Monday, June 28, 2010

Vendor Review - Venue: Boulevard Banquet Hall

I figured if I'm starting with vendor reviews, I should probably start with the most 'exciting.' Like I mentioned before, there are several of you who follow me on Twitter that have heard parts of my story about our venue. And I've promised a long detailed post to fill in the rest of the details, but really this post is more for any brides who landed on this blog because they were considering using Boulevard Banquet Hall as their wedding reception venue. Even if you don't read any further, please just don't make the same mistake I did by choosing to hold our reception here. 

If you've been following along for awhile you heard about finding the venue. It started out great because the owner was super accommodating and friendly and was even friends with David's cousins. He (Blake) was really laid back and was open to my decorating ideas. It was a perfect fit for a DIY bride like myself. He would basically provide the building, table, and chairs, and I could figure out the rest. This was exactly what we were looking for in a venue. We'd already chosen a couple of our other vendors and I knew I wanted to do a lot of stuff myself - details, decorating, etc. 

A few months after signing the contract, we found out that Blake hired a 'coordinator' to help out. It turns out she wanted to start offering (and I use that term loosely) package deals which would include other vendors and her planning, decorating, and coordinating services. Obviously we weren't going to be very interested. We'd put down a deposit on our photographer, we'd already met with our cake lady, and we'd just signed a contract with our DJ. We also knew what we were doing for food, so there really weren't any vendors that we still needed. Since she was just starting to offer these packages, the vendors weren't anyone well-known or high quality and they weren't giving her very good discounts. Had we went with one of her packages we would've been settling wth vendors we didn't really like and paying more than we were for the vendors we wanted. As soon as we (quite nicely) said we weren't interested in her package deals after meeting with her for almost an hour one day (and over our lunch breaks even) she didn't want much to do with us. There was obvious tension, and even more so when she later decided that we'd have to pay her to use the decorations that I'd already spoken with Blake about even though she wasn't even in the picture when we signed our contract.

We basically decided to just figure it out closer to the wedding. Closer as in the week of the wedding. David called to talk to Blake the Monday before our wedding and didn't get an answer. Instead he got a call back a few days later from one of the vendors connected with the venue. The guy thought David was calling because he was interested in booking the hall for an event until he realized that we were holding our reception there that weekend. It turns out that the vendors were now all co-owners of the venue and Blake is no longer in the picture. We never received a phone call or even an email telling us about the change in management. That's exactly what you want to find out 3 days before your wedding.

When we arrived at the venue to decorate on Friday it was insanely hot in the building. It had been upper 90's for several days, but when we asked why the AC wasn't on they told us that 'since we hadn't paid for Friday the AC wouldn't be turned on until Saturday'. They told us that it would only take about 10 minutes (?!?) to cool down the room that would be holding our 275 guests. The whole time we were decorating we got glares from the owners. No one helped us or even really talked to us until we were having an issue with the projector that we were going to use to play slideshows during the father-daughter and mother-son dances. They had to have Blake come over and figure it out, and that was the only time we saw him the whole weekend. The ladder (that was a liability issue even though we'd already signed a contract with a liability clause) was sitting out, so MOH A's boyfriend used it to hang my paper lanterns and none of them said a word. (Although I guess David's little sister heard the 'coordinator' threaten to tell him to get down.. She never did.) We asked again that they turn on the AC earlier than 5 minutes before the reception started, and we set up a time for my dad and SIL to bring some stuff (ice, last minute stuff, etc) over on Saturday.

When my dad and SIL got to the venue on Saturday at 1:30 (less than 4 hours before the reception was scheduled to start) the AC was still not turned on. When David and I arrived at the venue it was insanely hot in there. We were both sweating and so was everyone else. My SIL went to look at the thermostat and it was at 87 degrees. We later found out they had turned on the AC, it blew a breaker, and it shut off. It was over 95 degrees outside. Our guests were hot, my friend had to leave with her little boy because he was so restless due to the heat, and I'm sure there were plenty of other people that didn't stay as long as they would have because of the lack of AC. When we went around the tables and talked to our guests almost every single one of them said something about how hot it was. 

