El Pollo Loco
Mexican · Santa Maria
About El Pollo Loco
El Pollo Loco in Santa Maria offers a delicious and consistently high-quality fast-casual dining experience. Customers rave about the flavorful, citrus-marinated grilled chicken, prepared by skilled grill masters. Signature dishes like the chicken tortilla soup and the Original Pollo Bowl are popula...
El Pollo Loco in Santa Maria offers a delicious and consistently high-quality fast-casual dining experience. Customers rave about the flavorful, citrus-marinated grilled chicken, prepared by skilled grill masters. Signature dishes like the chicken tortilla soup and the Original Pollo Bowl are popular choices, with fresh ingredients and generous portions. The restaurant is known for its clean and inviting atmosphere, coupled with friendly and efficient service, whether you're dining in, using the drive-thru, or ordering catering. The staff is dedicated to providing excellent customer care, making every visit a pleasant one.
What Customers Say About El Pollo Loco
El Pollo Loco in Santa Maria is praised for its flavorful, citrus-marinated grilled chicken and fresh ingredients. Many reviewers highlight the friendly staff and clean environment. Complaints focus on occasional order errors and inconsistent customer service.
Popular Dishes
Best For
Tip: If ordering chicken tortilla soup, add avocados and sour cream for a complete meal.
Frequently asked questions about El Pollo Loco
El Pollo Loco Santa Maria Reviews
Good food, just seemed over priced now. Bit good flavor.
There is an employee by the name of Tommy. Most EXCELLENT customer service. Hospitable and very kind. Every employee were flipping busy, but they still jammed. I highly recommend this establishment to anyone who wants good service and food! Thanx Tommy and crew! 🙂
Love the chicken tortilla soup and tacos. The soup is superb! Suggest you add avocados and sour cream, and you got yourself a meal. The service via drive thru is top-notch! The chicken is great also if you're looking for a non-fried healthier choice. You can't go wrong with their sides, beans, rice, my favorite. Cole slaw, hit or miss!
If you are looking for a good meal for a cheap price go here. The food is always on point, coupons come in the mail every month and the employees are friendly/ hardworking. Never had an issue here and the quality of food exceeds the price. Quality fast food.
The young lady that took care if me was friendly and courteous. The restaurant is very clean and well appointed. I wish they had a Pollo Loco in my town (Lompoc)...the food is always excellent and the salsa is always fresh and flavorful 💫💫💫💫💫👍
I ordered the double chicken avocado salad with a bag of chips and guacamole. The ingredients are fresh, not canned. The chicken was slowly grilled for 55 minutes by a specially trained grilled master and chopped to order so no heat lamps. The chicken has the best taste of the citrus marinade. The veggies are crisp. The dressing is rich in taste. Best of all, it is keto friendly. No guilt food.
Best grilled chicken out on the market hands down. Chicken is citrus marinated, juicy and always packed with flavor. Prices are very reasonable, I love getting the "Original $5 Pollo Bowl" comes with your choice of chips or flour/corn tortillas and a drink! That's as good as a deal you'll get. Dining area is always pretty clean.
This is my favorite of all local fast food chain restaurants, rivaling the best independents. Consistent quality, the tastiest food by far, served by friendly staff in a clean environment. All the food is fresh, flavorful, and if you choose, you can go very healthy. This is the place with food so "real", that you wonder why you have eaten anywhere else. It is also the only place that has great music in the rest room, lol.
Had a delivered catering order and very satisfied. The food tasted great and there was not one complaint from our group. The recommended serving sizes were accurate and in fact, very generous, unlike other establishments. The young man who delivered our food was terrific and a great representative of this location.
The restaurant has a small seating area, but it's clean and neat. The food is served quickly and is delicious. One note: for most meals a drink costs extra. However, all meals are reasonably priced, and are large enough to fill the average appetite.
I had to update My Review. The Food is still good especially the Chicken. But Customer Service is Rude and has been the last 4 times My Family and I have gone. We mostly Dine in but the last 2 times We did the Drive thru. The Male Manager asked Us to Park and they would bring Our order out to Us. When they did they had messed up Our order and We had to go in to get them to give Us Our Order. It was Not Busy in the Restaurant - No one was taking orders but When I went to the Counter They Employees Ignored Me. It was Rude. Finally a employee came over and they fixed the order but with Attitude~ I don't know why? What were We just supposed to eat whatever they gave Us? Anyways My Family and I enjoy EL Pollo Loco so I hope Customer Service gets better.
Below is my review from 2 years ago! But today it's different!!! This evening we came for dinner and dined in! Farm cry from my last review because it's changed so much, and that should not be. A chain food place should stay consists. But today I don't have a good review to offer. We ordered a Meal for 2 and the photos of what we ordered showed 2 legs 🦵 and 2 thighs, and 2 sides, and 2 churros, and 2 side salads. 🥗 What we got was 1 plate with broccoli 🥦 and the chicken. Then on the other tray the 2 side salads and the churros 😋, the salads had a beer light splash of dressing (unlike the advertised photos). No extra plate even though it was 2 meals. Oh and 2 plastic bags with corn tortillas. So the salad dressing was not even close to being enough so my husband went up and asked for some dressing, they said they had to charge $1.08 for the dressing, he explained that there was very little dressing on the Saks. He was told that it is portioned and that's all you can have unless you pay for more! I can tell you for sure that is a LIE because with 2 salads and one of them had 1 and 1/2 more dressing than the other, so portioned is not possible!! Lies!!! So he paid the $1.08 for the extra dressing. I told him not to ask for the second plate, they would probably want $$$$. The chicken skin was so soft that when I took a bite it felt like I was eating uncooked skin, yuk! I spit it out. The churros were good. There was not enough broccoli for 2 people so it wasn't 2 sides of broccoli 😒 🙄 😑... so I will remember if I come back I will order 2 different sides. Needless to say, not a good experience today. I have owned and operated 3 restaurants in the past. So I am passionately about eating out and how the advertise etc... I never misled my customers and I never had a complaint. 2 years ago I made this review with a 5 star rating: Cooked just like I asked them to! This next time in the Santa Maria El Pollo Loco, the rice was hard and i could not eat it. But the rest was good.
Came to this location and my chicken breast had a clear film under the skin wich was also soggy. I wouldn't recommend.
Like other reviews, the food itself was fine. It's just that the past 2-3 the crew hasn't been able to fully complete my order and kept missing one item or another. This last time was the last straw for me because they've never been able to complete an order on time when I go through the app given a 30-40 min headstart. I've been left without THREE sides this last order which I believe was substituted with a protein bowl. Now I understand they were in a dinner rush and asked if switching from leg and thigh to mixed was ok and that was great. But I wasn't aware of this switch, if intentional, but it was not ok for the quantity that was missing. What's worse that I called to ask what could be done and while they were supposedly checking for my order they hung up on me. I attempted to call again after a little and no one picked up the phone and I haven't received a call back. The quality of the food is fine but do triple check your bag before leaving this store.
Friendly enough, but they have gotten my order wrong the last 3 times I've been there. I'm just not going back. I'm a santa maria native, and need to be quick on my lunch. I don't have time to fix THEIR mistakes for them. It's literally their job, and they are not good at it.
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About El Pollo Loco
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305 Betteravia Rd, Santa Maria, CA 93454
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305 Betteravia Rd, Santa Maria, CA 93454
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