Panera Bread

This is a great place to come and have breakfast! The food is really good and the service is efficient and the staff are really nice.

Great Place to enjoy and healthy meal. I go at least once a week now.

I really don’t get the 3-​star this branch has! Visiting from LA, my boyfriend and I were taken aback by the friendly and efficient service we have received during our two consecutive breakfasts in this place. The quality of the food (especially their amazing soufflés) was as excellent as in the other locations we have been to!

I was impressed with the great service I loved the soups and the baked pastries were to die for when in San Diego and you need a quick lunch in the Gaslamp area go here for sure !

This particular location needs some love. They are frequently understaffed. There is also a considerable amount of churn which translates into repeat amateur mistakes. Carpets and bathrooms are dingy. Toilets need autoflush as the bathroom always stinks. Amazingly the limited staff still manage to pull it off. I still stop by when convenient, but other locations meet the brand standard better IMHO. A makeover and pay raises might go a long way to revitalizing the brand in this prime location where many times visitors are getting their first taste of Panera.

The ONLY reason I eat here is because its next door to my office and the ease of online ordering (rapid pick up) and picking up with out having to talk to anyone is great!
The cons:
my order gets messed up about ¹⁄₃ of the time (even though its typed in a computer)
the food is lackluster, and usually looks like it was thrown together
the price for the quality and amount of food is ridiculously high

Not the best panera you would visit in San diego. Props for the best downtown location.
But food quality always leave a bad taste, with something or the other missing. This time they had me waiting 20 minutes for a cup of soup and a sandwich. When arrived the soup was served in coffee mug. Chicken and wild rice in water.
Homeless people always are around the corner table. No issues there, anyone and everyone should be served, but servers fail to clean up after any of the customers leave.
The downtown nbc building location is saving them

I’ve always had mixed feelings about Panera, especially this one, which attracts a varied crowd from lawyers to tourists to meth heads. The menu is the same as all Panera restaurants. It tries to be healthy and fails. Sure the workers are very friendly, but the food is only okay. The apples they give you as sides never taste good. The soba noodle bowl is only okay. In fact, all of the soups are meh from the black bean to the chicken soup. The sandwiches are similarly nothing special and really rely on cheese for flavor. The breakfast is pretty limited to calorie filled pastries and bagels. The bagels are alright, but again nothing great. That pretty much sums up the Horton plaza Panera.

A Fav. Not too many ghetto wanderers. Great menu. Always updating. I also appreciate their cleanliness

Another great Panera location! It is conveniently located across from my go to San Diego hotel — the Westin Gaslamp. The staff is friendly and the food is good too!

I’ve rated Panera at two other locations and in general I am a fan. However, I was a little disappointed in this one. I understand that where this is located they have some issues with homeless people and they are concerned about the restrooms. This place has coded locks on the bathroom doors and you have to get the code from the employees in order to use the restroom. You would think that this would indicate that the restroom would be clean, not in the least. Like the rest of the restaurant, it was not clean at all. I am very disappointed in this place except to say that all of the employees when we were there are very nice. They may need some training on cleanliness, but they have politeness down pat.

I go to Panera all the time because it’s close to my work and almost every time they have messed up my order. I didn’t feel the need to give a review before because I use rapid pickup and I understand there being problems with that but this time was just ridiculous. I ordered a bowl of tomato soup as I do every time, and it always comes in a bread bowl. This time it came in a cup. Not even a bigger bowl and I know this because my coworker got a cup and it’s the same size as mine.
I called to complain as my lunch break was coming to an end so I couldn’t go down to the store. The woman who answered proceeded to tell me with an inappropriate amount of attitude that I just didn’t understand that they have to put the soup in a bowl when it’s to go. That still doesn’t explain why every other time they managed to give me the bread bowl, or why I got such a small size when I paid for more.
She transferred me to her manager and he hung up on me. Thinking it was an accident I called back and when he realized it was me he sighed and told me exactly what she told me. Then he said that when they gave me the bread bowl the previous times (so many times) that it was a mistake because they’re only supposed to give me a bigger size when I order a bowl. When I tried to tell him that I didn’t even get that, he spoke over me and wouldn’t let me talk. I ended up hanging up out of frustration. Not happy and not going back to this location.

The worst Panera ever! Always dirty. Always a line. Always sold out of stuff.
The only reason I go there is because I work in the building next door, and it’s the only place to get an afternoon snack.
Service is almost always bad. There’s a completely different staff every time I go, so they obviously have an issue with turnover. I know it’s hard to keep good employees, but it must even be hard to keep bad employees too.

Great place downtown before work or play. Great selection of bagels and pastries.
Love the fresh b-​fest meals served
Come early and the place is quite and I can get a lot of work done before the day starts. Starbucks is a little crazy in the morning and hard to concentrate on task at hand.
A cross the street from Macy’s Horton plaza lower level. Customer service is always great here and they work very hard on getting you thru the lines of any. Parking kinda sucks!

