Tower Pizza

Tower Pizza recently went through a $ 70,000 renovation to become ‘Black Bird Bistro– serving Tower Pizza’. The interior was impressive for such a small space. The food and service were complete failures.
I had 30 minutes to grab a quick lunch in Rochester. It was 11:30am and since most restaurants open at noon, I chose the open Black Bird Bistro. In my time crunch, I immediately ordered a $ 9 antipasto salad, thinking it will be quick since it doesn’t have to be cooked. The waitress then disappeared. During the next 25 minutes, 2 other customers came in and left because the one waitress was MIA. At the 25 minute point, the waitress returned stating they were out of mushrooms and balsamic dressing. I asked for Greek dressing as a replacement and for my order to be packaged to go, since my time was almost up. As I ventured off for my day of appointments and errands, I had a few minute break to enjoy my salad. However, there was no fork. I did not want to waste a $ 9 salad, so I carried the bag around for the rest of the day.
When I finally got home to enjoy my salad with a fork, I was in for more disappointment. The antipasto salad was tiny and was 99% lettuce. There were 3 small nickel size pieces of salami and a couple of slices of ham. The dressing was incorrect and contained cheese (after I specially stated my dairy allergy). The $ 4 small antipasto salad from Hungry Howies is twice the size and has 4−5x amounts of toppings.
I really want to support the new business, and am hoping this experience was a fluke. My friends had positive experiences here and I will be back to retry Black Bird Bistro.

Worst experience ever! If there were zero stars to pick, I would have chosen that.
I called in a pizza order at 6:30 pm to have ready at 8:30 and first the bartender couldn’t find it in their computer. Then when she asked the owner Shelley about it, she found and told me it would be about five minutes. All of a sudden when the owner went into the kitchen the cook started yelling and swearing and came out to the bar and yelled to everyone if they had a cigarette? Then someone else comes in for a pizza carry out and they give him his. A few minutes later mine comes out and I decide to check it and it was the guys who just left. So the waitress goes outside to find him. When he finally comes back, they thought I would take it. I said I wanted a new one and the other customer just wanted his money back. So less than ten minutes later, my pizza is ready. I know from going there a lot that it takes at least 20 minutes to cook their pizzas. I asked if it was the same pizza and of course the bartender said no. If it just came out it would have been piping hot and it wasn’t. I just took it and left. Luckily I got my money. When I got home, the salad I ordered was wrong. Never again!!! They do not know how to run a business, always out of something, today it was their featured merlot. People, save your time.

My husband and I have been ordering from Tower Pizza for about 20 years — about once or twice a quarter. Tower has always been one of my favorites. I know everyone has their favorite pizza and it’s probably not for everyone. I like the thinner crust and the sauce is tasty. The pizza has been consistent over the years. So my rating isn’t based on just the pizza (which I still enjoy) — now the service has to be factored in.
In the last few months, new owners have taken over. It’s no longer Tower Pizza. They’ve remodeled it to be a bistro with pizza. They also probably lost two pretty loyal customers tonight when we had to wait 45+ minutes for our carry-​out pizza and then they sent us out the door with the wrong pizza. We returned a few minutes later and took the pizza back after we checked the it in the car and discovered it wasn’t the pizza we ordered. When my husband took it in and asked for his money back, the manager girl told my husband she was «still figuring things out». There was another girl in the restaurant who had waited for longer than we had for her pizza and I think we were returning her pizza. I’m pretty sure that the other review of Tower dated 12÷13÷12 is the girl who’s pizza we walked out with then returned. Just not a great experience at all

Tower Bistro…
No bistro menu Sunday to Wednesday…
No offer of a high chair (we did not feel like taking someone’s shoes off it and fetch it ourselves)
No-​one to take drinks order…
Can’t review the food, we walked out…

This hole rounds out the triad of dirty places that claim to be the «best pizza in town»
(Renshaw in Clawson and Como’s in Ferndale are the first two)
Don’t go… absolutely laughable that this is even pizza… pretty damn disgusting.
It’s just that simple. Lived in downtown Rochester for 4 years and this is the worst.
Just downright nasty. (Well, Sir Pizza up on Tienken would be a good challenger to the Rochester nasty pizza crown) We make fun of their «Best» sign every time we are in town.
Go across the street and get a pie at Kruse and Muer… or Jets is right up the street.

