First of all, when the client contacted me and asked me to help with her daughter's wedding, I…read morereadily agreed. The Loose Mansion managers, Abbey and Loren, seemed to have an attitude issue. I wanted the wedding event to be just as memorable for the client as they... but they seemed to want to make things unnecessarily difficult.
When I arrived at the scheduled time, neither Abbey nor Loren were there. No one else knew anything about any of the A/V equipment that Loose Mansion provides. Awhile later, Loren arrived. I introduced myself and was as pleasant as I could possibly be. Again, I received a "not so warm" reception. There was just a prevailing attitude of arrogance, entitlement and an unfriendliness.
Because Loose Mansion was providing the video projector for the event, I asked Loren if we could plug my computer into the projector prior to the arrival of guests to make sure everything operated correctly. She told me that she probably wouldn't have time to allow me to test the hook-up because she was "so busy". I thought to myself "had you arrived at the time we had agreed upon, perhaps you would have had time to check important components like making sure the A/V would work."
I was told that I would need to bring my own sound system and mics because they don't allow any "outsiders" to touch their equipment. So I came prepared with speakers, speaker stands, mixer, mics, and audio playback.
As I was setting up the computer, I couldn't get the "Loose Mansion" WiFi network to work. I said something to Loren and she told me that I would have to connect to the "office network". The WiFi network was so ridiculously slow that no webpage would even load up. I thought that something must be wrong... so I connected to the network with my phone to check the speed there. Again, practically non-existent speed... so bad that nothing would work (see the screen caps from both my computer and my phone). I was afraid to say anything to Loren or ask her to reset her router for fear that I'd get another harsh response. So I just set up my own hotspot and used that. I finally did mention it to Loren and she said "Yes, it's very slow... we just tell people to download everything they need in advance." It seems ridiculous that a professional "event space" facility would have WiFi that is virtually of no use whatsoever.
As the set-up for this very nice wedding event proceeded, I noticed that Loren was wearing a black skirt for the event, but with old green sneakers. I thought that she was just wearing these old green sneakers because they were comfortable during the set-up process, but surely she'd change into something more presentable for the wedding once guests started to arrive. Wrong! Later during the event, I overheard one guest mention her appearance to another guest... they were also surprised that management would allow an onsite manager to dress like this for a client's wedding event.
They forgot to turn on the speakers for the ceremony, so if you were sitting in the room used for the ceremony, it sounded like all of the sound/music was coming from the room behind you (there were speakers in other rooms of the house).
After the ceremony, as guests went for cocktails, we started to set up our gear for the after-dinner event. The "unused" Loose Mansion speakers were still sitting on the small stage... and when I asked Loren if we could move them aside so we could have room for our speakers, she said "No, we'll leave them right where they are!" Unbelievable!
Another thing noticed was the fact that in order to lower the projection screen from the ceiling mount, Loren had to get a tall staffer who stood on top of a bucket or something and then used a plastic coat hanger to try to reach the bottom of the screen and pull it down. Tacky!
My review is directed to other vendors/event planners. I've never had to deal with event space management who was NOT a team-player with the goal of wanting to create a stellar event by working TOGETHER with vendors. Instead, there was noticeable resistance. It's really too bad!
