University Club of St. Paul

ks leading up to our wedding. They both went above and beyond to make sure every detail was taken care of and that we could just relax and enjoy a beautiful evening with our friends and family.

d the Terrace. The chairs for the ceremony were half set up and the Terrace was still left from the event the night prior. I knew the manager would be at the venue a little later, but that was all I knew and I wasn't sure who else to speak to about setting up. So, my bridal party and I asked the lady at the front desk (I think her name was Mary) basically what was going on and when things were going to get moved. She said they had a big event the night prior, and it went late. I understood this. However, time kept ticking by and nothing was being moved out of the Terrace room. I arrived early in hopes that I could set up for my wedding right away and then relax and get ready before the ceremony. My bridal party took it upon themselves to finish setting up the chairs in the Summit Room (I would come back every so often to check and not much was being done) and started to move tables out of the Terrace. We ended up having to vacuum the Summit Room because it was clearly not done before setting up chairs. There was food on the floor and towards the back of the room I found q-tips sitting on a ledge. I dont believe this would have been picked up because the chairs were already beginning to get set up where these things were found. We asked the front desk questions here and there (Because again, she was the only employee around) and she was rude to almost everyone that spoke to her. She kept talking about the event the night prior and eventually my friend said "I dont care about the night before anymore, right now we're trying to set up this wedding" and the front desk lady responded with "Well this is America". Whatever that means. She seemed to care more about the club members and acted as if we were an inconvenience. I was really confused and frustrated with what was going on and the lack of staff there to help us. Guests were to start arriving at 2:30pm and I was worried things would not be done in time. Eventually I had to leave it to my family and wedding party and go downstairs to start getting ready. Had my friends and family not taken it upon themselves to move furniture and clean, I truly believe my wedding would have been a disaster. I was almost in tears because I knew things would not be set up and decorated how I had hoped. I planned this event for months and had an image in my head on what I wanted for my wedding. I was trying to be proactive and give myself enough time to get ready but the lack of help from the venue pushed this back. I had to rush getting ready, was not able to relax and was frustrated the entire time. So much time was wasted trying to pick up from the night before.. picking up someone else's mess. The manager showed up that afternoon, I'm not exactly sure what time. She did not speak to me the entire day/night. I think my husband spoke to her a few times, but she did not ask me how things were going or acknowledge what happened that day. Eventually I stopped caring about everything and tried to enjoy the day. This was my wedding day. My husband and I spent thousands of dollars, had high hopes, and were ultimately disappointed. The place is beautiful and the food was great. Other than that, I wouldn’t recommend.

