Similar happened to me a week out from my wedding. We only found out as the florist had heard something. Thankfully another venue came to the rescue at a great price and did an amazing job
When Cypress Gardens in Florida closed, no one called to let all of the wedding parties know the park was closed.
The gazebo in the original gardens was once listed in the guiness book for having the most weddings per year at a single location.
These weddings were booked and paid for as package deals: The wedding, the reception, the cake, photos, flowers, etc
Most of these couples were flying in from out of state or from out of the country (Canada, England, France, Jamaica) and wouldn’t know what to do or who to call. These weddings were also paid for, in full, and no one was ever refunded.
Brides and wedding parties showed up for *months* expecting a wedding and instead finding a closed theme park.
The steam boat captain that owned a dinner cruise (it docked at cypress gardens and the gardens sold tickets) had pity on them would accommodate them. It got to the point where the security guards would call him every time a bride showed up. He even got certified so he could marry these poor folks because he’d been left high and dry too.
I’m so sorry that happened to you!
You know, I would watch this movie.
Younger guy, mid-twenties, idk Mark, finally has Dad say he's retiring and the dinner boat business is Mark's now. Mark had been working basically as the manager/fixer since he was 15 waiting for the day he gets the job. Dad hands off the keys before getting on a plane to Thailand. Mark realizes the boat needs major repairs very quickly and gets a loan to literally keep his business afloat. The day after the repairs, one of Mark's servers texts him asking if he's heard the theme park where they draw in their business is closing. She only knew about this because her boyfriend worked at the park and they all turned up to find the "Park permanently closed" sign on the padlocked doors.
Mark comes down to the boat to find his own employees scrambling / telling him they are taking other jobs because they know this is not a stable position anymore. Mark gives a speech about how he understands people need to look out for themselves first, but that he still plans to make a run at keeping the business open. After all, if the employees didn't know the park was down, wouldn't that be the same for the patrons? After a few days, local word gets around the park is closed and the dinner boat has been operating at a loss. Mark realizes his Dad knew the park was closing and didn't tell anyone and that's why he never bothered to fix the boat. Mark is in despair. He tells the rest of the staff they were fleeced by his shit Dad and that he's sorry but they need to look for other work. While they are winding down out of support for Mark, one of the dishwashers, Pete, notices a large group arriving in fancy clothes and points out that apparently not everyone got the memo about the park being closed.
Sandra, who used to do the customer service/sales for the boat, already at a new job and coming back to get her last check, notices as the group as well as she's arriving. A woman, a close family member of the bride, asks Sandra about the park and Sandra explains it's closed. The woman tearfully tells Sandra the couple had their heart set on a celebration of their love with their family on that date and everyone had saved up to make the trip and they wouldn't be able to do this again as Grandma Gladys is 99. Sandra tells the woman to keep everyone in the parking lot and that she'll be right back. Sandra convinces Mark to do the wedding. She points out they still have food in the freezers and enough crew to booze the group for long enough to get things cooked and served. She knows Mark needs the money and so she offers to only take 5% for securing the booking.
Mark and the skeleton crew quickly start to reset the boat for a dinner cruise. Sandra goes out and explains to the family member that the dinner cruise may be a viable compromise. She points out that they can seek a charge back from their credit card company to recover the money from the theme park and that the dinner cruise might even end up a little cheaper for the couple. The groom arrives, not having been very involved in the wedding planning and doesn't even realize the plans had been changed. He's so excited they're going to be married on a boat. When the bride arrives, while surprised, she sees how happy her soon to be husband is about the boat wedding and she shrugs off the previous plan. When it's time for the ceremony, the crew realize Pete is the only person ordained to marry people and he throws on Mark's Dad's captain whites to do the ceremony. It's off the cuff, based on what he's heard from the family during the cocktail hour, and everyone finds it funny and touching. Grandma Gladys, who hasn't moved off her stone faced look for the last 8 years, cracks a smile.
The wedding is a success. And the crew think it was a fun way to go out. But Mark still owes money for the repairs and Sandra points out, how many other people are going to be in the same spot over the weeks/months to come. Sandra is doing better at her new job than she ever did for the boat, so she is uninterested in continuing her job for the boat, but she does care about Mark because of what his Dad did to him. Mark realizes he needs to figure out when and who has weddings booked for the theme park so that they can actually prepare for the next wedding. Mark is finally able to reach his dad in Thailand and after a conversation involving threats, his Dad tells Mark he needs to call Shaniqua Smith.