I pretty much ignored everything going on and enjoyed my reception. I had the time of my life and my family and friends did SUCH a good job of not telling me if anything went wrong. It turns out that two of the 'owners' were walking around in tshirts and shorts, eating our food and drinking our alcohol. Now I wouldn't have an issue with them fixing plates for themselves since they were there 'working' as security (making sure the parking lot was fine, not letting kids play outside, etc). However, they obviously made enough of a scene that people were concerned - David's brother/best man told us later that more than one person asked who they were. At the end of the night, 2 whole PANS of extra food from the refridgerator were missing. That's is simply inexcusable.

But you know, I could still get over everything up until this point. It wasn't a good experience, but it wasn't enough to send me over the edge (to writing a novel of a review like this and posting our terrible experience on every website possible). It was what happened after the reception that really did it for me. The two 'owners' were there while my family was cleaning up afterward. Our families were tired so the two guys made a deal with David's brother to finish cleaning up for $100. They tore down some of the paper lanterns and then told David's brother that he needed to get up on the ladder and cut down the fishing wire that was holding them. His brother said he'd take the money back then if he was still going to be the one cleaning up. I guess the guys blew up when he said that yelling about how my family had been complaining all night (uhh, with good reason!). Long story short, one of the guys yelled/cussed at my MOM, in front of children no less, and asked David's brother if he wanted to 'take it outside' to deal with the issue. He honestly wanted to physically fight him outside. A (drunk) business owner who wants to fight one of his customers. Really? It's so ridiculous it's almost unbelievable, but it's all true. 

The 'customer service' that we received from the employees of Boulevard Banquet Hall was absolutely awful. No one should be treated like that, ESPECIALLY your customers. None of them know anything about running a business, which was made very clear by their actions. I would not recommend them to anyone, and I'll discourage every bride I meet from booking them for their reception. I don't care if they usually provide decent service to brides who are willing to hand over their wedding day to them. If they provided this type of service to us, it's bound to happen again.

My rating: F

If you made it this far, thanks!! (Now you ladies know why I couldn't tell the whole story through tweets!) I promise none of my other vendor reviews will be this long. Had to get this one out of the way while it was all still fresh in my mind!

Anyone else have a terrible experience with their venue?

20 comments:

  1. Wow! I will definitely keep that in mind for the future! How ridiculous!

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  2. Oh no that is horrible! I'm glad it didnt ruin your special day though!

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  3. Wow. I can't believe this happened! Good for you for spreading the word about how horrible they are.

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  4. That's awful! I'm sorry you had to deal with that. I do hope you posted that review to wedding wire and any other vendor review site you can find for your area.

    Thankfully we didn't have to deal with any vendor drama like that on our wedding day though two months beforehand we had an issue with our original photography company that we ended our contract with.

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  5. We didn't do typical stuff so really we didn't have any contracts that vendors could f up. I feel horrible that this happened to you!!! Continue to spread the word (respectfully, as you did here) and look into legal action to recoup some of your money. For example, you paid for a venue with AC. Stay with it! I know it must be nice to let go a bit because it's over, but you could possibly save other brides!

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  6. Oh my goodness; that is absolutely inexcusable! When in the world do you have to book a place for two days to make sure the air conditioner is on the day of your event? And a drunk "owner" has no business being at anyone's wedding. That is just terrible.

    Glad you wrote this review; you should post it everywhere you can find... but you should also let them know you're considering legal action (if you are)--considering they stole from you and threatened to fight one of your family members, I would definitely be trying to get some of my money back. Negative reviews are great because they will help other brides in the future, but if you want anything back, letting them know you're planning to file a claim is the most helpful.

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  7. Good job on writing a well-written review. It's a shame it had to happen—AND ON YOUR WEDDING DAY!—but hopefully this will help other brides not book with them.

