I’ll set the scene on this one:  It’s January 11.  Approximately 4 months for my wedding day.   The Engineer, Sonya (our wedding planner) and I take the #2 elevator at the SunSphere to the 6th floor.   It’s the first time the Boy has seen our event floor.   They aren’t ready for us.  No biggie, as we’re about 5 minutes early.

The Sunsphere has recently reopened it’s doors to event planning, and have been booked solid since the official opening in September 2007 .    I signed my contract to use them in March 2007 (actually it was the 2nd blog entry). Since me signing a contract, I’ve gotten a new account manager.    No one has really spoken to me about my event until January 11, 2008.  Tasting day.

The Engineer , Sonya, and I are at the Sunsphere with our caterer Southern Graces Catering to have our official tasting for our reception dinner.    I had previously discussed all my ‘wants’ with my old account manager so I assumed the new account manager was up to speed with everything.   Boy was I wrong.   The first issues is that we’ve asked for a sit-down dinner for 180.  Now, we know we’re likely to come in under 180 but I wanted to be on the safe side.   The contract I signed in March says they will ‘easily seat 206, with a dance floor, a bar, a cake table and a gift table”.  No big deal.  We’ve got room to spare.  Again… wrong.    As I’m munching away on the cucumber cup filled with something, I hear the account manager say, “So.. um… if you want to have a seated dinner, with a dance floor, bar, cake table and gift table… we’re looking at maybe 120 people.. max”.   I almost choke on a cucumber.   WHAT!?!?!?   I’m stunned.   When I ask why the number is so dramatically off from my contract number, she shrugs her head.  As each dish is brought out, things get worse.  No dance floor, no cake table, no gift table might seat 150.   If I was willing to do a buffet I could possibly get 220 in the ’sphere but only if people ate is shifts (I was informed that at buffet dinners, no one eats at the same time… I don’t know what dinners she was going to, but that’s neither here nor there).   Each suggestion was getting more and more preposterous.  Bar on the 5th floor (we had rented the 5th floor for cocktail hour) but they wouldn’t let anyone take the stairs to and from the 5th and 6th floor.  That’s a problem since the elevator situation is still a disaster (the city owns the elevators.. enough said).  The more I heard, the more unhappy I got.   The other account manager who’ was present is less helpful.  He could only manage to mention how we got the  Sunsphere for a ridiculous low price and how no one could even rent the event floor for 6 hours now.  How they just couldn’t believe how ‘lucky’ we got to get to use their facilities for next to nothing (trust me.. it wasn’t next to nothing.. it was very much a 5 figure something).   By the time it was all said and done I was livid.  Why was I just finding out now, 4 months before my wedding, that my reception site just couldn’t fit us??   They had been having full scale events for 4 months and knew what their headcount capacity was, but no one thought to call and tell me?   I kept hearing alot of what I couldn’t do, not what they could do to make the situation better.  I was over it.  In the elevator ride down (it was a LONG 6 floors) I told Sonya that I wanted out of my contract and all my deposit back.   I saw a look of understanding and concern in Sonya’s eye.  It had taken us 3 months to find a reception site and here, 4 months before the wedding, we were going to try to do it again.  Now, the 11th was a Thursday and the following Sunday was the biggest annual bridal show in Knoxville.   I knew if I got out of my Sunsphere contract before Sunday, they would be more agreeable since they would be able to try to ’sell’ my date to other brides.  This would mean they would be more likely to give me my deposit back.  I also knew that I’d have two days to get ‘dibs’ on whatever wasn’t already taken before every other bride in Knoxville was set loose to find a reception facility.

As luck would have it, everything seemed to fall into place.    There were  were plenty of  places suitable for our reception that were still available.  Southern Graces gave me back my deposit with no hassle.   And, we were lucky enough to score Club Le Conte for our reception.  Club Le Conte is a members only restaurant that’s on the top floor of the tallest building in Knoxville.  Most cities, it seems, have one of the ‘club’ restaurants that cater to the business clientèle.   It turns out that  one of my former sorority sisters is the event manager, and my wedding planner was able to sponsor us (eliminating a non-member fee we would have had to pay had we not had a sponsor).   We originally thought that Club Le Conte was our of our price range, but after the waived non-member fee, and examining cost a little more, we were ecstatic to find that not only was Club Le Conte in our price range, but they were saving us money!!!  My sorority sister has been a fantastic help working with us under tight timelines.   The wedding planning is back on track. 

Needless to say, we can’t be happier.   The view is amazing, the food is A.W.E.S.O.M.E, and well… the service is impeccable.

And that is how you take lemons and make lemon meringue pie!