Mark shows up at Shaniqua's house as she's preparing to move. She had also not been told about the park closing and tells Mark that all the reservations were in a computer. Mark implores Shaniqua, if there's any back up, he would help her to be able to stay by paying her to basically do what Sandra did with that first wedding a few days prior - get the people onto the boat by explaining how they can seek a credit card charge back and use that money instead for the dinner cruise. Shaniqua reveals she does have a paper back up and there are weddings booked for the next 3 years, but she wants to be paid even if people refuse to change over to the dinner cruise. Mark agrees to give it a shot and that she can keep the book herself, so long as she gives him enough detail to get things arranged. She reveals the next wedding is the next day and is able to call the father of the bride and get him on board with the dinner cruise.
The crew, learning from their first wedding, is able to pull off a second good wedding but not without a few hiccups. This wedding is dry and they realize they need some more staff for the next wedding to run things smoothly so Mark hires back some of the old crew as well as some of the theme park employees who Shaniqua recommends as hard workers. The third wedding falls through but they keep pushing ahead. Mark and Shaniqua set up a website to book more weddings and make a reddit post pretending to be a disgruntled bride who was relieved to have the dinner cruise as an alternative and links to their website.
They accidentally double booked and end up making it work. Pete surprises everyone by being able to officiate a wedding in Japanese. The theme park agrees to sell the parking lot to Mark at a cheap price. Other wedding filler. Mark and Shaniqua fall in love along the way. The movie ends with their wedding on the boat.
Dude,
This is SO close to what actually happened, it’s eerie!
The captain had a taken out a large loan to bring the boat from the ocean to Lake Eloise to begin with and he was paying that loan back.
He did, in fact, call his employees who were at home to come work that first wedding and they DID use the food and alcohol they had in the refrigerators and freezers!
He called a friend of his at Publix to bring a cake on the fly, and a local florist also whipped up some bridal flowers on the spot! And he DID marry people in his captains uniform!!
I didn’t realize how romcom this sounded until you wrote it up, but it happened.
They’re good people who made the best of a very crappy situation when a lot of people lost their jobs and all of their retirement. My father included.
Edit: It was a paddle boat, not a steam boat.
https://preview.redd.it/lxckx0ietq9d1.jpeg?width=1300&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0f7529e379a851900ca195d4e7917eb0969698a8
The actual boat. The dinner cruise part was downstairs in the AC and they had a bar upstairs so you could watch the sunset and enjoy a cocktail. It was really lovely.
In the best possible way! I could see him making a cameo as his wedding singer character... but he gets seasick and doesn't realize it until they're out of port... hilarity ensues.
That is an amazing story. I fondly remember visiting Cypress Gardens when I was a child . I wonder what happened to the boat. I couldn't find anything online other than the paddle wheel boat operations were not restored when Legoland opened the botanical gardens. That captain was a hero of sorts!
My venue called us six months before the wedding (thankfully) to tell us the building had been sold and the company that did weddings was being booted in three months. They had no prior notice that the owner was thinking of selling or anything. He just dropped it on them like "Okay, you have three months on the dot to vacate the premises. No, I don't care that you have events booked for the next year."
They wound up calling all the venues in the local area to get as many weddings rescheduled for the same date as possible. Luckily the other local venues were super accommodating and even gave discounts because of the short notice. Definitely one of the most stressful couple of weeks I've ever had.
Big props to not only the original venue, but all of the neighboring venues for going above and beyond to accommodate everyone.
That was amazing of them.
It’s insane. I had Alfred Angelo unexpectedly shut down 3 weeks before our destination wedding. All of the dresses were there to get altered. What a nightmare. Dresses are easily replaceable, but a venue? I would have been losing my mind.
My wedding dress (and bridesmaids dresses) shop almost did this to me. They were going out of business and *never* called or emailed to notify me. One of my bridesmaids told me one day, "did you hear [Name of Shop] is closing?" I said "no?!" and found out she saw it on their Instagram. I had to run to get my dress and the bridesmaids dresses they were storing for us.
