Good food, but poorly managed
Let me start by saying that the food is great. We had his pulled pork, and it was some of the best tasting I've ever had. His staff is also quite courteous and tried to be accommodating. Now with that, dealing with Ernie himself was a bit of a nightmare. We used Ernie's Mobile BBQ for our wedding. We hit a few small snags along the way, as well as one large one. First off, even though it says on his site you can pay the day of the event, Ernie requires full payment before the date. He informed me of this only 3 days before the wedding. I was not expecting this charge to be on my credit card. I was planning on giving him a cheque when he arrived, my credit card was already quite maxed out with all the dozens of other things one must pay for before a large wedding. I ended up having to move a bunch of money around, not a big deal, but a bit of an annoyance to have days before our big day. Another small snag was his catering crew showed up at the wrong hall. Our venue was Madden Community Centre, his crew showed up at Golden Rod Hall near Airdrie. So while we were getting our Wedding pictures done, Ernie was calling me, asking me to send someone to the locked hall and let his crew in. When I found out he was at the wrong hall, I explained to him that Golden Rod Hall is NOT Madden Community Centre, and his crew now had to rush to the right venue. Ernie told me when you enter Madden Community Centre into google, Golden Rod Hall shows up, that's why the mistake was made. Although every time I enter it in, it takes me right to the halls webpage, Golden Rod doesn't even come up in the Google search. Also Ernie had catered before at the Madden Hall at another wedding, so I assumed he would know where to go. As I said, just a small snag, his crew showed up, were extremely accommodating, got the food out quite fast for being over half an hour past their supposed arrival time, and we were eating only a few minutes later than we were supposed to.
Now comes the big snag. We were quite short on food. In fact we were very short on food. As the groom, you don't really hear about these things till after the fact, but the next day I heard that a couple tables did not get to enjoy a full meal, and the help I hired (the local 4-H club) to clear tables and clean dishes, who I accounted for in my numbers to Ernie to enjoy a meal, only received the bottom of the pulled pork bin, and some buns. When I saw that Ernie had charged my Credit Card the FULL PRICE on the day after the wedding, I contacted him via email. I told him his food was great, but I had a concern that I found out we were short on food, and I wanted to bring this to his attention. He wrote back saying "the crew had brought it to his attention, he didn't know why there was a shortage, but thank you for your business", was the short of it. What came next was a series of slightly heated emails between the 2 of us. I did end up getting some compensation for it, but he only gave me the bare minimum. At the time I was just happy to receive anything from him and stop this conflict, but after talking with more of my guests the following couple weeks, I found we were very short on food. Ernie compensated me 12 plates, after discussing with guests, he probably should have compensated more on the lines of 30. Quite a few guests ate very little when they started to realize there was not going to be enough food.
This is absolutely devastating as the Bride and Groom to find out guests did not get enough to eat, and were scraping the bottoms of food tins to try to fill their plates. I can understand that this can happen, but what drives me nuts is Ernie's refusal to admit he screwed up. One, he knew there was a shortage of food, yet still charged my credit card full amount without contacting me about it. Two, he never offered to compensate me, I Had to ask for it, then received very little. Three, his crew was there and they saw how short they were, yet Ernie tried to play that they were only slightly short. Four, in his emails Ernie told me he didn't understand why they were short, he brought food for 190 people, and has never been short before. When I explained to him that our numbers were for 200 people, and that's what we were charged for, he just said, oops that was a typo, he meant to say 200 people. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that he screwed up, he was short before he even arrived, but he just full on will not admit it!
As I said, Good food, but Ernie needs to take some schooling on management.
Let me start by saying that the food is great. We had his pulled pork, and it was some of the best tasting I've ever had. His staff is also quite courteous and tried to be accommodating. Now with that, dealing with Ernie himself was a bit of a nightmare. We used Ernie's Mobile BBQ for our wedding. We hit a few small snags along the way, as well as one large one. First off, even though it says on his site you can pay the day of the event, Ernie requires full payment before the date. He informed me of this only 3 days before the wedding. I was not expecting this charge to be on my credit card. I was planning on giving him a cheque when he arrived, my credit card was already quite maxed out with all the dozens of other things one must pay for before a large wedding. I ended up having to move a bunch of money around, not a big deal, but a bit of an annoyance to have days before our big day. Another small snag was his catering crew showed up at the wrong hall. Our venue was...