Today I went venue shopping with my mom, Rachelle and Bryan’s mom. Here’s the summary of my notes:

The Forge in Woodbridge

Very reasonably priced, though they don’t include things in their price that the other two places do. Most notably, chair covers are $4 a chair and the chairs definitely need chair covers. But, they do offer a considerable discount for a beer and wine only option.

Their reception rooms were actually a lot nicer than I thought it would be. I preferred The Atrium because all the windows really made the place quite bright and cheery and I’m sure it looks lovely at night too. That room has a 175 person minimum, and I’m pretty sure we’ll have about 175 guests, but with unpredictable winter weather, that number could easily drop to around 150.

Our deal breaker though, was the ceremony room. It only accommodates up to 100 guests. They said if one of the other rooms were free, we could use that for the ceremony, but otherwise, half of our guests wouldn’t get to see us get married. Eh… next please.

The Grand Marquis in Old Bridge

The most expensive, but my favorite. They didn’t have our date available, but we would have to have the wedding on a Sunday anyway to be able to afford it.

Their rooms are gorgeous. I knew that before I visited. You have the ceremony and reception in the same room with a cocktail hour in between so they can switch the room around. I love that they have centerpieces you could use and they include linens and chair covers in the cost. There’s also free shuttle service for guests staying at the hotel near by.

The big selling point though is the food. Oh it sounds so good. They offer molten chocolate cake for dessert. We all giggled because we knew Bryan would love that. Besides dessert, they have some really nifty things like a hibachi station or a panini station. I was getting hungry listening to her describe the menu. Forget the real food, I’d be happy with just cocktail hour, lol. I mentioned that we were going to have a significant number of vegetarians, well, at least five, two of which are in the bridal party, so to me, that’s significant. She said they could do some fancy vegetarian dish. They seem to be really flexible with the food which is pretty cool.

Oh and they gave us a sample bottle of their raspberry champagne which isn’t actually champagne, because it’s not from Champagne. It’s sparkletini and tastes just like Arbor Mist, but that’s yummy too.

The Reception Center at Saint Clement in Matawan

Also reasonably priced, but after The Grand Marquis, a bit of a let down. I was impressed with the dude we met with, because it is a family business and he does seem really involved in everything that goes on there.

Like the Grand Marquis, their price pretty much includes everything. It’s a good deal. Everything sounds great, except I don’t like the venue itself. It doesn’t look nice. There’s no place to take pictures. He was trying to sell the ceremony back-drop, but no. That’s important to me, to have nice pictures, so I can’t have my wedding there.

They also don’t really have a place to get ready and they don’t offer free shuttle service to and from the hotels.

All three places offer vegetarian options and discounts for children and vendors.

Stay tuned for part two in my venue shopping series.

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 29th, 2008 at 12:46 am by Lissy and is filed under Ceremony, Reception, Venues. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.