Chisholm Trail Rustic Venue Reviews

Thank you so much for your amazing review!!! It was a GREAT wedding and I really enjoyed you guys!!! 😊

Thank you SOOO much Samantha for the wonderful review of the Chisholm Trail Rustic Venue!!!! It makes smile from ear to ear to know that your special day was wonderful and you were pleased with everything!

THANK YOU, Sandra!! You & Ritchie are amazing! We soooo appreciate your trust in us and loved your wedding!!

Ohhhhhhh Kindle!! Thank you so very much for such a glowing review!! I adore you & Keegan so much!! 💓 Please come back and visit me soon!!

We are so excited too Hayley! Thank you so much for choosing us for your special day! ❤❤❤ It will be EPIC!!!!

Thank you SOOOO much, Samantha!!!! Your wedding was beautiful!!! Please come back and see us for anniversaries, okay?? Kathy

Thank you so much Cheryl!!

Thank you for taking the time to send your comments. First, let me say that I am sorry your day did not go as you had planned, and it is our desire that our guests have a great experience.

After being in business for over 7 years and hosting well over 250 successful weddings, I am proud to say that I've had an almost perfect record of excellent reviews....until this one.

In response into Kristen Slay's review, I want to say that I'm so disappointed that this bride didn't have a great experience at my venue. This is very upsetting.

My crew and I do our best to anticipate issues. Still, with all of the challenges & curveballs in this type of business, unfortunately, unforseen problems happen occasionally. In this case, there was no way to anticipate that the main electrical circuit breaker was failing.

Please allow me to explain how things went that weekend:

Friday 9/22/23
2 pm- Kristen & her family/friends arrived at the venue, had their rehearsal, and spent the night. No problems at all.

Saturday 9/23/23

11:42 am - I received a call from the coordinator that the electricity was off. I figured it was just a breaker, so I asked the coordinator if she could reset it, but she couldn't, so I jumped in my car. NOTE: I didn't receive her matron of honor's voicemail until later because I was en route to the venue. I spoke to her upon arriving and assured her I would make it right. She did not have to do anything extra at all, and she was with the bridal party in the Guesthouse the whole time (thankfully, the Guesthouse was never affected).

12:06 pm - I arrived at the venue, flipped the breaker & the power came back on. However, the breaker popped off again 30 minutes later, so I knew there was a problem. I immediately called an emergency electrician, who was there within 43 minutes.

12:49 pm - The electrician arrived and told me the whole circuit panel was going out and there was nothing he could do right then without shutting off the electricity the rest of the day to fix it. This was not an option.

It was a sweltering day, and my mission was to find a temporary solution to sustain power so the wedding & reception could go on as planned.

2:15 pm - I called around and was able to rent two gas generators, and my assistant went to pick them up. In the meantime, all I could do was flip the breaker back on every time it popped off (which happened about every 30 minutes).

3:30p.m - The generators were delivered and set-upset up outside. The electricity was off for about 40 minutes (not all at once) and another hour before I arrived = so in total, the electricity was off for less than 2 hours total during the 48-hour venue rental.

The electricity never went off again after the generators were set-up at 4pm.

4:45 pm - I hired a 2nd electrician to come and assess the situation. He was able to switch some things around that were double plugged in by the caterer & the DJ, which helped alleviate some of the electrical burden so that we could unplug one of the generators. The generator behind the barn was only used from 4 pm-5:15 pm. It was turned off before the ceremony started at 5:30pm and never turned on again. The second generator (on the other side of the venue) was only needed for one additional hour after that.

6 pm- While not perfect in the eyes of this bride, the wedding and reception did go ahead as planned and all the air conditioners & lights were working perfectly. The wedding & the reception were both beautiful and her guests seemed to have a wonderful time too.

Sunday 9/24/23

11:37 am - The bride & bridal party left the property.

Please allow me to address the other items that were mentioned in the review......

We are a 'rustic' venue (it's in our name), and the venue was built with historic materials from the 1860s, and that is why people love the authenticity of the venue.

I will review and discuss your concerns with my staff to see that they don’t happen again.

This property is FAR from neglected. The venue is consistently serviced by a monthly pest control company and a weekly cleaning crew that thoroughly cleans the venue. Additionally, we employ a maintenance crew four days a week to keep up the entire property.

The electric outlets and all wiring are routinely inspected to maintain the building code standards and meet Cleburne requirements.

Because we are a rural venue that sits on over 4 acres of fields, we actively service the property and buildings for pests on a routine basis. Still, nature can elude us. As a result of Kristen’s feedback, we’ve increased our efforts by installing sonar pest control devices. This has never been an issue before but we are closely monitoring it.

I have alerted my maintenance crew to be on the lookout for any nails/screws on the property.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t notified of the cake concern until later in the evening, or I would have suggested the cake be moved the cake into the Guesthouse refrigerator if it was starting to fall. Thank goodness the cake was still so beautiful for the pictures.

Our venue has always offered 3 options for chairs at our weddings, just as I did for this bride: hire my crew to move the chairs for your event for the very reasonable fee of $50, assign someone in your group to help move the chairs, or have each guest bring their own chair into the barn (my least favorite option).

We are making a change to alleviate any issues going forward. So, all future weddings will include the nominal $50 fee, so my crew will move all the chairs in & out for guests.

As a conscientious owner, my job is to assess the problems and try to fix them as quickly as possible so my guests can hold a successful event. This is what we tried to do for Kristen.

The bridal party enjoyed the venue for 48-hours, from Friday to Sunday. We attempted to support them as a team and did everything possible to make the wedding weekend successful.

I was surprised to receive a call from Kristen one week later (not the next day) asking me for a full refund or I would receive a bad review.

As a reasonable concession, I offered a free weekend and even a partial refund for any troubles....but she declined.

I am so disappointed that this bride was not fully satisfied. Looking back however, there was nothing we could have anticipated in advance or done differently that would have changed this bride's level of satisfaction.

I wish Kristen & Jeremy all the best in their new marriage.

Kathy Cannella - Owner
Chisholm Trail Rustic Venue
Cell: 972-898-4650