This is a review of our experience of having our wedding cocktails & dinner reception at the Sheraton Palo Alto, and working with Kristina Tobin as our wedding coordinator.
We were looking for an indoor venue that was close to our wedding ceremony at the Memorial Church, andwe found many positive reviews on Yelp about the Sheraton and specially about Kristina, so we decided to check it out.
From the moment we met Kristina, we know that if we had our reception there, it would be in good hands. She was friendly, easy to work with, organized, and extremely professional. Every positive comments about her that I read was true!! She answered all of our questions thoroughly and made some great recommendations. One of the main reason that we chose the Sheraton was because of Kristina.
I enjoyed working with Kristina because she listened to all of our concerns and addressed everything appropriately. During the sales phase, she quoted us the total costs - including gratuity and taxes - so we could have an accurate estimate of the total costs of the reception. During the planning phase, she worked with us on the dinner menu, other vendors, and the reception agenda. Between my husband and I, we sent many emails to Kristina, and she promptly responded to all of our emails. And on the day of the wedding, she decorated the room accordingly and everything when smoothly as planned (as I knew it would under her management). In addition, she was able to secure a room for us at the Westin, and we arrived to find chocolate covered strawberries and champagne waiting for us in our suite!
One last note is that I was able to use a conference room to get ready in the morning, and we also used a banquet room at the Westin to take some photos in the morning because it was raining outside. Everything turned out well and it was very nice of the hotel to be so accommodating to us. I am so glad to have a "plan B" since having a wedding in March was unpredictable weather-wise.
In summary, we had a wonderful experience at the Sheraton and working with Kristina. Our guests had a great time, and everything worked beautifully. It truly made our day less stressful and more enjoying knowing that we were in good hands at the Sheraton.
Additional details: We selected the "Willow" package. Our main courses included the Hawaiian Sea Bass and the Beef Tenderloin. I thought the food at the reception turned out better than when we did the tasting (before we signed the contract). We were not able to sample the food at the cocktail hour, but everything turned out well. We selected the crab cakes, coconut shrimp, and cheese plate during the cocktail hour. We selected the cake from Satura, which turned out to be excellent! (Our guest had the most comments about our cake.) One of the main concern that I had was having an open bar (because I know friends who went over budget by 10K because of an open bar), but everything worked out just fine and we were even under budget in our estimate. Since most of my guests were from out of town, we negotiated group rates at the Sheraton and at the Westin. Most of our friends thought spending the extra $ was well worth the cost.