Milestone Events Group - Santa Rosa, California

Miki

We got married on 5/18/24 at Paradise Ridge Winery & have only wonderful things to say about our primary coordinator, Marissa Sartory. She's kind, caring and was an ally during planning process. She's quick to respond to all communications, reassured us when we had concerns, understood our budget, & anticipated our needs.

After 9 months of working with Marissa, there was an unexpected turn of events caused by some turnover/changes in roles. We were told that our day-of coordinator was now Paige Hough. Although Marissa was still our main point of contact, we now had to shift our trust to another individual who was to execute our wedding day wishes, which was unnerving. Most of our planning had been taken care of in collaboration with Marissa, so we were flexible with our transition to a different coordinator/director of operations (Paige), even though it was not our preference. This is all not to say that our wedding was not amazing, but it was something that we did not anticipate & caused added stress. Marissa continued to support us during the transition & made us feel comfortable with the changes; without her we would not have been as confident. Again, our day turned out to be wonderful but we feel that since we had such a close working relationship with Marissa, there would be no cons listed below if we continued to work with her:

Pros:
-One stop shop for everything with flexibility in regard to vendors.

-Things went smoothly as structured in our wedding timeline; no major hiccups or issues that we noticed. We had the assistance of the DJ, who is our good friend (DJ Willie G), who was additional help with coordination

-Catering: Food from Girl and the Fig (buffet style) was fantastic, and staff were attentive. Would recommend this caterer to anyone else. We had comments from many people saying "this was the best food ever!"

-Rehearsal: We had an issue with a promotion offered to us initially due to staff turnover in Milestone Estate Kitchen (MEK). Rehearsal was to be part of our catering package but issues with booking occurred & it was missed. MEK, specifically Dan, made everything right & it turned out great. We loved our alternative solution, and appreciate Dan and MEK for working with us to resolve the issue. We believe that if this was to occur with any other coordination service, this would not have been resolved in such a way.

Cons:

-Potential for turnover and change in staffing which can add stress and be a detriment to overall continuity.

-There was some miscommunication between the venue and milestone regarding where we could store our decor list items when we came for rehearsal. Instead of a private, indoor space as promised, we were told to keep our delicate florals & decor items outside, overnight. we did not feel this was the fault of our coordinator but the venue, as they booked an event which required use of our promised space the day prior to our wedding, which is when we needed to drop everything off. Fortunately, Paige stepped up and offered solutions to either bring all the florals to Milestones' office and transport them herself the next day, or she return after the event ended and move the delicate items indoors. We really appreciated that she offered a resolution and accommodated us to ensure our items were stored safely.

-As we were sent off prior to the end of our wedding, we were made aware by some members of our wedding party that some things weren't packed up as directed in our décor list. So we are missing some items we were hoping to keep.

-We were made aware that an entire sheet cake wasn't put out and was almost left in the fridge. This was supposed to be served and/or packed up for us to take home.

All in all, if we were to do it over again, we would still choose to work with Milestone. If you follow their structure and timeline, utilize their tools and resources, you will be set up for a successful event. The staff are knowledgeable and helpful. we recommend their services to friends and family. Thanks for helping us pull off an amazing day!

Megan Nickell

Milestone Events Group helped us make our wedding planning journey perfect and memorable! We got married on 9/23/23 at Villa Chanticleer and couldn't have done it without them!

Our coordinator Liliana was incredible in every way and on top of all the details. We enjoyed working with her so much and she truly was such a major part in helping to make our wedding run smoothly and look amazing!

The whole Milestone team and Milestone Kitchen team are exceptional people and we are so happy to have put our trust in them for one of the most important days of our lives <3 Thank you MEG!!! The Nickell's

Carrie Zhao

Our experience with Milestone is mixed. Our initial coordinator was not engaging. She then left Milestone 2 months before our wedding, giving us 3 days heads up without connecting us with her replacement. We were then assigned to work with Kristine, who is actually the Estate Kitchen Manager. Thankfully, Kristine exceeded our expectations. In the 2 months leading up to the wedding, she was extremely responsive, providing prompt and detailed feedback on all of our questions and modifications for rentals, layout, wine purchase, decor etc. She had good recommendations for seating arrangement and tips like including an umbrella for our charcuterie station. On the day of, she was extremely professional and thoughtful, making sure we didn't worry about anything or miss a moment of our big day.

Cody Gregg

We had a very positive experience working with Milestone. Additional details are below, but the summary is that we used them to book the venue and then were able to work with them to have one of their best wedding planners, Paige, act as our day-of coordinator (we already had an amazing independent planner, Brittney Espinoza of Bri Solutions, for our planning). For our wedding, this was the perfect partnership.

