My recent experience at Deer Creek prompts me to share some observations and concerns, with the hope that future couples considering this venue may benefit from our insights. We in...itially chose Deer Creek based on its outstanding reputation and commendable reviews, but unfortunately, our experience did not align with these positive accounts.
We perceived a potential decline in the overall value of the services provided, which may be attributed to recent changes in staffing. While acknowledging that our experience may be an anomaly, we believe it's crucial to bring attention to specific issues that we had along the way.
Leading up to the wedding, we were pretty low maintenance. Hailey checked in every once in a while, we had a few questions but nothing crazy. However, around 10 or 11 days out we had final guest count due to the venue along with a final invoice. Hailey went on vacation during this time and nobody in the Deer Creek event staff could be reached. We sent many emails and copied multiple people to make sure they were going to the right place and did not receive a response. The phone would ring and nobody would answer, we left voicemails that were not returned. After a few days of not getting a response I had to send an email to the general manager to get someone from catering to reach out to me and finalize the details of the wedding. Finally after we heard back from Kylee the new Catering Manger, the ball started rolling in the right direction or so it seemed. She was underwhelming with her knowledge of how the venue operated or even the wedding industry as a whole. Even the smallest task seemed to rattle her and cause her to tailspin. We had to go sit down with her one night and go over all of the mistakes on the contract, and even after that the updated one still needed corrections. It was a battle to get the contract correct and finalized. Not to mention not what you want to deal with the days leading up to your wedding.
During the rehearsal, the day of coordinator was out sick so we had someone else from the venue step in. It was very clunky probably due to her inexperience leading these kind of event which is understandable, but it is a little bit of a problem to me that they do not have solidified backups to such important roles.
On the wedding day itself, despite adhering to specified timings in our BEO, there was a notable absence of greeters when we (the bridal party) or when guest arrived. The day of coordinator that Deer Creek provides per the contract was not present once again that day and the General Manager Marty expected other staff that had responsibilities in the kitchen and dinning room to pick the slack up. Fortunately our parents and vendors stepped up in place of the designated coordinator but there was still unnecessary stress felt behind the scenes knowing the coordinator was not there. The coordinator was very important the day of to be the liaison between us, the venue and the vendors.
My wife’s wedding dress encountered issues due to unclean floors throughout the venue, which made it extremely dirty before even reaching the ceremony. The bridal suite had cleanliness issues, including dead cockroaches and dirt under the rug. Marty the General Manager did offer to cover cleaning expenses but that is beside the point and does not really fix the issue nor did he tell us how he wanted to cover it and since stopped responding to my emails.
Despite these challenges, our wedding day was ultimately memorable, thanks to the exceptional performance of our top-tier vendors who displayed extensive knowledge of the venue and the wedding industry. It's unfortunate to note that our previous communication addressing these concerns also went unanswered from Marty.
In sharing our experience, our intent is not to discourage but to provide constructive feedback for the improvement of Deer Creek which they seemed to ignore and not want to grow from. We had high expectations based on the venue's reputation, and while our wedding day was special, it was in spite of the challenges faced at Deer Creek.
We believe in the potential of Deer Creek as a wedding venue and hope that our feedback contributes to ongoing enhancements, ensuring a smoother and more enjoyable experience for future couples.