Wave Resort Reception Venues - The Knot

The Wave does social media, marketing and photography very well and there is no denying the amazing location and stunning rooftop. But it was my experience that the backdrop over the ocean wasn't worth the poor execution of my wedding. We experienced some major issues throughout the night and the planning process that we would like to share with future brides here. Our wedding was replanned due to covid rules (which we understood) several times, on top of this place mandating their own rules that were not formal NJ restrictions. Ryann although a super sweet person, fell short of executing our wedding due to a lack of communication with her staff, but most importantly with the executive Chef on the night of. We changed our wedding so that we could still host it outside, with just 50 guests. Unfortunately, we had impeccable timing with a short summer rain shower that delayed the cocktail hour about 60 minutes. We chose to stay outside because the terrace was the main reason we booked the venue so this was very important to us. At no point were we told the decision to remain outside would affect our food menu for the evening (another top reason we chose the Wave). We had our first dance inside, with our friends and family all masked inside, but the staff was nowhere to be found to the point so we ended up dancing with no lights on. Once the rain cleared, we went outside to start dancing and to re-start the cocktail hour. Our guests didn’t receive a morsel of food until 8pm. To put this in perspective, the rain was cleared by 6:45 (Ceremony ended at 5:30) and they still couldn’t get cold food out on the table in a timely manner. Our families were starving and it was just the tip of the iceberg for the evening. We paid to upgrade to a raw bar appetizer, which was poorly done and not even what we ordered. What we paid for: oysters, shrimps, clams, tuna poke, salmon tartar, Hamachi and yellow tail. What we got: oysters, shrimps, clams, and slabs of raw tuna and salmon ( no soy sauce mind you, so inedible). The meat and cheese platters for the table were subpar. The items looked like they picked them up from a local Shoprite. Then our pasta serving (3 different types) and 8 more appetizers (essentially the entire cocktail hour) were just completely NOT SERVED TO US with ZERO communication. Ryann told me ‘Chef said we lost the hot food’ Excuse me? How did you lose all of this food? Even if the food was made too early, you had 1.5 hours to remake it or to reheat it at that point. The chef said ‘it wasn’t up to his standards to serve’. I’m sorry but this was a private event that people were STARVING at, we needed the food out, it was apart of our contract! It was beyond embarrassing and I went to all my tables to apologize for the lack of food after telling them not to eat all day and how amazing the cocktail hour would be. I was in tears for half of my wedding whereas if Ryann and the chef had better communicated the plan, none of this should have happened. As the bride and groom, the staff never came to serve us drinks and barely checked on us. Thanks to our friends for keeping our drinks full. Fast forward to our discussions with the Wave post wedding as we were distraught over the evening. It was not without a fight that we finally received some money back for the food not served, although we do not feel it was enough, we did not appreciate the lack of empathy from the food and beverage manager for these issues.

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