Crystal Ballroom BeachPlace — Attraction in Fort Lauderdale

I am not the type that writes reviews for businesses but after taking several days to reflect on my experience at Crystal Ballroom FTL I felt compelled to write this. So to start off in February when I initially put down my first two deposit for my wedding in December, I was sold on Alberto’s sales pitch of having a smooth wedding experience at his newly renovated “All Inclusive” venue and that the only thing that we needed to provide was food and liquor. He boasted about his vast variety of decorations, napkins, table runners, and silk floral options to choose from only to be offered two types of silver table runners, one style of wine colored napkins, and one style of black cocktail table covers with our choice of gold or silver runners which I noticed was never changed from gold to silver on the day of my wedding. So not only did this venue lack in decorations they also lacked in professionalism and communication. I found that a lot of information was missed during the few times I got to meet with Alberto, one of which he was an hour and a half late to and ended up cutting our meeting down to only 15 minutes so a lot of my questions were left unanswered and getting someone on the phone was almost impossible. After a while I started to feel like the entire process was more like a business deal than my wedding.

After I made my final deposit for my wedding, I received a call from Alberto a week later inquiring about my “Financial Status” apparently he lost track of my first two deposits in February so they were never applied to my account and showed that I had an outstanding balance which was incorrect. After confirming each payment made to him and helping him track down my payment history, I never received an apology. The week prior to my wedding day I got another call from Alberto informing me that I had a balance of $1000 to pay, $500 for the security deposit and $500 for gratuity which were due on the day of my wedding rehearsal that was not included in my final invoice. When I asked him why he reminded me about it so close to my wedding date he stated, “Well I thought your planner would have written this down and reminded you” keep in mind, the last real meeting we had with him where he discussed any information like this was 10 months ago when I decided to book him and I somehow feel that he neglected to remind me because I opted out of using his event planner for my wedding. After that day It only went left from there.

On the day of my wedding rehearsal Alberto kept mixing up my ceremony and cocktail hour locations up, it was almost as if he never actually took a look at my wedding file at all and insisted that he told me to bring over my liquor for inventory when he never discussed that with me. When my wedding day finally came, and I walked down the aisle towards the alter all I could think of was how hot and smoldering the ceremony area was. I knew that they had an issue with the A.C in that area but when I addressed it a couple of months back, I was told that it would have been resolved prior to my wedding day and it wasn’t. Not only was the A.C. broken but so was the dancing on the clouds machine, which my husband’s best man had to fix, and apparently their Gobo name projector which I only found out about six days after my wedding day and only after I didn’t see it in any of my pictures. Had I not noticed I doubt Alberto would have told me about it and I would have been out $300 for a service I did not receive. All together my overall experience at Crystal Ballroom was very unpleasant and I only wish these 1-star reviews were available prior to me booking my wedding with them.

P.S. Please remember to take inventory for everything you bring; somehow two out of my 3 boxes of 12 pack Laskey burgundy taper candles went missing and I had to go back 2x to get items that weren’t put in my section after the wedding like my unity candles and...

I got married at this venue and want to share my horror story. In the beginning, everything was GREAT. I booked the Lake Melva location approximately five months out, pre-construction. The venue was designed and pretty much ready to go as promised, but then the issues started. The A/C broke, and the repairs and inspection would take an additional month to fix. The problem was that I was told this two weeks before my wedding date.

I don’t necessarily blame them for the unexpected repairs (though extremely unfortunate), but I do blame them for everything that transpired afterward. Alberto made many promises that weren’t kept, and that’s the biggest issue. We were pretty much forced to have a daytime (brunch) wedding. This is not what I wanted. This is not what I paid for. Instead of my wedding starting at 6:30 p.m. on a Sunday evening, as we had agreed upon when I paid, I had a Saturday morning wedding that started at 11 a.m. Half of our vendors could not accommodate the last-minute change, and about 35% of my guests couldn’t make it. The change was too last-minute, and some out-of-town guests who flew in couldn’t change their tickets.

