Applebee’s Customers In Minnesota, Wisconsin + Beyond Mad At Epic Date Night Pass Fail

Recently, Applebee's received a lot of publicity around their new $200 Date Night Pass, which the restaurant chain created to get people to have weekly date nights year-round.

They boasted that if fully utilized, the $200 pass had a value of over $1,500, so obviously there were a lot of people excited about the promotion, which seemed to be set up well.

What Is Included In The Date Night Pass?

The Applebee’s Date Night Pass is good at participating  Applebee’s restaurants nationwide 52 times between February 1, 2024, and March 31, 2025. Passes will discount up to $30 of food and non-alcoholic beverages with each use. The pass could also be used online and through their app.

How Were You Supposed To A Date Night Pass?

Applebee’s Date Night Passes were only available for purchase online at the Applebee’s website. They went on sale Monday, January 22 at 11:00 a.m. CST. At that time, they promised a purchase button would appear on their website.

Get our free mobile app

That was the setup, but once the on-sale time arrived on Monday, January 22, things did not go well for a lot of Applebee's customers. Even though Applebee's warned they would sell out fast, the customer experience was very frustrating.

I witnessed how at first, the website crashed and was unavailable after multiple refreshes on multiple browsers. When the site did come back, there was no purchase button to be found on their Date Night Pass Page regardless of the browser used.

Then, the page would crash again and would only come back after another round of page refreshes. Then when it came back again, which was a few minutes past the on-sale time, there was a message saying the elusive Date Night Pass was sold out.

Well, that was fun. A quick glance at social media revealed this disappointing experience was shared by people across the country.

Below is just an example of some comments found online Monday morning, and there were countless more being added by the minute:

Get our free mobile app

Read Now: Iconic Minnesota Bar + Restaurant Closing After Nearly 35 Years

As of 11:45 a.m. CST on January 22, Applebee's had issued no official comment on the Date Night Pass debacle. Did you or anyone you know actually get the pass?