Because of the number of good reviews for Made by Meg, I decided to try them for a Celebration of…read moreLife event I was hosting in honor of my mother who passed. After reaching out to them, was finally able to get a response concerning their interest. They referred me to their website to review food choices. Their offerings are really extensive, which made selection rather daunting. Brenda called me to help with putting something together. However, when I asked to meet with her, was told that their policy was not to meet in person until they had a signed contract. For me, that was like the chicken and the egg. How do I get to the point of signing a contract when I'm not sure what to request. She volunteered to put together a proposal for 20-25 people. Her initial proposal called for 5-7 catering staff since I wanted to have my guests served. After a conversation regarding the many staff for the size of my party seemed excessive, we agreed on a bartender and a server. That seemed more reasonable so a contract was issued which I signed and returned. Prepayment was made for the contract items. This was roughly two weeks before the event. When I didn't hear anything from Brenda about the details and logistics for about a week, I became concerned about knowing who was doing what. Her response came in a timely manner so we both knew who was doing what. There was no offer to meet to work out details. There was no offer to stop by my home to set what the situation called for. But again, because to the number of positive reviews, I wasn't overly concerned.
On the day of the event, I went to the service for my mother and delivered her eulogy. Minutes before I was to speak, got a call from Brenda who wanted to know about getting in the house because no one seemed to be a home. The front door was left unlocked and my neighbor was supposed to be watching for the van to park in our driveway and apparently didn't see Sedrick arrive. When informed about the unlocked door, Brenda passed that info along to the bartender to begin setting up.
Jane left the service early to come home and see if our bartender, Sedrick, needed anything. This is where things went off the rails.
From the moment Jane arrived home, it was clear that there was way too much work to do before guests from the service began to arrive. She enlisted the help of my neighbor to help with the setup. Why? Because the server I paid for who was supposed to help with the setup was NOT going to be there to help with either setup or serving. The bartender was scheduled to arrive at 2pm, giving MBM about an hour and a half to get ready for my guests. Well, Jane and my neighbor were working diligently to help with setup, they are not professional caterers. While Sedrick was trying to get things set up, my guests started arriving a little before 4pm. Since Sedrick was busy with set up, I stepped in to begin serving drinks to my guests. That was NOT what I planned. Once setup was pretty much completed, I was relieved of my bartending duties and able to spend time with my guests, some of which had traveled thousands of miles to be here.
Things finally began flowing and my guests enjoyed themselves. So why such a poor review? Well, you should be able to get my drift about what didn't go well. Let me expand on that.
If l were just rating the performance of the staff, Sedrick was 5-star. He's personable, professional and has a "can do" attitude. As good as he is, he cannot do the work of two people and succeed. He was setup for failure by MBM, and darn near did. Also, I paid for a server, yet none was provided.
I'm writing this review several days after the event because I wanted to give MBM an opportunity to follow up with me. They have NOT as of yet. That leaves me to believe that even though they knew my event was going to be a challenge with a lone bartender, they have little concern for me as a client.
If you're looking for a caterer to just drop off food, MBM gets my recommendation. The food was excellent. But if you want to have a caterer who will handle everything for your event, like Chef Dora does, look for someone else.
