First, I want to point out that I am an event coordinator so organizing this kind of small event is what I do for a living – I know how it should work. I found the Carlyle Club on ProjectWedding.com and was ecstatic to see the pictures – the venue looked like it was going to match my theme perfectly. The few reviews on the site were raving about the funky décor and great food. My first warning sign should have been the owner’s delayed response to all my emails and phone calls. While he responded immediately to my initial request for information, it took him an average of 2 – 4 days to respond to my communications from then on. He is unreliable and does not answer his phone or email consistently.
We had some trouble getting our schedules to work out, but we finally had a first meeting on December 3rd. In the email he sent me when we set our meeting date, the owner confirmed that he had put our date on hold (October 15th, 2011) to reserve the space for us. In the initial meeting I asked all the normal questions that an event coordinator would ask, plus those of a bride. The owners were incredibly nice and insisted that they could fit in any request I made – “we’re very flexible and just want your event to go well,” they kept saying.
I made several requests for additional information in that first meeting. I had to email the owner requesting that information 3 times – it took him over a week to email me a sample contract to review. I also requested a sample invoice and customized package pricing to review – he never sent that to me. I didn’t see that until our 2nd meeting a few weeks later. I created a customized contract based on the sample contract he gave me. Again, the owners assured me that our date (October 15th, 2011) was reserved (please note that it was also explicitly labeled in the sample contract I gave them), that we would have the right of first refusal should anyone request the date, and that they were “so flexible”. We were a little concerned about signing a contract for a specific number of people because the vast majority of our guests were coming from overseas and we still didn’t have a good idea of how many could make it. The owner was INSISTENT that the date was reserved for us and “you don’t need to sign the contract now – let’s just wait until you’ve got a better idea of the headcount.” We told the owners that we were in 100% to us the Carlyle Club for both our wedding ceremony and reception and were grateful they were so flexible and willing to work with us.
AWESOME right?
2 weeks ago I got an email from the owner and was mortified to find out that he had let another party sign a contract for our date without giving us any kind of notice. This was the vague note he sent me: I hope you had a great New Year. Just checking in to see if you have made any final decision on the wedding recption at the Carlyle Club. Please let me know as soon as you can. Thanks.
I emailed him right back and asked him to please contact me right away, to send me a contract so we could sign our date so there was no confusion. It took him a week to respond to me. Despite the fact that he had confirmed in an email that the date was reserved for us, despite having a sample contract with our date labeled in big bold red letters, and despite us having had 2 in-person meetings about my October 15th event, the owners signed out a contract for my event date and didn’t even bother to contact me until almost 2 weeks after the other party had signed for the club on the date they guaranteed us. These are not professional business-people or event coordinators, they’re just greedy and unethical people who happen to own a very nice venue.
In summary, don’t believe anything they say. Get everything in explicit detail in writing because as much as they’ll say they are “flexible and just want to help” they’ll do anything to sign a bigger party at your loss. Don’t expect for these people to be prompt in returning any communications you send them and keep that in mind for your big day. They’re unprofessional, unethical and unworthy of that venue. If you want to have an event at the Carlyle Club us an experienced event planner/wedding coordinator who has balls of brass to be cut-throat with these people and ensure that they don’t screw you over the way they screwed me and my family. If you are considering the venue, please take this post with you and and use it to your advantage. I want to do everything I can to ensure this never happens to anyone else and that the owners are held responsible for their unethical business practices.