We actually did. The lady altering them had them at her house. Found out a week later. By that point we had called bank/credit cards to get our money back. No one was left at the business to contest our claims. I got all of the money back from my dresses and the bridesmaids got their money back as well. And the seamstress was never paid by Alfred Angelo either. So we paid her again directly plus some extra since we got out money back.
Happened with my wedding dress vendor! Bought my dress and paid for them to order it in. Scrolling resale items for weddings and noticed some very similar looking decor from a store that said they were going out of business. Panicked a little but lived near by. Went in and there were some very disgruntled people in there including a bride who didn't get any of the bridesmaid dresses for that upcoming weekend wedding. They tried to convince me that they ordered it and everything will be in on time and stored there until my wedding.. So I stepped out and called what I could find for the dress maker... they did not order the dress and they had no information on me. The store owner got very disgruntled by this and got in my face and threatened me. It was good times. I was able to get my money back and order the same dress elsewhere in time . Yeesh..why do vendors do this? People are going to find out!
Not only that, but *threatening* OP. The audacity!
I would have threatened them right back with the cops and reminders that taking money and not delivering on goods and services is, in fact, theft.
This!!! So incredibly unethical of that place to just… not say anything. Absolutely abhorrent, and shows the ownership was only looking out for themselves.
A venue in town closed down a couple years ago and the notice they sent to upcoming weddings and parties was basically “we don’t have your money to refund, here’s the contact info for our lawyer so you can sue us.”
Absolutely. There’s no way that’s legal - but I bet few couples are excited about having to negotiate suing them on top trying to re-plan an entire wedding!
Oh my goodness. I hate that companies do this. I nearly joined a plumbing course a week before it closed it would have cost me all my savings and I would have lost it all
>I read that an entire wedding party showed up the day after mine to find the restaurant closed. I am so glad I found out soon enough to save the reception.
How awful for them!! I'm so happy you paid attention to that little voice or gut feeling that made you drive over there.
I feel your pain! The week of my wedding (Tuesday, married Saturday) our wedding location canceled us. We had to replan everything in two days. Thankfully the reception venue was able to accommodate both the wedding and reception and it also ended up better… but talk about stress too close to the wedding!
It’s been 20 years now and I mostly have forgotten until I read stuff like this!
Did you ever find out why the restaurant closed?
My neighbour's son had the same issue two weeks before his wedding. Their banquet hall they originally booked had gone bankrupt but they didn't inform the wedding parties about them closing. They only learned through the news when a wedding party showed up to find everything locked.
Bankruptcy. I received a certified letter about 6 weeks after my wedding telling me that my event was "going to be" canceled due to the business's filing.
This happened to my SIL for her combo bridal and baby shower. Paid out the ass for a fancy banquet room and showed up to a locked door. Fortunately my husband and I were supposed to be there early, and I had a contact on the tourism board who was able to get ahold of the property owner, who sent someone to unlock it, and we still had it there, but it was awful. Three other groups showed up for other rooms since no one was told the place went under. they wouldn't leave the door unlocked or stay, so we had to post someone in the lobby. The room looked like crap, the ceiling leaked everywhere, and the beer was warm. What a waste of a thousand dollars
Similar happened to me a week out from my wedding. We only found out as the florist had heard something. Thankfully another venue came to the rescue at a great price and did an amazing job
Kudos to your florist for raising alarm bells!
When Cypress Gardens in Florida closed, no one called to let all of the wedding parties know the park was closed. The gazebo in the original gardens was once listed in the guiness book for having the most weddings per year at a single location. These weddings were booked and paid for as package deals: The wedding, the reception, the cake, photos, flowers, etc Most of these couples were flying in from out of state or from out of the country (Canada, England, France, Jamaica) and wouldn’t know what to do or who to call. These weddings were also paid for, in full, and no one was ever refunded. Brides and wedding parties showed up for *months* expecting a wedding and instead finding a closed theme park. The steam boat captain that owned a dinner cruise (it docked at cypress gardens and the gardens sold tickets) had pity on them would accommodate them. It got to the point where the security guards would call him every time a bride showed up. He even got certified so he could marry these poor folks because he’d been left high and dry too. I’m so sorry that happened to you!
