Bristol Farms

Over the past few years, this store has gone downhill with no end in sight.
The checkers know it, some other employees know it, and the surrounding community certainly knows it… because customers talk about the decline, in the check-​out lines & in the parking lot.
Expired goods on the shelves:
–I’ve been watching for the Annie’s poppy seed bottled salad dressing to be refreshed, because every time I look I’m seeing only the same 3 bottles that expired in April.
–I stopped buying tortillas here after I recently brought home some with green stuff growing on them. My pregnant guest had already eaten two before we noticed. I returned them to the store, showed them the green growth… and none of the other packages were taken off the shelf. I did see them go on sale, though. These had apparently been improperly stored because they were still within the expiration date, barely.
–Last winter I pointed out that the salad dressing in the cold case was room temp, who knows for how long. The fridge unit was malfunctioning. Next day it was cold again but the same bottles of dressing were still there on the shelf.
I could go on and on. These are just a few examples.
Today a checker told me that the cashiers do their best to catch the expired stuff as they ring up purchases. It’s a problem. Everybody knows it.
Today I arrived at the store at 8:15 am (they open at 7) only to find no food in the deli (except the deli meat section) and no breakfast food on the hot bar. As I left with only bottled water I mentioned to the checker… no food. She said yeah, sometimes they’re slow… but with the heat wave & people shopping early today, you’d think…
I agree. Maybe some of the 5 employees I saw standing around behind the food section, chatting, could get a clue.
Speaking of the hot bar, many employees agree that «It used to be soooo much better.» (The words of an employee.) Currently, it’s the same hard ribs & sugary chicken nuggets & mashed potatoes, every day. Unless you arrive on Baja Day, when you can get tamales & enchiladas so spicy hot that the mostly elderly clientele can’t eat them. Even one young male BF employee told me a week ago that he can’t eat the spicy stuff, either. It’s ridiculously spiced, overpowering.
Have I spoken to management? Yeah, many of them. For a couple of years. It falls on deaf ears. Everybody blames somebody else as the situation just gets worse. Sometimes there are 2 or 3 of us customers in a little group, trying to get a manager to hear what we say (not so far & I gave up months ago).
And there’s no shortage of staff at this store. They’re everywhere, sometimes more staff than customers.
The reason for 2 stars instead of one:
–Whole turkey at the hot bar, sliced for you. It’s one of the few edible cooked things left.
–Best watermelon on the peninsula.
–Meat department is great, nothing pre-​packaged wrapped in plastic, everything fresh, amazing selection.
–Long-​term friendly checkers (who are well-​aware of the store’s problems).
–Summer weekend barbecues in the parking lot. The cooked-​to-​order burgers are great & appreciated. But… sometimes they wrap up early, or don’t BBQ at all, cuz (I’m told) the parking lot is deserted. Solution: start later on foggy days because the beach is like a ghost town on weekends when it’s foggy. When the sun burns off the fog, people come out. (A manager seemed puzzled when I told him this.)
For many locals including me, this is their main grocery store. Or it used to be.
More and more often, I find myself leaving BF empty-​handed & driving all the way down the hill to the Whole Foods at PCH & Crenshaw like I did this morning… where I found plenty of fresh food, like a breath of fresh air. But the drive is hugely inconvenient.
BF hot bar could be a gold mine if operated with competence. Simply follow the no-​brainer rule of business: recognize who your customers are, meet their needs.
We pay more to shop at BF, expecting quality products. And at this tiny BF location with a ton of employees on hand, what’s the excuse?
Who’s minding the store?

Bristol Farms is a gourmet grocery store but also a great spot for a grab and go quick bite when in the Palos Verdes Area.
I’ve had several great poke bowls here. Recently, the gal in the sushi department made one up for me with warm sushi rice, spicy aloha poke (non mayo spicy version) avocado and ginger and extra sesame seeds. $ 9.99 I enjoyed every bite! I’ve also purchased poke from their self serve station sold by the pound for $ 16.99 per lb.
Their hot food bar also usually has at least something that looks interesting and they roast whole turkeys here on a daily basis and carve to serve.
If you stop by any time after 4 pm though the pickings for hot food bar start to get slim, and the sushi dept. closes up for the night and you are left with serve yourself cold case sushi options/​poke station.
The store also has a casual seat yourself order at the counter restaurant over by the produce section but it closes early as well, maybe by late afternoon after the lunch rush. I have not tried the restaurant food because I always end up buying something from the grocery side and just take it into the restaurant, when time permits, which is perfectly acceptable.

