We had our wedding reception with 125 guests at Dominion Valley Country Club on May 19, 2018.
SUMMARY: We had many issues with the new Private Events Coordinator in the beginning, but our reception was perfect, thanks to Ben Gibson (our day of coordinator) and the rest of the staff at DVCC.
PROS: all-inclusive pricing (most packages include room rental, catering, alcohol, taxes, and service charge); large space; clean venue; beautiful scenery; delicious food; temporary complementary membership to gym/pool; accommodating service staff; good value
CONS: private events coordinator hard to reach; had to review/correct all layouts, timelines, and event order forms
DETAILED: There were several venues that met our reception venue criteria, and after touring all of them, we liked DVCC the best. When we sat down to book the date, the Private Events Coordinator (PEC) at the time informed us that she was leaving DVCC that week and they had not found a replacement for her position yet. We went over details, pricing, and signed the contract. Fast forward several months; I got an e-mail from Brittany Batcheler, introducing herself as the new Catering Manager/Private Events Coordinator. We exchanged e-mails and set up a date/time to have our tasting and detail meeting (where you go over detail choices, such as linen colors, and day-of timeline). When we arrived for these meetings, Brittany had double booked another meeting, so we were helped by Ben Gibson. He has been at DVCC for several years and was very accommodating/knowledgeable. We chose the BBQ package and tasted pork bbq, cold pasta salad, macaroni and cheese, fried chicken, grilled chicken, and fire roasted corn. We went over the timeline and details. Brittany met us after we finished and took the notes from Ben, saying she would be in touch with us soon. I’ll spare you the details, but we had many issues trying to coordinate with Brittany after this point. She was very hard to get a hold of and every BEO (banquet order event form – which is basically a bill/timeline for your event) was incorrect and inconsistent with our contract. We understood that Brittany was in a tough spot to be taking over contracts that somebody else wrote, however, things like pricing were agreed upon, written down, and signed by both parties. I spent many hours on the phone and in person with her trying to get everything sorted.
In the end, we requested Ben to be our day of coordinator. We dropped off decorations a few days before. Ben and his team did all of the prep work and the venue was almost completely set up when we arrived at 1PM (reception did not start until 7PM). It had rained all week prior, so we had to move our cocktail hour from the grassy spot near the golf course to the front foyer and under the covered driveway. It was enough space. Just like our tasting, the food was wonderful. We chose everything except the fried chicken (because we thought it would be too messy). We had it buffet style with cornbread/rolls on the buffet. DVCC did forget the cold pasta salad (my mom was the only one to notice this). Everyone raved about how great the food was. At the end of the night, we did the sparkler exit using DVCC provided sparklers. They were the long kind and lasted for more than enough time. While everyone was outside, the DVCC team started the breakdown and my family was able to take everything home that night. Our reception was great and a true testament to the hard work of all the staff at DVCC.