Seven7Seven is a beautiful venue that is really negatively impacted by their team, particularly Katie Brown. Katie Brown was immensely unprofessional and has poor stress management skills that made our experience with this venue immensely challenging. We had our wedding reception here.
The initial problem started after a lack of communication regarding a change in event coordinator--there was an email for an open house and tasting sent, however we had already completed our tasting and we live relatively far from the venue so driving over on a Tuesday after work for an open house didn't feel worthwhile. There weren't any emails sent after that. We then reached out to the coordinator originally identified when we booked--she said she was no longer with the company and Katie took over that position. Katie stated she introduced herself at the open house and told them she would be the new point of contact. There was no communication around this until we reached out and no accountability for the failure to notify us.
She then scheduled a meeting with us, where she had no information from the previous coordinator, and then proceeded to tell us all of the ways that what we had agreed upon with the previous coordinator would not work. Our guest count was suddenly too high, our menu was suddenly too expansive, and the valet agreed upon in our contract was no longer going to be provided. We had to reach out to our vegan and vegetarian guests apologetically and ask them to change their RSVPed meal. The venue is a beautiful outdoor space with a tent covering about 1/3rd of the space, and Katie tried to insist that we can only have tables and guests in the tented area. Why would we choose a partially outdoor venue to only use the indoor part?
Katie's lack of accountability was one of the largest challenges in working with her. Everything that no longer worked for her was blamed on poor planning by the previous coordinator. She often stated "she is no longer employed with this company for a reason" in a very smug voice. She often approached things with a snappy and exasperated manner, saying things like "wedding season is upon me and my three venues.", implying she does not have time to meet with us or respond to us. It felt like she poured her frustrations and stressors onto us after a challenging transition. It seems like the internal workings of the company made for a rough and overwhelming coordinator switch and I have empathy for that, but she also constantly made our lives harder, while telling us "I'm here to make sure you have the most wonderful day ever! Anything you need just let me know!"
Katie also impacted the day of the event. Two moments stand out in particular. The more innocuous one is my mother came to the venue and when Katie spoke to her she inquired who she was and what she was doing there. My mom said "I'm the mother of the bride". Katie responded to her "what do you mean?" and my mother didn't know how else to make her role clear. Katie then told her she couldn't be at the venue, during our family photo and setup time. My mom felt unwelcome and my mom wasn't alone in this experience. Friends and family noted that Katie was brusque in her interactions.
The other challenging and unwelcoming moment was a racial microaggression. For context, I am a multiethnic person. We were told family could come to the venue for pictures. Katie spoke to our coordinator and was asking who everyone was, saying there were too many people present and they couldn't all be family. Our coordinator responded stating the people present are family, Katie then points to my grandfather, who is Black, and says "Well he's CLEARLY not family." She was notified that that is my grandfather. Multiple people overheard this conversation and shared this with me. How appalling for myself, my grandfather, and all present to experience such casual racism at an event meant to celebrate love. These weren't the first microaggressions as she continuously spelled my husband's name wrong and showed difficulties in understanding how our cultural or religious background may influence our choices in planning the event.
Again, this is a beautiful venue and the food is wonderful, however I would not recommend it due to our experience with the team. read more