Alberto also stated that if I found another venue, he would send his team to decorate the place, and he would use my payment to Crystal Ballroom to take care of the new venue. At first, I didn’t take that option because it was on the spot, and I needed time to digest and get a feel for how this change would impact others. After weighing my options, I decided that I really didn’t like the idea of an early morning wedding and contacted him about his offer to book another venue. This is where the lies started. Alberto then told me that he never said he would do any of that. He also said that he would give me my money back and that I could pay him to have his staff go to the other venue to decorate. I would have to deal with the other venue (The Lavan) myself. When I spoke to The Lavan, they told me that in the past (something like this had happened before), that was the arrangement. For some reason, Alberto changed his mind with our wedding.

At the point when Alberto said he would give the money back to make everything “easier,” it was a week and a half out from the wedding. If I had more time, that would’ve been okay with me, but not when it was that close to the date. I thought I had secured my venue five months prior to my wedding and didn’t want to look for something else a little over a week before my date. Keep in mind, I had made deposits to my vendors, booked vehicles, hotels, Airbnbs, etc. Changing the weekend was virtually impossible at that point. Instead of Lake Melva, we had the wedding at the Beach location. It’s a beautiful venue as well, and I will never take that away from them, but I didn’t want the wedding at that location. I had family, friends, and associates who had their weddings there, and I didn’t want to be just another person getting married there.

That wasn’t a huge deal, and I could’ve looked past it if I had been able to get an evening wedding as I had requested. Alberto also said he would be at the wedding, but he was...

On June 21,2019 my friend sister had her wedding at the Crystal Ballroom. When we met Alberto he was kind, helpful, and informed us that the bride would have everything she wanted. The day of the wedding we were to have sunflowers as centerpieces per the brides request and Alberto informed us that they’ll be able to take care of that. When we got there they were no sunflowers as centerpieces.

We had to have our personal florist add whatever yellow flowers she had to the centerpieces to go with the decor for the wedding. We also had someone come and place monograms on some of the clear chairs that we were using for the wedding. They personally spoke with Alberto and informed him of the proper way to remove the monogram, informed him that it would be a little time consuming, and reassured him that the chairs will be fine and back to normal. Alberto was fine with it.

So the wedding went on as planned. As the night was coming to an end the hall manager spoke with the mother of the bride in regards to the monograms. She volunteered to put a team together to come in the morning to assist with the removal of the monograms. He informed her that it wouldn’t be necessary all his staff needs is soap, water, and a little bit of elbow grease. Fine. The next day we get a call from Alberto that they cannot remove the monograms.

Ok, we sent the bridesmaids to assist with the removal. As the girls were in the mist of removing the monograms it was taking longer than Alberto liked, so he informed the ladies to stop what they were doing cause as far as he was concerned the chairs were damaged goods now and couldn’t be saved so he was keeping the deposit. We informed him that we would have the person who placed the monograms on the chair and informed you on how to remove them come by and remove them.

Alberto told us NO the chairs are ruined and there’s nothing anyone can do. Ok, we understand and apologized. Informed him that we would be coming to pick up the 20 damage chairs and a mirror we used for the wedding. Alberto informed us that we will NOT be getting any of the damaged chairs that our deposit paid for, NOR will we be getting our deposit back. They only thing Alberto informed us we can come get is our mirror.

When we go to get our mirror and chairs Alberto would not talk to us face to face. He spoke to us through his office door. Alberto didn’t talk to us through your office door when you wanted us to book with him. Then threaten to call the police on us. When we informed him that we would be taking him to small claims court his words were, “I got money for a lawyer.” through the closed door.

The level of unprofessionalism that Alberto displayed was disgusting and appalling. To send so much money with a venue and for them to turn around and treat you like you didn’t just do business with them said a lot about The Crystal Ballroom. Luckily 06/21/2019 was and will forever be the last time I go there NOR WILL I EVER RECOMMEND THIS PLACE TO ANYONE LONG AS ALBERTO...