I’m so let down by the market now.
They used to be so much better, but now I find myself sifting through the grocery items to make sure I am not picking up expired goods. It happens A LOT there.
And I will call and explain and the manager tells me the same almost recorded style response, «Sorry, sir… please bring it back and we will refund your money or exchange it for a fresh version.»
It;s almost like the manager finds it easier to field complaints than to ensure quality.
The prices are expensive and with the price tag should come the quality. I have refrained from going back when I hit the third time of getting expired food.
I once pointed out to someone that handled cheese that they had a product expired by three months. I went back a week later and it was still there. Just gross and beginning to reflect an atmosphere of nobody that cares.
They used to be so good.

Visited here really quick after starving from a great 4 mile hike in Palos Verdes.
Somehow I was really craving some Poke and after searching on Unilocal I came across this grocery store. Determined to explore, I went in and saw what a different grocery store this was. I also used their bathroom and that was tidy as well.
Besides ultra high-​end prices, and fully-​stocked shelves, the store was kept clean with tons of samplers throughout. All which were better than the next…
Cheese, bacon, salsa they got all the samples you need to fill you up. Haha.
So, their fresh poke (@ $ 16.99 the lb) bar had plenty of options including seaweed salad
salad and sardines. Let me tell you that was one of the freshest poke I’ve had! Loved it.
As I paid, the cashier was the sweetest, kindest lady ever! She had amazing customer service skills and soft inviting voice; her name was Ingrid.
If I could shop for groceries from this store every week, you bet I would!

Always super friendly staff and helpful. Always fresh food and a lot of variety. Love this place. Btw James is Awesome.

We ordered our Thanksgiving dinner from Bristol Farms two years in a row, and two years in a row they did a terrible job.
2014 they completely got our order wrong — 10lb bird instead of the 15lb we paid for, half the sides weren’t there, and some of the ones that were there weren’t correct. Had to improvise at the deli with sides and they didn’t have enough of what we needed.
2015 we ordered again (who would think Bristol Farms would mess up twice?), showed up at our appointment time, and they said they didn’t have our order at all. A woman in the café did her best to piece something together for us, great. Then two hours after we get home we get a nasty call saying we didn’t pick our order up and to call them back. We call the number they have us and couldn’t get an actual person on the phone. I kept redialing the deli about four times and finally got an apathetic employee and told him what had happened, and he gave a sedate «sorry.»
Never again Bristol Farms.

The store has always been good, but the Resturant on the other hand is a completely different story. Horrible service and attitude, not only they don’t help you with anything, telling you to pull the table and chair by yourself, then tell you «sorry you can’t put this here because it’s a hazard»…well, then why don’t you do it since I don’t work here? I just want something to eat! And then they just left you there want for 10 minutes without anyone come and ask if you need anything. What a horrible place!

Bristol farm palos verdas have change a lot in the last 15 still good place to grocery shop but used to be much better. It carries wine beers high end store, the sushi department and bakery is good. I love their pastrami sandwiches.

I go to this Bristol farm for some yummy poke. They have a fresh poke bar at $ 16.99/lbs. the price is pretty good for what you get. It’s fresh & delicious.
They have a hot food section with variety of American style food. What I like is that they have samplers throughout the store, I love tasting things while shopping.
Most everything else is far more expensive than even whole foods!!! I only buy very specific things (for example: sesame seed oil) from this market that I know nowhere else carries it. Overall, this market is very clean & organized but way too pricy & out of my budget to do daily grocery shopping from there.

High quality brands beautifully displayed. I like this grocery store, but the prices were much higher than I pay in Alhambra. The store was very clean, bright, and welcoming. The staff was friendly and helpful. There were some brands of iced coffees and teas that I’ve never found elsewhere, and more types of iced water than I could fathom. The baked goods were tasty and unique, such as Cappuccino Muffins and fancy cupcakes, but some ranged as high as $ 7, not cheap! One of the cashiers was wearing bunny ears, which was a cute touch. Getting ready for Easter perhaps? I recommend checking it out if you’re in the area.

Stopped by this Bristol Farms when we were last in Rancho Palos Verdes. It’s definitely an appealing shop with all sorts of home made meals, natural and organic products, and baked goods.
However, as soon as I walked in and saw that they were charging $ 12 for a quart of soup and $ 20 for take away sushi I knew it was not for me. In fact, it’s so pricey I held off buying most of what I needed knowing that places like Ralph’s would be a far better value.
Nice shop but certainly not a go to supermarket for the masses.

