Lisle Lanes

So, tonight was the worst bowling experience, (or should I say lack there of) I’ve ever had. On Thursday, a group of us finally decided to celebrate a friends birthday at this bowling ally. There would be a group of 16, with some of us bowling, some not. I called to ask (on Thursday) if I could reserve two lanes for a birthday celebration. The woman on the phone informed me that there were leagues on Friday nights, and that they also had another party booked for a reservation, but since we only needed two lanes, they would be able to accommodate us as well. I was making the reservation for 8:30pm, and she told me that leagues started at 6pm. Excited that we would be able to be here (close to where everyone lives and perfect reservation time), I told my 15 friends it was a go! Well… Not so much. At 830pm most of us arrived at the bowling ally. We were told that there was a mistake, and we wouldn’t be able to bowl until 10pm… Apparently the ‘owner’ (which I have a hard time believing the owner of an establishment wouldn’t try to make his customers happy) said that the girl who took my reservation was new and shouldn’t have done so. He claimed (though I had no missed calls or voicemails on Thursday) that she called me and left a voicemail explaining that I could not have the reservation that she booked… Then he said he also left me a voicemail. Well, I checked my voicemails, and he did leave me a voicemail at 330pm (5 hours before I was showing up) while I was at work.. . I have a few problems with this… Besides the fact that I am being told I shouldn’t have been given a reservation that I called well in advance for, even if I had received his voicemail, there would have been no time to make reservations for so many people at a different bowling ally.
The group of us decided to wait, and at about 950pm, we were told that everything was almost ready, but they weren’t sure when the people would clear out.. . At this point, our group was completely frustrated and sick of spending our money in their pricey bar. I decided to tell the man how very upset I was and that I would not be returning to his establishment. He began to offer to buy us a round of drinks, or a pizza… AFTER AN HOUR AND A HALF OF US WAITING!!! (This step should’ve been taken sooner!) I told him I didn’t want anything from him, and we left.
This bowling ally is unorganized, grossly mismanaged, and most importantly, displays despicable customer service skills.. . Go anywhere else but here. This place is for leagues only, they don’t care for any other customer base whatsoever.
The ONLY remotely nice thing I can say about this place is that our bartender was sweet and helpful. (But the owner should’ve been buying our drinks and paying our bartender extra for entertaining us in the small bar area with only one television).

Very welcoming atmosphere. Great place for a Saturday outing! My sisters and I planned an outing & bowling was our game of choice. All of the «big» name places weren’t sounding to appealing for our friendly get together so I called Lisle Lanes, spoke to Dave about reservations for a Saturday and he was very helpful. We got a lane right away and bowled a couple hours before leagues began.
We enjoyed eats from the the café. Everyone was pleasant and overall pretty helpful as we hadn’t bowled in years. It was a great gathering spot. Look forward to visiting Lisle lanes again

fun time! gets really busy after 10pm on weekends. but staff does a great job accommodating everyone not just the leagues. bar is quick with service food was great!

I bowl in a league here and I like the lanes but I have a few complaints… First of all– the hours they post online are NEVER correct, on multiple occasions I have shown up during what the website says is business hours and they’ve been closed. I don’t like the $ 10 minimum charge for credit cards and the «bartender» asked me how to make my drink. I still like that it feels like an old fashioned bowling alley and the Pro at the Proshop is great.

This place is gross. The bathrooms smelled awful. Horrible do not go here. The manager was rude and didn’t help at all. The restaurant was awful and the bartender had no idea how to make drinks! Awful! I do not recommend going here.

I practically grew up on this bowling alley. I love this place! Sure, it may not be the most up-​to-​date place, but the people are always really cool, and the prices are reasonable.

Okay so I’ve been here multiple times and haven’t had a problem until recently. I came here on June 20^th at about 10pm with my girlfriend and another couple to bowl a few games and have a few drinks. When we walked in only 3 lanes were occupied — so not many people were there.
First we walked up the counter and waited for about 5 minutes before anyone came to us. Actually a worker walked right past us and didn’t help us. Next a lady ended up helping us and told us about a deal — 3 games and shoes for $ 7 per person. We did that.
After bowling one game a larger group of people left which only left us and one other group. Halfway through our second game the other group left which left us. At this point, the music shut off and the bar closed (it was about 10:50pm). The lady that helped is came up to us to let us know they were closing at 11pm but somewhat implied we could finish out games if we hurried up?! (Why would you sell us 3 games if you closed within an hour?) Also their website and door said it was open until midnight. As soon as we finished the employees basically left with us.
So that sucked. We won’t be coming back here considering this happened.