Love coming to this place for morning brew and bagels. They have a great selection
Now to the 3 stars. This place is going down hill. Every time I come here place is dirty and prep areas for drinks and coffee are gross. Makes you wonder what the kitchen area looks like???
I have been sitting at this booth for 1 – 2 hour at 7:00 and the table still has not been bussed or cleaned. Who wants to eat where cleanness is not top priority!!!
I have noticed the same thing at lunch. They are so busy trying to serve food that is so-​so
That they forget to clean the place. I talked to the manager and she said I will get it cleaned up asap. Well! 7:45 and still nothing done. Gross!!!
If this is how they are going to do business I’m taking my elsewhere!!!
BTW Starbucks 150 yards away.

What is going on with Panera?! The last 3 visit there has been an problem every time. First time, I got old loaded potato soup. Potatoes were so old and it didn’t taste right. They never came by to check how was our food.
Last week I went to buy a breakfast sandwich to go. Egg still had part of the shell on it. I can see that happening. I got the sandwich to go so there was no going back.
Today I went back and bought another sandwich and chai tea latte. My chai tea latte was filled a little more than half way. Seriously for 4 dollars plus tax. Ridiculous. I got the food to go so I couldn’t go back.
Very frustrated with panera! It’s not worth spending my money at this restaurant.

The best way I can describe my experience at this Panera is in fact A-​OK. I ordered the Lentil Quinoa Soup with a Cage Free Egg and a Low-​Fat Mango Smoothie. First of all, saying that order felt a little pretentious, but, I only ordered it because 1) I decided to get adventurous 2) I was curious as to how a Caged Free Egg tasted. It tasted like freedom. No, I’m kidding. It was actually a little salty for my own taste, so I had to water it down with some water and then it really good. Super hearty because of all the lentils. The Caged Free Egg made no difference to me. The smoothie was yummy as always.
Service on the other otherhand was weird. The girl who rung me up spoke quickly and sounded as if she lacked any emotion. It felt a little intimidating giving her my order. But hey, she was faster than other Panera cashiers. The servers were nice and attentive. For my experience with the cashier and the saltiness of my soup, I decided to dock two stars. I’m not normally in Downtown San Diego so I don’t see myself coming back to this Panera in the near future. But after this trip, I feel like this visit was enough.

I had a great experience here for lunch today. Even though I walked in during the lunch hour rush I was still able to order my food within less than one minute.
Panera has an extensive menu with soup, sandwiches, salads, pastries even gourmet bowls too along with coffee and a variety of hot and cold drinks.
My top recommendations:
1) The Mac and cheese, an amazing simple but delicious comfort food
2) The Fontina: grilled cheese sandwich with four different types of cheese in the crispy crust
3) Broccoli Cheddar soup– get more bang for your buck by ordering the soup and sandwich combo
Be sure to register for their rewards program while you are there. It’s called MyPanera and it’s free. You even get a free pastry just for signing up.
Prices are very reasonable here and if you get the combos it’s definitely worth it and you get the variety too!

I don’t know how I feel about reviewing Panera Bread… but then again I’ve reviewed Subway… so Panera will get a review!
Busy during lunch! Come here like 15 – 20 minutes before noon and you’ll be okay. I got the half sandwich and half soup. The soup tasted like any soup from a fast food chain. I got the chicken noodle. The sandwich itself was decent. Half size, a bit small with the soup, about $ 10. Lacked a bit of flavor, but you can feel safe at Panera, as in the meats and bread will be consistent with all the Paneras and there’s always ppl here, so things are not just sitting around waiting for customers.

Do.Not.Waste Your Money. Here
Every other Panera can fill an order competently… not the Broadway location. They are simply INCAPABLE of filling an order made online.
This is the second time I tried to use a Panera «reward» only to be cheated out of it when I pick up my order. Case in point, today, I had 2 rewards: A free birthday pastry and $ 1 off Soup. I ordered the Soup in a bread bowl and a Chocolate pastry. When I placed the order, it ‘redeemed’ my birthday pastry but wouldn’t redeem the soup one. Not a big deal…
HOWEVER, I was scheduled to pick up my order at noon. I arrived 5 minutes early and it was already sitting on the shelf. There was the usual lunchtime clusterf*^k in there, so I just grabbed my order and left since I have meetings starting at 12:30.
When I got back to my office, this is what I got: An empty bread bowl… COLD soup the size of a cup and NOT the bowl (God knows how long it sat out!) and a dry, hard white dinner roll. WTF?! No birthday pastry.
I called the restaurant and it took 5 attempts to get anyone to answer the phone… it kept cycling through the recording. I asked for a manager and some random guy said he was «the lunch manager»…ummm…whatev! I then proceeded to tell him my story and how this was the SECOND time they’ve messed up an online order! He said: I’m so sorry… we’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again… but he CAN’T (or WON’T) undo the ‘redeemed’ pastry. Well, THAT is what I heard the last time, so he makes empty promises. He might as well have told me to go f##k myself for all the good he was.
I WILL NEVER SPEND MONEY HERE AGAIN. I think they are so used to dealing with tourists shopping at Horton Plaza that they really don’t give a shit.

Lecker Espresso, freundliche Bedienung, Bagel mit cream cheese obligatorisch! Für’s Frühstück echt zu empfehlen! Free wifi!