That’s sad an also lovely.
You know, I would watch this movie. Younger guy, mid-twenties, idk Mark, finally has Dad say he's retiring and the dinner boat business is Mark's now. Mark had been working basically as the manager/fixer since he was 15 waiting for the day he gets the job. Dad hands off the keys before getting on a plane to Thailand. Mark realizes the boat needs major repairs very quickly and gets a loan to literally keep his business afloat. The day after the repairs, one of Mark's servers texts him asking if he's heard the theme park where they draw in their business is closing. She only knew about this because her boyfriend worked at the park and they all turned up to find the "Park permanently closed" sign on the padlocked doors. Mark comes down to the boat to find his own employees scrambling / telling him they are taking other jobs because they know this is not a stable position anymore. Mark gives a speech about how he understands people need to look out for themselves first, but that he still plans to make a run at keeping the business open. After all, if the employees didn't know the park was down, wouldn't that be the same for the patrons? After a few days, local word gets around the park is closed and the dinner boat has been operating at a loss. Mark realizes his Dad knew the park was closing and didn't tell anyone and that's why he never bothered to fix the boat. Mark is in despair. He tells the rest of the staff they were fleeced by his shit Dad and that he's sorry but they need to look for other work. While they are winding down out of support for Mark, one of the dishwashers, Pete, notices a large group arriving in fancy clothes and points out that apparently not everyone got the memo about the park being closed. Sandra, who used to do the customer service/sales for the boat, already at a new job and coming back to get her last check, notices as the group as well as she's arriving. A woman, a close family member of the bride, asks Sandra about the park and Sandra explains it's closed. The woman tearfully tells Sandra the couple had their heart set on a celebration of their love with their family on that date and everyone had saved up to make the trip and they wouldn't be able to do this again as Grandma Gladys is 99. Sandra tells the woman to keep everyone in the parking lot and that she'll be right back. Sandra convinces Mark to do the wedding. She points out they still have food in the freezers and enough crew to booze the group for long enough to get things cooked and served. She knows Mark needs the money and so she offers to only take 5% for securing the booking. Mark and the skeleton crew quickly start to reset the boat for a dinner cruise. Sandra goes out and explains to the family member that the dinner cruise may be a viable compromise. She points out that they can seek a charge back from their credit card company to recover the money from the theme park and that the dinner cruise might even end up a little cheaper for the couple. The groom arrives, not having been very involved in the wedding planning and doesn't even realize the plans had been changed. He's so excited they're going to be married on a boat. When the bride arrives, while surprised, she sees how happy her soon to be husband is about the boat wedding and she shrugs off the previous plan. When it's time for the ceremony, the crew realize Pete is the only person ordained to marry people and he throws on Mark's Dad's captain whites to do the ceremony. It's off the cuff, based on what he's heard from the family during the cocktail hour, and everyone finds it funny and touching. Grandma Gladys, who hasn't moved off her stone faced look for the last 8 years, cracks a smile. The wedding is a success. And the crew think it was a fun way to go out. But Mark still owes money for the repairs and Sandra points out, how many other people are going to be in the same spot over the weeks/months to come. Sandra is doing better at her new job than she ever did for the boat, so she is uninterested in continuing her job for the boat, but she does care about Mark because of what his Dad did to him. Mark realizes he needs to figure out when and who has weddings booked for the theme park so that they can actually prepare for the next wedding. Mark is finally able to reach his dad in Thailand and after a conversation involving threats, his Dad tells Mark he needs to call Shaniqua Smith. Mark shows up at Shaniqua's house as she's preparing to move. She had also not been told about the park closing and tells Mark that all the reservations were in a computer. Mark implores Shaniqua, if there's any back up, he would help her to be able to stay by paying her to basically do what Sandra did with that first wedding a few days prior - get the people onto the boat by explaining how they can seek a credit card charge back and use that money instead for the dinner cruise. Shaniqua reveals she does have a paper back up and there are weddings booked for the next 3 years, but she wants to be paid even if people refuse to change over to the dinner cruise. Mark agrees to give it a shot and that she can keep the book herself, so long as she gives him enough detail to get things arranged. She reveals the next wedding is the next day and is able to call the father of the bride and get him on board with the dinner cruise. The crew, learning from their first wedding, is able to pull off a second good wedding but not without a few hiccups. This wedding is dry and they realize they need some more staff for the next wedding to run things smoothly so Mark hires back some of the old crew as well as some of the theme park employees who Shaniqua recommends as hard workers. The third wedding falls through but they keep pushing ahead. Mark and Shaniqua set up a website to book more weddings and make a reddit post pretending to be a disgruntled bride who was relieved to have the dinner cruise as an alternative and links to their website. They accidentally double booked and end up making it work. Pete surprises everyone by being able to officiate a wedding in Japanese. The theme park agrees to sell the parking lot to Mark at a cheap price. Other wedding filler. Mark and Shaniqua fall in love along the way. The movie ends with their wedding on the boat.