We had a great time bowling at these lanes on Saturday night, although it took awhile for us to get to this point. I had a Groupon for two hours of bowling on a Friday or Saturday night, so I had planned to go with a few friends. I called on Saturday a couple of hours before to see if I could reserve a lane and they told me that in fact they have leagues taking up all of their lanes on Saturday night until around 10:30 PM. I was shocked that on probably one of the busiest nights for non-​league bowlers to bowl that you would not leave any of your lanes open to the public. Disappointed, I decided to use my groupon on another night and I went about finding another bowling alley. Long story short, the other place didn’t work out either because they had unlimited bowling and we ended up waiting an hour there before giving up.
We called Lisle Lanes around 9 PM and again asked if they had any lanes open up. We explained that we had been waiting at another alley for over an hour and were just looking for a place to bowl. The manager wanted to help us, so he said to come over and he’d get us on a lane in less than 10 minutes. We went over and checked in and he told us that he’d have a lane in a few minutes. We had enough time to grab a drink and then our lane was ready. I had no problem with them honoring the Groupon and we had a great time. My only suggestion would be to have lanes more available for non-​league bowlers during peak times.

Took the family here today, had a great time. We used a groupon and it was well worth it for a day of family fun. As for the quality of the bowling alley, it is in pretty good shape, people are friendly, and the restroom was clean, so no complaints.

It’s a bowling alley, not too fancy not… fancy at all actually. As far as bowling alleys go, I’ve been to better. The ball selection is paltry and difficult to find one that will work for you. They a wall of heavy balls with tiny finger holes or medium/​light weight balls where the finger holes are on opposite sides of the ball.
The saving grace for me was that there was a nifty little arcade that had some sweet pinball. And the bars were well tended. The specials weren’t really all that special, but what really gave me sadface was that they didn’t do buckets. I cried a little.

Just visited Lisle Lanes last night for your Saturday special. The Saturday special is marketed as 2 ½ hours of bowling for $ 15.00 from 10 pm to 12:30 pm. We arrived around 10:30 and paid for those two hours. So, we continued to bowl and ordered drinks from courteous bartender. Around 11:45 an announcement was made that the bowling alley was closing in 10 minutes. Then at 11:50 all the lights for the lanes were shut down. We were cut short 40 minutes of bowling because the staff stated lack of business. Our group spent $ 60 on just bowling plus a good amount of premium alcohol not just beer. I was completely let down by my experience. I have come to Lisle Lanes since I was a kid. This experience has made me choose to go to another bowling alley. Maybe you should consider taking care of the customers you do have and not wasting their money.

I am not sure why there are haters on here about this place. It was VERY CLEAN, great service at the bar and cheap munchies and beer. Its old school but alot of fun. Looks rough on the outside sure, but inside is bright and clean. Great staff… and did I say cheap beers. Wonderful time and we will be back. Bring some cash not sure if they have a atm or not but its not a big deal. 50 bucks in the city wont get you as much fun as this place will!

Great service. Was there on Saturday night and was able to get a lane without wait. If you are looking for a layed back atmosphere at an old school bowling alley then this is the place.

They take care of the lanes, staff is friendly enough, and theres a decent amount of lanes for what seemed to be a small establishment.
If you order a pizza be warned though, they dont make it in-​house (they have a joint-​deal with a local pizza place) and ours arrived when we were just about done bowling.
Other than that, its one of the cheapest places to bowl in Dupage so it makes for a great practice session or outing for a casual game with friends.

There’s not much to say about ye olde Lisle Lanes. It’s fine if you want cheap no-​frills bowling. We were there just to have fun so it was no big deal. Their ball selection kind of sucks though. They only take cash, and the ATM was broken when we were there.

It’s cheap, but it’s kind of a dump. However, dump or not, it’s still better than Brunswick Zone.