The original Bristol Farms location might be the smallest of the lot, and its inconsistency and high prices keep it to the just-​okay level rather than the local gem it once was.
First, the inconsistency: The cooked food made in-​house runs the gamut from terrific to inedible. We’ve gotten soured Chicken soup (the response when we called: «yeah, we get that sometimes»), meh salads, bland baked goods. We’ve also gotten really wonderful bread and produce and several items not carried by anyone else in the region.
And then there are the prices. It’s… expensive. Think Whole Foods, maybe a little more at times. If what you’re getting is either unavailable elsewhere or not worth driving to the Whole Foods a few miles up Crenshaw, then the prices aren’t a problem. But this is not a store for people who «have to ask.»
Service alternates between very good/​friendly and scattered/​confused. We’ve experienced utter confusion («um… huh. Let me see if there’s someone who can… you know, I’m not sure. Hold on…») over catering orders, but also prompt, immediate service. It seems to be random, but for upper-​end-​supermarket catering, it’s the only option in PV.
Bottom line: It’s an okay option when Ralphs/​Pavilions won’t do and Whole Foods is just too far for you.

Community oriented — they donated a gift card to our school’s PTA holiday event to raise money for our school! We really appreciated it!

Bristol Farms.
It’s like a smaller version of Whole Foods. But just as expensive. Maybe even more expensive in some ways.
This Bristol Farms is one of the smallest I’ve been to. They don’t have a wide selection of products. Their bulk foods section is super small as well. But, it doesn’t matter too much for me because I mostly come here for the poke anyways. Yummmm poke at $ 16.99 a pound. Cheaper than most poke places or about the same, but just as good. There’s different kinds of poke like spicy poke, salmon poke, regular poke, etc. It’s usually pretty fresh. At least for all the times that I’ve gotten it.
The only downside is that there isn’t like a hot food or salad bar like Whole Foods has. But they do have a Bristol Farms Café next door!

The guy in the meat dept. put the breaded fish on the meat paper using his BARE hands! It wasn’t like I could rinse it off either since it was breaded. Whole foods uses gloves! But I like the other products there so I will probably still go there. But not going to purchase their meats.

I love Bristol Farms, one star off for this being a small location and the pricer are a bit higher than I would like.
I think even a bit higher than Whole Foods, just with a much smaller selection.
Their bakery is amazing, I can’t come here and not get anything, just doesn’t happen.
They have good fruit and veggies and I always find new items I’m excited about trying.
Feel good shopping at it’s finest!

The grocery store is great and the people are very helpful. I needed help in picking out a good pineapple and one of the workers did not hesitate to help. They also offer organic chicken which I thought was nice, not much sure about their beef selections.
But when it comes to the café, I was not impress. The food was not bad but the service couldn’t been worst. Came in with a friend and saw that other people that came later was serve first. Later noticed that the other customer felt the same. So I guess nothing racial there. Then we were over charged, turns out they switched our order to the other table. Asked for more water and nothing happened. After the long wait for the food I have decided not to come back here again. Oh and this place for some reason is loud, not by people talking but a lot of background noise coming from the kitchen. Can be annoying to some.

Two stars only for being the only gourmet food store in area. Deli service slow and personnel in deli rude and appear to resent helping customers. Poor attempt at «Hot Food «bar. Food at hot foods prepared is over cooked dried out and worst yet, since its uncovered, I’ve seen some old folks using toothpicks and plastics spoons eating right out of the foods we are supposed to buy as clean sanitary food.
Witnessed an employee picking out of the seafood POKE bar with toothpick eating and going back for second thus contaminating the food. Who the hec is the manager at this store to let this happen?
Digusting. They get one star for us having no other choice for gourmet food store in the area.

Bristol Farms is one of my favorite grocery stores in the world. They have EVERYTHING.
I’m a huge fan of their deli. They have a huge selection of meats and cheeses that you wont be able to find anywhere else.
The reason I am writing this particular 2 star review is the sushi counter. I usually come here for sushi when I’m crazy it but feeling way to lazy to go down to Torrance. The sushi here is not the best, but they use good, fresh fish.
But NOT this past week. I picked up a Spicy Salmon Bowl on Wednesday, and it was disgusting. The fish had a funky taste, and the color was waaay off. I threw all of it away. I’ve never been so disappointed by Bristol Farms.
I’m staying away from their sushi from now on.

Bristol Farms, quite pricey really but wonderful homemade soups and tamales though.
Bristol Farms is there for my special higher end shopping ingredients such as imported cheese, homemade soups, and lean grounded beef. I loved the fact that they usually have free samples of their imported cheese, fruit jams, crackers, and beverages.
I really enjoy their homemade soups such as their Matzo Ball, Tomato, Chicken Noodle, White Clam Chowder, and the Butternut Squash. Really homemade and tasty.
Their mixed salads are also very fresh a lot fresher than Pavilions nearby.
Their café is also very nice and they offer yummy selections from breakfast to dinner.
The service is pretty friendly and it is never very busy there.
Overall, great place to shop for groceries that you cannot find in Pavilions. Everything is great but most of the items here are very pricey and usually not on sale.