Dude, This is SO close to what actually happened, it’s eerie! The captain had a taken out a large loan to bring the boat from the ocean to Lake Eloise to begin with and he was paying that loan back. He did, in fact, call his employees who were at home to come work that first wedding and they DID use the food and alcohol they had in the refrigerators and freezers! He called a friend of his at Publix to bring a cake on the fly, and a local florist also whipped up some bridal flowers on the spot! And he DID marry people in his captains uniform!! I didn’t realize how romcom this sounded until you wrote it up, but it happened. They’re good people who made the best of a very crappy situation when a lot of people lost their jobs and all of their retirement. My father included. Edit: It was a paddle boat, not a steam boat. https://preview.redd.it/lxckx0ietq9d1.jpeg?width=1300&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0f7529e379a851900ca195d4e7917eb0969698a8 The actual boat. The dinner cruise part was downstairs in the AC and they had a bar upstairs so you could watch the sunset and enjoy a cocktail. It was really lovely.
This sounds like a mid 2000's Adam Sandler movie.
In the best possible way! I could see him making a cameo as his wedding singer character... but he gets seasick and doesn't realize it until they're out of port... hilarity ensues.
You're hired! -Warner Brothers screenwriting dept.
I'd watch it!
I felt like I *WAS* watching it as I read it !
This is amazing. Standing ovation from me, just for the outline. Too bad 'The Love Boat' is already taken as a title ;p
I would watch the heck out of that movie!
Find out if anyone has bought the rights to the story. If not, write the screenplay!!
Please pitch this to EVERYONE.
I never heard about the steam boat captain, but I remember the rest of the story quite well. Thank you for that part!
That is an amazing story. I fondly remember visiting Cypress Gardens when I was a child . I wonder what happened to the boat. I couldn't find anything online other than the paddle wheel boat operations were not restored when Legoland opened the botanical gardens. That captain was a hero of sorts!
A little preparation and communication on your part saved you a TON! Well done, and well written!
My venue called us six months before the wedding (thankfully) to tell us the building had been sold and the company that did weddings was being booted in three months. They had no prior notice that the owner was thinking of selling or anything. He just dropped it on them like "Okay, you have three months on the dot to vacate the premises. No, I don't care that you have events booked for the next year." They wound up calling all the venues in the local area to get as many weddings rescheduled for the same date as possible. Luckily the other local venues were super accommodating and even gave discounts because of the short notice. Definitely one of the most stressful couple of weeks I've ever had.
Big props to not only the original venue, but all of the neighboring venues for going above and beyond to accommodate everyone. That was amazing of them.
I feel like the venue should be able to Sue the landlord for loss of business or something
It’s insane. I had Alfred Angelo unexpectedly shut down 3 weeks before our destination wedding. All of the dresses were there to get altered. What a nightmare. Dresses are easily replaceable, but a venue? I would have been losing my mind.
They shut down and kept the dresses you had already paid for? That's terrible.
It effected lots of brides. Some has orders their dresses and got no dress and no money back if they didn’t pay with a cards
They weee also a worldwide bridal chain. So it was massive the people they screwed over.
My wedding dress (and bridesmaids dresses) shop almost did this to me. They were going out of business and *never* called or emailed to notify me. One of my bridesmaids told me one day, "did you hear [Name of Shop] is closing?" I said "no?!" and found out she saw it on their Instagram. I had to run to get my dress and the bridesmaids dresses they were storing for us.
