you can easily eat too much and more than you need too! For a small dinky prize for every 15 plates you insert into the slot. I visited Kula when they had Hello Kitty prizes which is worth it! Haha And 5 plates to see mini cartoons. It definitely adds up.

Yes! Yes! Yes!
I loved loved loved this place. The sushi was so tasty, the experience was so cool, and the price per plate was $ 2.25. I mean, who can beat that?
First, the revolving sushi brings out your predator instincts… You sit and eye your prey until it’s time to pounce on your unsuspecting victim! My victims were the crunch spicy tuna roll, the slide roll, the salmon belly and the crunch spicy salmon roll. Everything was very tasty and fresh. The entire concept of grabbing your food of the revolving belt made the meal that much more exciting.
The best part about this dining experience is that you don’t have to wait for your waiter to put your order in. You can sit down and start eating immediately.
We wanted miso soup… Not part of the revolving sushi but you can get it on a conveyor belt by ordering on the tablet at your table.
This is my new favorite spot in San Diego until they get one in DC!

Love this place! Where do I begin? This place reminds me of the sushi spots in Japan. Who doesn’t love a place where sushi goes around on a belt and you choose what you want! If your not seeing what you want, you can order it on a screen by your table and it arrives in minutes! After 15 plates, you win a cute prize! This place is amazing! Everything is fresh and authentic.
I came on a Sunday night and it was packed! Recommend this place to everything who loves sushi!!!

I have become a Kula regular for a number of reasons… but mainly for he hand rolls.
The conveyer belt sushi is a cool concept and amazes everyone who first sees it but after a few visits it could lose its charm. What Kula does better than just about everywhere else is high quality, fast service, excellent quality, bargain price. That’s something that makes it worth so many repeat visits.
We stick with hand rolls and Geso (fried squid) and the odd roll or nigiri that passes by. Always order the hand rolls and Geso from the touch screen.
Also our favorite server is Phuc who always is cheery and helpful.

I came here with my friend on a Friday around 1 for lunch and there was a 30 minute wait. I have been to a revolving sushi place in Irvine before but this one was way cuter and exciting .
You can order from a screen or grab a plate from the fast moving convert belt. This restaurant made me sorely regret not going to conveyer belt sushi when I was in Japan. This was definitely the fastest conveyer belt sushi I have ever seen. You also get a reward if you eat 15 plates. My friend has been here plenty of times already and I’m never a fan of revolving sushi usually, but this place was really fresh ! Since there are so many people coming the sushi has a pretty high turnover rate. We had about 9 dishes, my favorite being the garlic ponzu tuna and the takoyaki!
This restaurant is pretty affordable unless you are eating alot, but the bill was $ 24 for 2 ppl. I think I would come here again but only if it was less crowded I don’t think I would want to wait so long if I was so hungry.

Taste– ***
Service– ****
Ambiance– ****
Parking– *
Fun, fun, fun! This concept is super duper fun! Moving to Japan in a few months and thought I’d give this place a try. You just sit around and watch all the plates go by and pick off what you want. The waitress comes around and teaches you how to use «Mr. Fresh» lol! For every 5 plates you eat you watch a little cartoon clip on the screen above your table, and when you eat 15 you get a little toy. Helping the little ninja slay the demon definitely had me eat the extra 3 plates I didn’t want to eat. The sushi isn’t awesome, but it’s not bad. It’s just a fun place to go. The wait is usually pretty long and the parking royally sucks. Fun to go with friends once in a while.

We’ve been a fan of Kula even before it opened a location down here in San Diego. We’ve been to several of their locations up in LA county and the idea of revolving sushi in a conveyor belt along with it’s novelty and affordability was a really big hit.
Obviously, since this place is the only one in San Diego county, wait can be really long especially during peak hours. My suggestion: go really early or really late. For $ 2.25 per plate, you can’t really go wrong. Try as many different types of nigiri, rolls, hand rolls that your little heart desires. The good thing is, with per plate order — you’re not stuck eating the full roll of sushi you ordered.
Me and the hubby really enjoyed their hand rolls — spider hand roll and spicy yellow tail. Salmon belly is a must! If you don’t feel like waiting for the sushi to go around and make it’s way to you, you can also order from their tablet menu and it’ll be ready in no time.
Service is good here. They are all attentive. Kula is always on our rotating list of restos we go to in Convoy area. Don’t forget the Japanese Soy Milk Donuts w/​ice cream. Perfect way to end your dinner!

Ein Sushi Restaurant mit einem Erlebnisfaktor.
Wenn sie hierher kommen nehmen sie viel Zeit mit, ich war da zwei Mal am Abend und jedesmal 1 Stunden gewartet. Aber es lohnt sich auf jeden Fall.