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  8. I feel so bad for you :( I know what you mean about a frustrating experience with a vendor. Seems like it happens at almost every wedding - there's one vendor who just doesn't follow through. For my sister, it was her DJ, and she complained and got half of her money back. Thankfully, none of the guests knew how much he screwed up but we did.

    For us, it was our photographer. Though I admit I do have some gorgeous shots...but there were also a lot of problems with him...and if you read my post, there were a ton of crappy shots as well as a ton of missing shots!

    Our venue though was amazing! And our other vendors were so great to work with. I only had one issue a few months before the wedding with my hair/makeup stylist but she made up for it in the end and it was fine.

    It is so hard to deal with venues that have help like that. I would definitely complain and tell them you want some sort of compensation for the ridiculous amount of uncomfortableness, unprofessionalism and vulgarities you had to endure. You may not get anything...but the air conditioning issue alone would make me tell them to give me a refund! I've been to weddings in the summer with no a/c and they are just so bad to sit through. It's unfortunate, but at least you still seemed to have a good time :)

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  9. Wow - that's incredible!! I agree with kj - you should DEF spread the word and see if you get a response (although sounds like these people aren't accommodating business owners who would make good) - I'd def. look into some sort of contractual infraction because you certainly didn't get what you paid for and you weren't informed as to the changing of the management. You're definitely entitled to some sort of refund.

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  10. O my god that is hell. I can't even believe you had to deal with this on your wedding day. I'm glad to hear you had the time of your life - I hope those people rot in hell. (And thats not really a joke right now! I'm so mad at them for you!)

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  11. I have ran into one bad vendor so far, hopefully I don't come across any more. It sounds like you handled it in a professional and respectful manner, unlike them!

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  12. Oh my word! I am so sorry about your experience with this venue! What idiots! They won't be opened for business too much longer...word will get out!

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  13. Whoa - thorough review! I LIVE by product reviews, I hardly buy/use any product/service without a bunch of good reviews!! Yours will be so helpful for the next future Mrs =)

    Thanks for entering my giveaway and following! Love your blog!

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  14. That's horrible! No wonder I thought you were sweating in your reception photos. I thought it was just from much dancing/partying, but now I see it's the venue owners' fault. That's so unprofessional of them.

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  15. I'm so sorry this happened. I am glad you were able to have a wonderful day despite this bad venue.

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  16. Laura didn't exaggerate one bit, unfortunately! The day after the wedding, both her new brother-in-law and I wrote reviews on as many sites as we could - great minds think alike! But we hadn't really talked about suing. Now I think we'll consider it. We haven't even gotten the deposit back.

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  17. Oh I hate that for you! Not at all something you should have to deal with ever, but most especially on your wedding day. I'm so sorry it turned out that way, and mad props to you for being able to ignore it all!

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  18. This makes me soooo livid for you! Seriously, people these days never fail to surprise me with how awful they can be! I'm glad that you were able to enjoy your day despite this huge problem!

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  19. Did you pay for the venue on a credit card? If so, you should dispute the card.

    We had a bad experience with our venue as well. It is a very upscale country club that was very expensive. I had 200 guests at my wedding. They set all of the tables 2 guests short, so I had 40 guests that did not have seats. It took them an hour to get everybody seated, and during that hour they wouldn't serve anybody from our "open bar." Our grand entrance was an hour late, which had a cascade effect on the rest of the wedding. There are other things that happened also.

    We met with a lawyer regarding this, and sent a letter that said that we were going to place a dispute, and the venue contacted us immediately. We met with them and they are giving us a 50% refund rather than going to court.

    E-mail me if you want details of what we said in our letter, what our lawyer said, etc. You definitely have a right to be upset!!!

    Disappointed.bride.23@gmail.com

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  20. Oh wow. Wow. I'm like so late getting caught up on this, but wow. I'm so sorry for all of this. Completely and utterly unacceptable. It's disgusting, actually. I hope you get your money back, but even then that won't really help the disappointment I'm sure you must feel. Thankfully it didn't affect your time at your reception, but man...so upsetting to hear about you and your family being treated like that. Keep us updated on what happens...

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