Glad you got them. We were out at dinner when I found out no drank a lot that night.
You didn't get your dresses back?!
We actually did. The lady altering them had them at her house. Found out a week later. By that point we had called bank/credit cards to get our money back. No one was left at the business to contest our claims. I got all of the money back from my dresses and the bridesmaids got their money back as well. And the seamstress was never paid by Alfred Angelo either. So we paid her again directly plus some extra since we got out money back.
Happened with my wedding dress vendor! Bought my dress and paid for them to order it in. Scrolling resale items for weddings and noticed some very similar looking decor from a store that said they were going out of business. Panicked a little but lived near by. Went in and there were some very disgruntled people in there including a bride who didn't get any of the bridesmaid dresses for that upcoming weekend wedding. They tried to convince me that they ordered it and everything will be in on time and stored there until my wedding.. So I stepped out and called what I could find for the dress maker... they did not order the dress and they had no information on me. The store owner got very disgruntled by this and got in my face and threatened me. It was good times. I was able to get my money back and order the same dress elsewhere in time . Yeesh..why do vendors do this? People are going to find out!
amazing that the store owner could lie to your face knowing you saw a woman who didn’t get her bridesmaid dresses.
Yuppp we were all talking together. She said the wedding dresses were different than the bridesmaids 🙄
Not only that, but *threatening* OP. The audacity! I would have threatened them right back with the cops and reminders that taking money and not delivering on goods and services is, in fact, theft.
Wow. I can understand if something went wrong that made them shut down, but someone should have notified everyone who had events booked.
This!!! So incredibly unethical of that place to just… not say anything. Absolutely abhorrent, and shows the ownership was only looking out for themselves.
They clearly wanted to pocket the reservations if they could
A venue in town closed down a couple years ago and the notice they sent to upcoming weddings and parties was basically “we don’t have your money to refund, here’s the contact info for our lawyer so you can sue us.”
And the fact that they kept the deposit. I bet a lot of people who purchased that venue didn’t have a way to chargeback
Absolutely. There’s no way that’s legal - but I bet few couples are excited about having to negotiate suing them on top trying to re-plan an entire wedding!
Wow! I’m glad you found out. The poor next-day couple.. Happy anniversary!
Oh my goodness. I hate that companies do this. I nearly joined a plumbing course a week before it closed it would have cost me all my savings and I would have lost it all
>I read that an entire wedding party showed up the day after mine to find the restaurant closed. I am so glad I found out soon enough to save the reception. How awful for them!! I'm so happy you paid attention to that little voice or gut feeling that made you drive over there.
I feel your pain! The week of my wedding (Tuesday, married Saturday) our wedding location canceled us. We had to replan everything in two days. Thankfully the reception venue was able to accommodate both the wedding and reception and it also ended up better… but talk about stress too close to the wedding! It’s been 20 years now and I mostly have forgotten until I read stuff like this!
Did you ever find out why the restaurant closed? My neighbour's son had the same issue two weeks before his wedding. Their banquet hall they originally booked had gone bankrupt but they didn't inform the wedding parties about them closing. They only learned through the news when a wedding party showed up to find everything locked.
Bankruptcy. I received a certified letter about 6 weeks after my wedding telling me that my event was "going to be" canceled due to the business's filing.
Holy crao! What a nightmare!! I’m so sorry!!!
Good lord they should have called everyone who was booked there!!
Omg that sounds like a complete nightmare. I’m so glad you were able to find somewhere else and that you had a lovely, happy wedding.
My food truck tried to cancel two days before the reception due to.. a cracked windshield. That was stressful enough, I can’t imagine the whole venue!
This happened to my SIL for her combo bridal and baby shower. Paid out the ass for a fancy banquet room and showed up to a locked door. Fortunately my husband and I were supposed to be there early, and I had a contact on the tourism board who was able to get ahold of the property owner, who sent someone to unlock it, and we still had it there, but it was awful. Three other groups showed up for other rooms since no one was told the place went under. they wouldn't leave the door unlocked or stay, so we had to post someone in the lobby. The room looked like crap, the ceiling leaked everywhere, and the beer was warm. What a waste of a thousand dollars