Venue Management: The Milestone team was very responsive compared to the other non-milestone venues at which we looked in Santa Rosa. Jennifer Millsap, one of their site selection specialists, was excellent; we provided our initial thoughts on cost and a high-level summary of our vision for the wedding and reception and she easily steered us to the best venues for our price range and gave us tons of great information to help us make an informed decision. They waived their buy-out fee for catering since our wedding was less than half of their catering minimum. We benefited greatly from their list of preferred and recommended vendors (definitely check out Pacific Connections Catering, Stephanie Hopkins Photography, and Premier Productions, who, together with Bri Solutions and Milestone, were the perfect team).

Day-of Coordinating: As mentioned, we already had a planner, but she was also in my wedding party, so we needed a separate day-of coordinator. We were able to contract with Milestone for less than the cost of the full planning services to have a day-of coordinator. Based on other reviews we read, we requested Paige, and we were not disappointed. Paige was an incredible addition to our team. Although having a separate planner in some ways made things more complicated for Paige when it came to running the event, Paige was always extremely positive and willing to go the extra mile to help our wedding come together. She attended our walkthroughs, helped us with questions about the venue along the way, and did an amazing job on the day of our wedding at coordinating setup and making sure that all the little details came together.

As a note: In speaking with prospective vendors, we did receive some feedback indicating that they charge more if Milestone is your planner (impliedly due to some amounts that the vendors have to pay Milestone out of their proceeds). To make sure that we didn’t have to pay extra, we clearly communicated to vendors that Milestone was not our planner. We did choose all of our vendors, other than Bri Solutions, off of the Milestone approved vendors list and, as noted above, were thrilled with each of them. Bri Solutions was amazing and, if you have a planning-intensive event, we highly recommend using Bri Solutions for planning and Milestone for day-of coordination; it paid off big for us.

Hannah Risch

We are so happy we booked our wedding through Milestone! We worked with Arianna and she helped plan and execute the most perfect wedding day! From answering so many of my smallest questions to making sure we didn't have to worry about a single detail day of and to running the most seamless and smooth event, she is amazing. Thank you, Milestone!

Shannon Channels

Milestone was an unfortunate necessity at Charles Krug Winery. The initial coordinator assigned to us, Liliana, did not seem particularly excited to help us ensure our perfect day. Her lack of enthusiasm put a damper on each one of our pre-wedding planning meetings. Going forward, we hope that Milestone will use the tasting room staff of their venues to run the wine tastings prior to the event as it was clear that Lili had no interest in the wine she was serving us. All this being said, we are giving 3 stars because of how wonderful Kristine was. We asked Milestone to switch our on-site coordinator, and Kristine stepped up to the task with massive amounts of enthusiasm. She made sure that EVERYTHING was perfect, and we are extremely grateful for her and how well she represented Milestone. Kristine gets 5 stars.

Pure Life

My venue was beautiful, but the worst part of my wedding was working with Milestone. We booked our venue while it was under the management of another company and everything was going fine. The moment Milestone took over, the problems started. They tried multiple times to not honor my contract and tried to get even more money out of us on at least 3 separate occasions. They made planning extremely stressful for both myself and my coordinator. There was little to no communication except when they wanted more money. Even on the day of my wedding, they fell through on things that were promised- like coffee and tea during dessert (It was part of my bar package, but was no where to be found so my dad had to run to Starbuck to get coffee for everyone), they had my vendors SIT ON THE FLOOR to eat dinner because they couldn't 'find chairs', and the 'site manager' who was supposed to be my main point of contact, changed at least 3 times and it was like starting over every time- half of the time people I spoke to had no one I had already booked my event! Their properties are stunning but I will never work with Milestone again.

Daniel Willner

My wife and I had our wedding with milestone last year and while our wedding was great, it was in spite of everything milestone promised us but didn’t deliver on. We were led to believe milestone would take care of everything, but then our planner left for a month right before our wedding and everyone became very unresponsive and dismissive of our concerns which proved to be valid. They sold us on an appetizer package which they said would be sizeable for our guests, but it was literally 2 small mezze platters for 150 people. The mezze platters likely fed no more than 20 of our guests. They were also over an hour late with our dinner service, which cut into our bands time which we had to pay for but did not receive any compensation for because milestone said it was not their fault that they were an hour late with the food. Whenever a concern was brought to their attention, instead of treating us like a paying customer, they always chose to respond defensively blaming us for not understanding the process. If you are planning a wedding and you want to use one of the venues they work with, you can book the event directly with the venue and steer clear of their incompetence. The bottom line is that wedding planning is stressful and you don’t want to have added stress because your events group is dismissive, rude, and incompetent.