City Cruises - Boston

We had a private event (a wedding related event with 100 people) on the Seaport Elite. Overall, the actual experience was quite good and all our guests had an amazing time. However, there was a mixed bag with planning and event coordination. Pros: The boat itself is very nice. It looks nice, the views of Boston are great, and the food was tasty. There was enough space for casino tables, dance floor, bar, and dining area. The viewing area had heating lamps and was comfortable to stand outside even on an October day. The staff were kind and communicative once on board the ship, and all the guests were taken care of. This made it so the guests and my fiance and I were very satisfied with the event itself. Everyone had a really enjoyable time. Certain people were excellent at communication and checking in with us, I will specifically call out Jonny Beres as a point of contact who was very helpful and easy to communicate with. Cons: The communication with the event coordinators/planners from City Experiences were very poor. They were extremely unresponsive and failed to deliver on many items. For example, we hand crafted a specific playlist for the DJ to play but the event coordinator failed to send our playlist to the DJ (so none of our songs were available once on board). They event sent me an email saying they sent it, but once we asked the DJ on board he said he never received it. The event coordinator changed the table arrangements, removing a table without communicating this properly. We had printed table cards and assigned seats that had to go unused and we only found out 15 minutes before everyone boarded the boat. We were also never told about having a gift table or card box, something that was an option but we had no idea about. Because of this, we actually ended up not receiving gifts and cards from our guests which are now lost forever (including some other items that were brought on board). The company claims they were all given to guests prior to leaving the boat, but I have contacted our guests and no one has them. Additionally, we were promised a bridal suite, but it was not communicated that the bridal suite had to be setup so we did not even really get to enter it or use it any point. All of these miscommunications and misplanned items left a bitter ending to an actual great night. We were able to overcome this and still have a great party. I would just choose this venue with caution or be prepared to handle more details yourself

I cannot stress enough, do not ignore the one star reviews. While it was the best day of my life (only due to marrying the love of my life), it was also the worst. My husband and I literally spent the next day steaming over how horrible the day went and how poorly Boston City Cruises did. Boston City Cruises will make a lot of promises - such as having a “Day of Wedding Coordinator”, people helping guide and help people on and off the ship, an ample of communication, we would be on schedule - WE HAD NONE OF THAT (and more… so much more). They were severely understaffed, which led the entire day to be 1 hour behind and ALSO allowed random people to walk through our wedding. After bringing attention to the fact that we were one hour behind to our “day of coordinator” (also apparently a plate runner), they said we needed to wait - as if it was our fault. Nothing was ever communicated … all day long… we were in the dark. BCC did give us 30 minutes at the end of the wedding to continue dancing… however, did that make up for everything - no… absolutely not. Honestly, it is exhausting to relive and think how much we spent on this venue - so I will not continue the review. Please… please… do not book Boston City Cruises… it is NOT worth it.

I was looking forward to giving this venue an excellent review, however our experience was terrible at the end. They canceled our wedding 72 hours prior because of the storm, even though they said they would still have our event dock side, they back pedaled last minute. It ended up being a beautiful day with rain in the morning and some wind, but nothing like what they justified canceling for. The communication from the beginning was lackluster. We were assigned 4 different event coordinators and the last one just 5 weeks before the event. Our vendors had to contact them about set up information instead of the other way around (which was promised). Where we really ran into issues was the handling of our canceled event and their condescending manager. She was lacking in empathy and unwilling to help us. We completely understand the safety aspect of the cancelation, but the damage control, or lack their of afterward was disappointing. It’s a unique experience and idea but their customer service was absent. I have tried to reach out to their corporate employees to discuss their manager’s attitude and responses to us but no one will reply. We thought we were getting a good deal, but the venue we miraculously found gave us so much more. My recommendation is to continue searching pass City Cruises and consider other venues for your wedding. You want a venue who will communicate when you need, assist when they can and support you through the planning process. For the amount of money weddings cost, the last thing you want is a subpar venue with horrible communication leaving everything to the last minute.

Overall, we had a great experience with City Cruises. The venue came with its own catering, DJ, and day-of coordinator which was helpful for me as I did not hire a wedding planner. The scenery is beautiful and the sunset over the city is GORGEOUS, so I was able to skimp out on my floral budget. All my guests commented on how cool it was to have a wedding on a boat, and the waitstaff was incredibly friendly and helpful. The only negative was that they will nickel and dime you for everything. I signed my contract in early 2021 and there were a few instances where they tried to add fees they introduced in 2022, so read your contracts!!