What a horrible waste of money!! I wanted to throw my son a nice party for hisbirthday at the…read moreAMNH, so we of course HAD to use Linda Kaye's Partymakers since they seem to have an exclusive contract with the museum.
Even though we had to wait a few days to hear from Linda Kaye's office if "the whale room was available for the party", giving the SADLY MISTAKEN impression that the party was held in the whale room, it was not. We only spent about a half hour in the whale room doing a scavenger hunt. The rest of the party was held in a dingy, depressing, dungeon-like room in the basement of the museum referred to as the "Birthday Cafe". It isn't even in the cafeteria. It was an awful place in the bowels of the AMNH. Also, I knew nothing about that room until about 4 days before the party, when she told me that was where I should bring the cake if I wanted to go early and drop it off at 9am. It was never clarified on their website or by the Partymakers Party Planner that this would be the site for the majority of the party. Additionally, when the planner kept asking if I wanted to order balloons or decorations, I said "We like the whale room just the way it is". She could have corrected my mistake then and told me about the "Birthday Cafe", but she did not.
Our planner was just awful. She was full of attitude, made us feel very much like she just couldn't be bothered with us, and was very unorganized. She never gave us any BASIC information (like where the party would be held, what will the kids be doing at the party, how the guests gain entrance to the party, etc) and when we asked for these things, she snapped at us with quotes like "It's not a soccer match, it's a birthday party. We don't have a schedule." Well, if you are worth your salt in event planning, you SHOULD have a schedule, even if you only follow it loosely. And you most definitely should provide it, upfront, freely, and without attitude.
Partymakers never did the invitations that were supposed to be included in the pkg, saying she was busy but that "I could send out my own". However, even after I asked several times, she never gave me enough information to even tell the guests where to go to enter the party. And since she left out that we would be in the basement the entire party, the guests were all lost and calling me on my cell as I was waiting in the whale room for the party leaders to arrive (they came a half hour later, saying they'd been waiting in the "Birthday Cafe" for us.) It was a complete mess. Now I wonder if they leave that information out on purpose!
Also, the reason I asked for a schedule was because a week earlier, the planner was pushing me to order a full lunch menu for a 10am party. I had gotten fruit platters and juice boxes and was bringing cake (even lots of that ended up going to waste), so lunch would have been a huge waste of time and money, but a commission for them.
The only times the planner ever contacted me was when she wanted to push the Partymaker party extras and things that would earn her commissions (like loot bags, decorations, lunch menus, and their own cake) on me. Even after I told her I wouldn't be needing them, she kept asking, several more times over 2 weeks, all while ignoring my basic questions. It was extremely tacky behavior.
I want to clarify that the people sent to lead the actual party at the museum (separate from the planner) were lovely and very good with the kids, but the basement room was awful and I never would have paid $100 per kid (not including any food or anything else, btw) to sit in the museum basement for almost 2 hours. I could have held the party in my apartment building's boiler room and it would have had more appeal.
My advice -- If you want a party including the museum or the zoo, take your guests to the museum or zoo on your own and then take them to the cafeteria there or to a restaurant somewhere. It would be far cheaper and far more appealing than this was. Don't waste your time, energy and money with Partymakers!! I've dealt with a number of event planners and I have never before seen such poor party planning and I've never been more disappointed and frustrated with an event in my life.
