The Woodwinds — Attraction in Branford

We found The WoodWinds on Zola, and the pictures looked breathtaking. The packages, specials, and everything included almost seemed too good to be true. My first interaction was with Ken Broccoli, and he was phenomenal. He was truly the sole reason we booked this venue sight unseen. My husband grew up in New Jersey, I grew up in Massachusetts, and since we currently live in Virginia, finding a Connecticut venue as a halfway point was important to us. Ken made planning from states away feel easy. He was knowledgeable, accommodating, and assured us we would have the best day ever, and he was not wrong about that.

After booking, we were handed over to Michael Diblasi. Unfortunately, our experience with him was not nearly as positive. Communication felt dismissive at times, with long response delays and very brief replies to detailed questions. As first-time visitors to the venue planning a wedding from out of state, we had reasonable questions, but often felt like we were inconveniencing him. Our virtual walkthrough felt rushed, and while things improved slightly when we met him in person to drop off our final payment, there were still miscommunications. For example, we were told our day-of coordinator Sergio would know certain details we discussed, but he had no idea, leaving us to re-explain everything on the spot.

Sergio himself was great during drop-off. He was attentive and patient as we went through our 15-page setup document. However, there were still mistakes on the wedding day. Tables were mislabeled despite the floor plan we provided, our ceremony entrance was reversed from what we had repeatedly requested, and there were last-minute charges like $250 just to use the lawn for a half-hour of pre-ceremony photos, which felt unreasonable.

Day-of service was a mix of highs and lows. Tiffany, our bridal attendant, started off strong but disappeared for long stretches. We even had to go to the bar ourselves multiple times for drinks, and several bridal party drink orders we submitted in advance never made it to us. There were delays in food service of about 30 minutes, servers seemed confused about the meal indicator cards the venue required, and there were long waits for broken glass to be cleaned up on the dance floor. The food itself was mostly good, the vodka sauce pasta was excellent, but the included JJ Cakes wedding cake was dry and disappointing.

One of the most frustrating parts came at the very end. We had been told multiple times that our décor would be packed up for pickup the following day, which was perfect for us since we live out of state. However, ten minutes before the wedding ended, we were told we had to break everything down ourselves that night because they were closed Sunday. My family had to spend two hours packing up 16 tables worth of decorations while we left for our hotel, and staff made them feel rushed out as they were locking up.

Overall, The WoodWinds is a beautiful venue and offers a great value for the price, especially if you catch one of their deals. Our wedding itself was amazing because of the people we love and the memories we created, but there were too many preventable hiccups along the way. If you book here, I highly recommend working with Ken if possible. He was exceptional. Unfortunately, our experience with Michael and some of the day-of issues left us with...

After having to cancel and reschedule our wedding due to covid, we finally had our dream wedding at Woodwinds on 1/15/22 and it was everything we could have dreamed of. Woodwinds was extremely accommodating with our situation , as we live in Alabama and everything had to be done virtually.

Originally, our wedding was planned for 1/2/21, but with the way covid was panning out, we made the call in August ‘20 to move the wedding to 2022. Ken was extremely helpful through this whole process and they honored all of our original contract details and deposits with our wedding date move.

As we approached closer to the wedding, we worked with Randy who was also very helpful and responsive in our final months leading up to the big day. Our biggest concern was with the new covid variant and people deciding they no longer want to come/test positive for covid. Randy reassured us that we have up to 7 days before the wedding to finalize the guest list/number of guests attending. We ended up having about 25-30 guests back out in the last month, thus pushing our total guest count below the required minimum of 125 with the venue. Although we paid for 125 guests, Randy allowed us to use the extra money we paid to go toward add-ons with the venue, which we ended up with a late night Buffalo wing bar, pretzel bar, and chocolate liqueur cup station that were all such a big hit.

The wedding was perfect, absolutely no complaints. Our coordinator for the weekend was Sergio. He did an amazing job through the entire day to ensure everything went smoothly and flawlessly. He also made sure there was a drink in my hands at all times, and I appreciated that! They still had their beautiful holiday decor up which was the perfect touch for all of our photos. The bartenders were great and they made a phenomenal Espresso Martini that was wanted by all. The food was absolutely unreal. From the cocktail hour to the dinner, everyone raved about all the amazing appetizers and entrees. Chef Silvio’s Sunday Sauce is no joke!

Their Winter Wedding Package deal was awesome. It included everything with the venue, the DJs, the wedding cake and some of the basics from the florist. It was everything we could have dreamt of and still well within our budget. The team at Woodwinds takes pride in their work, and it definitely shows. Highly recommend for weddings. Especially in the uncertainty of the covid era, they will not leave you out to dry and will help you along the way.

Thanks again for...

I’d honestly had my heart set on a barn wedding when I first visited Woodwinds for a tour, and was a reluctant bride in the beginning. But after working with Woodwinds for over a year on planning my wedding reception there (ceremony was off-site,) and after finally getting married last Sunday, I cannot stress enough how incredibly thankful I am to everyone at Woodwinds. I have worked with Joanna, Marshall, and our wedding coordinators during the event were Scott and Antonella. Everyone I have worked with has blown me away, and my mom and my now-husband both rave about Scott. I visited plenty of venues in Connecticut while initially searching, but Woodwinds was the only place where I truly felt like they cared about me as a bride, not as a paycheck. Whereas one venue tried to charge me $1,000 to put up white Christmas light in their venue, Woodwinds gave me an amazing day at 1/3 the price of other venues, along with complimentary dinner at Café Allegre (sister restaurant) to taste the food, and a free stay at The Inn at Lafayette for my husband and I the night of our wedding. Everyone at Woodwinds has always made me feel like family, and Scott even said as much when he once met my mom during his day off: he said that he was there for my mom on his day off because he truly loved his job and he loved working at Woodwinds, and after 16 years there, this was his family. When I told our DJ (Powerstation Events, DJ Kevin) that our reception would be held at Woodwinds, he said that he and other vendors loved working there because the staff at Woodwinds were genuinely wonderful people who always treated their vendors well. Everything during our wedding was spectacular – the food, drinks, service, etc. was top notch. We received compliments throughout the night from guests who were blown away by Woodwinds, and my husband and I truly could not have asked for a better wedding experience. We are forever grateful to everyone at Woodwinds for giving us a day that we, our families, and our friends will cherish and...