Venue Searching

We toured one, but that being said I did so much research on probably 50. We compared prices, size, packages, etc I honestly didn’t think the one we picked would be “the one”, but after we toured we knew.

3. The first was crazy out of budget due to some things the contact conveniently left out of our emails, the second was awesome but we wanted to look at the others on the list before booking, and the third was absolutely miserable so we immediately went to book the second.

We toured two and booked the second.

Thank you both. I've researched or contacted every local venue I found here on WW (that I was interested in obviously) along with Google searches and local Facebook groups. It just makes me nervous I guess! I don't have many options with such a limited budget though, which makes it difficult.

View Quoted Comment Thanks! I guess maybe I'll know after touring the first one.. I really like it on paper!

We toured 5, booked the 4th and toured 5 more. So a total of 10. We kept touring because the venue we booked had a refundable deposit minus $150 and it's a blank canvas venue minus chairs and tables.
I researched A LOT. Made a ton of phone calls to other places for pricing too. The whole process took almost 3 months of setting up appointments and researching in between. I probably called another 20+ venues we didn't see and emailed 10 or more.
We've already talked to 2 caterers and have a list of 5 we need to check out. I'm pretty sure we'll end up with 10 or more tastings by time we're done.

3. I knew the first one was it as soon as we toured it but wanted to make sure. Poor communication is a big red flag for me. If they can't be bothered to respond to you when they're trying to get your $ how bad will they be once they have your money? The third place we checked also was not great at communicating and I was skeptical of them. Our tour proved me right. The guy was a fast talker and not trustworthy.

We looked at about a dozen places online an about half of them responded. From there we set up tours with the two we liked the most. Oddly enough we ended up going with the first one we toured.

Communication was key for me- if you couldn’t give me a direct answer in a reasonable amount of time then I moved on.

View Quoted Comment Thank you! The price of catering is what's killing off most of my venue options. I just can't afford $90 a person!

View Quoted Comment I have high hopes for my venue option. They seem great so far! The other venue really disappointed me with the poor communication - I agree, red flag. They are not a traditional venue but it took them 10 days to respond to my email, stating my wedding date is booked (we're flexible with date).

View Quoted Comment Thanks! I agree, waiting more than like 2 or 3 days for a response is a bit of a turn off.

If a venue has terrible communication to start, chances are that won't change even if you book the venue. Go with someone who is eager to be part of your special day! Wishing you the best of luck

Seven. Then re-toured two of them with at least one of my parents (they're paying), and are re-touring one more on Tues. Hoping to make a decision by the end of the month. I also did a TON of research, but we were able to knock a bunch of places off the list after our first two tours b/c we decided we wanted a hotel wedding. My parents also asked me to do research into some more lower cost options after what we called our "safety school" venue ended up not being a viable option, but then they never asked me to reach out to any of those options after I did the research (I told them I would only reach out if they wanted me to).

View Quoted Comment Thank you! I agree.

View Quoted Comment Thanks for your experience.

We toured 3. Booked the third.
I possibly would have booked the first. They had posted that they were doing renovations and they would be done by January. In March, they hadn't started and weren't sure they were going to do them. So we passed.

View Quoted Comment I probably would have passed on the one doing renovations also. Thanks!

I tried other wedding sites like eventective and wedding spot and the knot too. They had other venues I hadn't seen before or had direct links to venue websites. I found the venue websites helpful since many had pricing and sample menus available. Saved some time knowing who I didn't have to waste time with. Nearly everyone charges a service fee of 15-25% plus tax so roughly another 32-35% on top of the what you see pricing. It's ridiculous. Anything more than a stated $50 was out our budget.
Keep searching and don't sign without tasting!

View Quoted Comment Thanks! I'm going to check out eventective

View Quoted Comment Some didn’t even respond to my cursory emails. I treated other vendors the same way. If you don’t want to answer my phone calls then you don’t need my money.