As promised in an earlier thread, here are my vendor reviews. Almost all of our vendors were simply amazing. Sorry I use awesome and amazing so much, those words just describe things so well. Details below
Ceremony/Reception Venue: Troon North Golf Club A+
Troon is such an amazing and beautiful venue. The ceremony site looks onto mountains and desert landscape with lush green grass, a brick stage (of sorts, not sure what to call it) and a fireplace. It is truly amazing. The ballroom has floor to ceiling windows and looks over the entire lit up city when it gets dark. What is just as good as the view is the staff. Amber, the event director/catering manager, is absolutely wonderful. She organized everything. I mean everything. I didn't lift a finger except for finding vendors and telling them who to contact. The staff was so friendly, especially the bartender (Ben) and the wait staff during the reception. They made sure we had everything we needed and wanted, and were polite and friendly to every single guest. Amber was my sole contact at Troon and even on the weekends when I would email her, she would email me back the same day (unless she was out of town). I had absolutely no problems communicating with her. I cannot say enough good things. Troon was absolutely the right choice for us
Officiant: Phil Waring, AZ Ministers A+
Phil and his wife Gwen are fantastic. Gwen was the one that I kept in contact with throughout the planning and she never ever took more than 24 hours to respond to any questions or concerns (she usually took less than 8 hours to respond, actually). She always let Phil know if I had a question that she couldn't answer (which was rare) and he would answer. On the day of the wedding, Phil arrived early and was as light spirited and hilarious as always. He is so incredibly funny, but when it was time to be serious, he was. He and H made jokes to each other the whole time before I walked down the aisle, and when it came time for Phil to do the ceremony, he was fantastic and had almost everyone in tears throughout the ceremony. One other thing that I absolutely love is that just before he pronounced us H&W, he walked to the end of the aisle and gave a short reading about love. He does this so that he won't be in the photos of us kissing and I think that is a very thoughtful thing to do. Not that I would have minded, but now our photos of us kissing after being pronounced are just us. That makes my heart happy
If you are looking for an officiant, I HIGHLY recommend getting into contact with Phil and Gwen.
www.azministers.com
Florist: Butterfly Petals A
Amanda with Butterfly Petals is awesome. She works with any budget and actually came in several hundred dollars below our budget which was awesome. I had absolutely no problems communicating with her and our flowers were SO beautiful. We did a run through which I was ok with, but hoped the flowers for the wedding would blow me away. And they did. We used mostly roses and the arrangements were gorgeous! I wish I had photos of them right now, but I will post them as soon as I can so you can see for yourself
Dresses (Bridal and Bridesmaid): Azteca A
I know some people don't like the service that they have received at Azteca, but I had phenomenal service every time I went there. I got my dress and the bridesmaids purchased their dresses there. Most of us also had alterations there as well. My dress was perfect. I couldn't have asked for better and I got an amazing deal. I am extremely happy that I purchased my dress there. I always went during the week, mostly in the evening and saw very few other people there when I was there. They say that weekends are super busy, but I never dealt with a crowd. I was usually helped by the owner herself and she was there every time I was. Her brother (co-owner maybe) was also there each time and he usually helped us check out and made sure we were happy before we left. They are great.
Tuxes: Mens Warehouse A
To be perfectly honest, Mens Warehouse was my absolute last choice. We bought H a suit to wear, we tried to find the GM suits to rent, we tried to find other rental companies, but in the end we went with MW because everyone was scattered around the country and apparently rental suits are kind of hard to find. As my grade my implies, they were great. They were super easy to work with, everyone got what they needed and nothing was wrong with anything when we picked the tuxes up and dropped them off. The only complaint I have is that, at times, the staff doesn't seem super excited to be there. However, putting that into perspective, they probably aren't super excited to be there all the time. They were never rude or unfriendly though. Not a bad experience at all.
Invitations: Pink Orchid Invites (Etsy) A+
Caroline owns/runs Pink Orchid Invites on Etsy. I really wanted pocketfold invites, but didn't want to pay a ton and wanted them mostly or totally customized. Caroline was amazing to work with. We had completely customized invitations, exactly what we wanted for no more (cost wise) than ordering regular non-pocketfold invites off of a site like WeddingPaperDivas. Our invites are so fantastic and I am so excited that we have a few extras to frame. They are beautiful. Our invites are also now offered on her website which is exciting because I liked them SO much and I am glad to know that she liked them enough to offer them to others as well.
Cake: Bamboo Bakery C
Bamboo Bakery is a little hard to communicate with because they are Viet Namise and have heavy accents. However, they are very nice and friendly. The cake tasted awesome and was beautiful. However, the reason for the lower grade is because the colors on the cake were wrong. It still matched out colors which is why the grade is not lower, but there was navy icing on the cake (which I didn't think they could do, but honestly looked fantastic) and it was supposed to be white. To be clear, it was a white cake that was supposed to have white icing details, but the detailing was navy. They also put the topper in the wrong place. It was supposed to be on the 2nd tier (of 3) because it was so large but they put it on top instead. They also put business cards out on the cake table which I'm SO glad I saw before the ceremony and snatched up before anyone else saw them. That was the hugest no-no of all. I can't say that I will continue recommending them because of these things. However, the cake did taste amazing and was beautiful.
DJ: Chris Mitchell A+
I had a little bit of difficulty communicating with Chris, but he was awesome! In his defense, he has a family, a job and moved while we were planning. He made the party! He did our ceremony which went as well as possible. He had all the music I requested for the ceremony. Then, the reception started. It was so awesome! During dinner he played older music that every single parent and grandparent in the room came and told us they loved! It was music that was appropriate and that they recognized! They all loved it. Then, when dinner was over and the dancing started, he kept the party going all night! I cannot say enough good things. We saw him at a wedding which is how we got in touch. He is SUPER affordable (I'm talking nearly half of a full on DJ company) and we could not have asked for better! He even stayed an extra hour than what we contracted him for because everyone was still dancing and having such a great time. I would highly recommend him if you are looking for someone a little more affordable, but just as good as the DJ companies in the valley! dj@zandervix.com
Photographer: Radiant Photography A+
Photography was one of the most important things to us on our wedding day. We completely blew our budget on photography and it was totally worth it!!! Breanna and Scottie, who own and shoot for Radiant, are awesome! We got every single photo we asked for and so many more! They even set up a sneak peak of our photos during the reception on their computer and I am SO excited to see the rest now!!! Everyone thought they were amazing. And they stuck to the schedule so well that we had 20 minutes before the ceremony to just hang out and relax!! I am positive that once we get our photos I will be adding several more plus signs to my grade! Breanna and Scottie were also the ones who advised us to do a reveal/first look. It was the best decision for us and I am so beyond glad that we did it. I HIGHLY recommend checking them out! I cannot say enough wonderful things about them.
So hopefully these vendor reviews help you all through the planning process. Please let me know if you have questions or want contact info for any of the vendors I have reviewed here. I couldn't imagine things going better on our wedding day than they did and a lot of that is because of our amazing vendors. Good luck to all of you planning out there!!!