And if I could make the word “finally” in bold italics with a red font, I would.
Mr. NexStitch and I have been together for 8 1/2 years and engaged for 3 1/2. No, that’s not a mis-type. We got engaged and decided to buy a house soon after. The market was doing all kinds of crazy things and we panicked thinking we wouldn’t get a house before the balloon burst. And once we were in, it was his priority to get the recording studio going.
Fast forward 3 years later and here we are.
So now we’re planning the wedding. A beach wedding in fact. I’m from the beach (or as those who aren’t from there call it “The Shore.”)
I’ve scouted out two venues to look at. Both of the places I’ve picked out have almost no information online, meaning that when I tried to find out about other people’s real weddings at either facility, I came up pretty much blank (even The Knot had nothing). So they haven’t been talked about at all online really, so I figured someone ought to do the dirty work for other brides researching online (hence the spamming of websites).
The first place is called, ”Windows on the Water at the Surfrider Club” and the other is called, ”Matisse.“ I placed calls to both on Monday, August 11th at about 1:30 in the afternoon. I was excited to say the least. It was a “Finally!” moment.
The first place, Windows on the Water never called us back.
So five days after placing my call (Friday), I called back and noticed an email address mentioned on the answering machine message. I sent off both an email and filled out their contact form (within minutes of each other and with the same exact message). I received an email from Ashli about 25 minutes after emailing:
I am sorry about that; we have been having some issues with our phones.
I have attached all of our menu and pricing information. We do customize every menu so what I have attached is more or less a general idea.
On Friday and Sunday’s we ask for 125 guests and on Saturday’s we ask for 145 guests.
Please feel free to contact me with any questions or to set up a tour of the facility and again I am sorry about the phones.
I emailed her back immediately and pointed out that I had been to a wedding at their facility a few years back which had only 50 people on a Friday night and that we’re looking for about 60 on a Sunday. And wouldn’t you know it, five days after receiving that email,
I still haven’t received a reply to my email. Shocking...
But Sunday morning, I received this message from the executive chef who answered the contact form I filled out:
I would like to begin by apologizing for not getting back to you, this is our busy season and we like all of our brides to have the utmost care in all of there weddings. We schedule all of appointments on Saturdays from 10:00 to 2:00 and on Sundays from 10:00 until 1:00. Please let us know what would be convenient for you.
Interestingly enough, my mother had called them in the Fall
(about 10 months ago) and
never received a call back either. Now, if your phones are broken for 10 months (or more),
wouldn’t you have gotten them fixed, considering that you’re running a business? That didn’t make sense to me. However, when I got the second message I couldn’t help but wonder, “Which is it? Bad phones or you’re just too busy?” Sounds like one hand isn’t shaking the other, so-to-speak.
Between that and looking at their outrageous prices and guest requirements, we’ve decided to skip this place. It’s a lovely place, but on my wedding day if you can’t bother to phone back some other anxious bride to make a simple appointment, you either don’t have enough staff or the staff you have can’t multi-task. Both of those are important for someone’s wedding day.
The second place, “Matisse” located in Belmar, NJ is a restaurant which does catering for weddings during the day.
They are located right on the boardwalk. This is the downside as their beach area isn’t private and you can have many strangers in bikinis and bad Hawaiian swim shorts waving in the background of your wedding photos.
They have an email address and contact form on their website. I tried filling out the contact form but it was broken. So after typing out some questions, I copied the info into an email and sent off my questions on the evening of August 9th, along with the information that their contact form was broken and how they could possibly fix it. When I heard nothing back, I called as I stated above on the following Monday. That was 10 days ago, and would you believe it, I‘ve heard nothing back from them. Not a phone call. Not an email.
How on earth do places like this stay in business when they can’t be bothered to pick up a phone or type out an email in a timely fashion? I’m not tear-your-hair-out-mad or anything, just miffed that this is how some people conduct their businesses. I can’t imagine!