I’ve eaten better microwaveable frozen pizza from supermarkets. Aside from how awful the pizza and service are, I was charged $ 1.50 for an Arizona Iced Tea that costs $.99 all across America.

While this Rochester pizza joint may make for great late-​night eats, I wouldn’t go there sober.
You need a roll of paper towels to soak up the grease on their pizza, and the place smells like cigarette smoke.

Pizza is like sex in many ways. Sometimes, you just need it when you don’t even realize you do. Sometimes, you just take what you can get.
I stopped into Tower Pizza for two slices on a particularly rough day, seeking some good old-​fashioned comfort food. Or maybe even anger food.
The portions were huge, which improved my mood quite a bit. At $ 2.25, a slice equals a quarter of a medium-​sized pizza. Nothing like a generous slice to put your mind at ease.
The flavor, however, is nothing new or exciting. It’s greasy pizza, and I’m pretty sure I could taste the shortening used to grease the pan at the end of one slice.
I’ve had better; I’ve had worse. Tower Pizza was there when I needed it, and I left in a better mood. If I smoked, I probably would have lit one up after that experience.

I went there once for curiosity’s sake and haven’t been back. The sauce is too sweet for me, and the mozzarella was lacking in flavor. I threw out the leftovers, which is almost sacrilegious to me, but I couldn’t justify the calories or the time I would waste eating it.

Tower has gone downhill over the past few years.
Slices used to be $ 1. Now $ 2.25.
The sauce is still icky. Cheap cheese that doesn’t melt well. Skimpy on toppings, but those aren’t great either.
Several times our pizza was handed to us nearly raw and obviously undercooked. They remade it the exact same way.
Also, the girl working didn’t know how to slice a pizza and asked me if I would do it myself.
Also, they tend to close whenever they want to, so don’t rely on their posted hours of operation.
Wow…great service…

Hell yes it’s the best pizza in Rochester!
Priced well, made extremely well… I have absolutely no complaints about this place. Their portions leave a lot to be desired with other «cardboard» pizzerias, as do the heaviness of the toppings.
But as I’ve said many times over, it’s the sauce that makes or breaks a pizza for me. Tower’s sauce is phenomenal!
And it’s definitely true; they have Christmas lights! Can you really say no to Christmas lights?
The only place that could beat out Tower as far as laugh-​factor is concerned is the Mellow Mushroom… which isn’t even in Michigan yet. Hmmm.

I used to live above this place. OK pizza, I guess… their real draw at the time (around 1998 – 2000) was the nitrous oxide they were selling to kids by the tank. By kids, I mean raver kids. These kids would get it from Tower Pizza in bulk so they could take it to rave parties in Detroit and make a killing off of selling balloons full of the stuff. It was funny to see (from my upstairs window) dudes coming out of this place EVERY DAY with huge tanks full of medical grade gas on a hand truck.
Eventually, some concerned parents called the press and they did an undercover report kind of thing where they sent in a decoy with a hidden camera to buy some nitrous… and the folks at Tower took the bait. It was all on the 11 O’Clock news. Hilarious.
By the way, they always charged me full price with no discount for everything that I would order from them. I thought this was pretty lame, considering that I was paying them monthly rent for the apartment. They could have at least thrown in a couple nitrous balloons!

This place is a welcome haven from the slow creeping of chain pizza restaurant boredom. It’s a small place, with kitschy décor that probably hasn’t changed much since opening (including Christmas stuff up all year long!). They still use a mechanized cash register and do hand receipts — something that is pretty unique. However, the pizza is wonderful and has a great taste that defines Tower from others.
Do yourself a favor and try this place out — it’s local and «real», not fake and corporate.