stopped receiving any and all communication from our assigned coordinator, Amanda. Weeks of unanswered emails and phone calls went by. End of August, I received one email response from Danielle, answering one question (out of many) that I had asked in previous emails, and ignoring my requests for an in-person meeting, as it was stated in the contract we would have an in-person meeting 4 weeks prior. It was at this point we were informed our previous coordinator, Amanda, was no longer with the U Club. We were told, “we thought she was still handling some weddings” even after her departure. No one knew if our wedding was included in that. There was no introduction from our new coordinator Danielle, no assurance that she would now be taking over and no apology. Early September, about three weeks before the wedding, my fiancé was finally able to get ahold of Danielle. He was also able to speak to the owner of the U Club, John Rupp. He shared our immense disappointment regarding the lack of communication. While doing so, John Rupp told him that if we were so disappointed, we should just not have our wedding at his venue. This was three weeks before and a completely inappropriate response. Eventually, we were able to have our in-person meeting at the venue and were promised the following from both John and Danielle: Communication would be 100% better from that point on. Our wedding day would go perfectly. Our wedding would receive the most attention out of any wedding they had planned for the year. None of these promises were met. My email to Danielle the week of the wedding went unanswered. We had a rehearsal the day before and walk in to the reception layout, not the ceremony. We had to wait 45 minutes for everything to be taken down and reset to the ceremony to begin the rehearsal. We are then late to our own rehearsal dinner. The wedding day arrives. I walk into the venue expecting my guests to be seated in the Summit room so I could sneak into the Terrace room, that would supposed to be closed, unseen. I walk in to almost all of my guests staring at me, who have now seen me prior to the wedding. I had to stand in their public restroom, crying and humiliated, as my 8-months pregnant Maid of Honor corralled my wedding guests into the Summit room. As a woman, I’ve spent my entire life imagining that first moment of walking down the aisle and my guests and groom seeing me for the first time. This moment was ruined for me. Additionally, no one knew where the flowers were (they were delivered to the venue hours prior), and I again had to send my 8-months pregnant Maid of Honor to run around the venue gathering the flowers, my bouquet, the boutonnières and my mother-in-law’s corsage. Danielle was no where to be found. Not once did Danielle check on me prior to the ceremony. After the ceremony, while we were taking photos, I noticed that random dinner name cards were being moved. I asked my Maid of Honor to please get Danielle for me. This was the only time I spoke to Danielle the entire day, after having to have someone get her for me. Dinner begins and we are served a salad with no dressing. It is inedible. My husband has to get up from the head table and ask them to dress our salads. The entrees come out much later than anticipated, and they are cold. Almost all of our guests ordered the New York Strip, and the steak was rubbery and flavorless. We are informed by a guest that the coffee that was put out for guests to help themselves to, has a dead fly floating inside the canister. After dinner, my husband and I are trying to salvage our enjoyment of the day, when we are informed by my brother and his girlfriend, that the ceiling had just leaked dirty water all over them. It started raining around 4 PM this day. Around 10 PM, we walk around the Summit and Terrace room and find 6 separate places that water is leaking in from the roof. 4 places in the Terrace room, one being directly over their piano that got covered in dirty water, and two in the Summit room, one being directly over a guest table covering it in dirty water. My own brother and his girlfriend left my wedding early from being soaked in disgusting water. Our guest book and card box got wet. Phones left on the table in the Summit room got rained on. My husband had to get one of the two people still left there for the night (a bartender and a server) to let him know we were being rained on. When my husband asked if they were aware previously that the ceiling leaks, we were told the owner, John Rupp, was aware and knowingly has not done anything about it. Please see the photos attached of the dirty rain water accumulating all around the rooms we reserved for the most important day of our lives. The day after our wedding, we called John Rupp. When my husband began to explain how terrible our wedding day had gone, John interrupted and said "I'm not doing this with you over the phone". He told my husband to email him to set up a time to meet. John responded to our email nearly a week afterwards, and we were able to meet with him. In the meeting, John himself told us that he was firing our coordinator, Danielle, and that our wedding was a "complete failure". We agreed. We told John the only thing that could make this right, is a full refund of all payments made to the University Club for our wedding. John agreed to a full refund, looked both my husband and myself in the eyes and promised he would make good on this agreement, and shook my husband's hand. That was on September 30th, 2023. John promised we would receive our refund by October 30th, 2023. We have not heard a single thing from him since, and he has not responded to any attempts to contact him since that agreement was made. We are now in the process of legal proceedings. We want to have another ceremony again someday, far, far away from the University Club. I am hopeful someday we'll be made whole and will have that opportunity. Please, if you are seeking communication, edible food and a safe and dry experience for your wedding day, do not use the University Club of Saint Paul.

ng itself was amazing! We booked the University Club in November of 2022 for a December 2023 wedding reception with their coordinator Danielle. I wanted to get things done early and was really on top of the "standard timeline", so the booking and planning process went well. We did not know this at the time, but the University Club has one person (this was Danielle) covering ALL University Club events so she was VERY busy. Since my event was so far out, I wouldn't hear back for a few weeks if I sent a question via email. Everything was going smoothly until about one month out from the wedding the event coordinator Danielle unexpectedly left the University Club with no information on who would be helping with our wedding. After receiving this information, I did not hear back from the University Club with next steps for five days and I called and emailed every day. I know job changes can be last minute and stressful for a company, but we were really frustrated with the lack of planning or communication. We had already met with Danielle for our final details meeting where she had taken very thorough notes about the day. I had sent over many wedding documents all in a shared folder and we were told the new person handling the wedding would have access. We find out about two weeks before the wedding that everything I sent over was gone and got deleted when Danielle left. We were very upset and had to re-do and re-send everything which took about four hours of my time. About two weeks from the wedding we met with Sami, the University Club's front of house person, who was assigned to help with the wedding. Sami did an AMAZING job filling in and trying to figure out the wedding packages and what was planned given the lack of information left for her. We had chosen the Gold Package for our wedding which caused a lot of confusion in the contracts and billing since no one was familiar with the packages. We also were sent the wrong bill for a different wedding happening the same day at one of the University Club's other locations. Overall, this was stressful being just two weeks out. Sami understood our frustration and was able to comp the yogurt and mimosa breakfast in the morning which was very kind. After we worked everything out the actual wedding went wonderful! It was the perfect night; all the servers and bartenders were great! The food was amazing and everything came out hot and on time! There was a small miscommunication with the bar bill since we had picked the gold package and package # one, but it got resolved a few weeks after the wedding. Overall, we WOULD recommend the University Club. It was beautiful and Sami did the best she could with the information she had. I would not book unless they have a new coordinator hired to fill that role!