Pritzlaff Events — Attraction in Milwaukee

Beautiful space, but be prepared for a massive headache when working with the Pritzlaff. It's easy to sum up: most vendors are in the wedding business, the Pritzlaff is a real estate company (Sunset Investors). In fact, the space was purchased by a commercial developer who converted it into a wedding venue only to ride out the real estate crisis that crippled his original plan to use the space for luxury condos and boutiques. Their main concern is turning a dime, not your wedding. And you will feel that severely throughout the entire process. Responses (only after you sign the contract) are abrupt, boarder line rude, mark ups are CRAZY expensive (200 do simple go to the roof and take a photo? 500 for a string of lights?), added gratuity way above 20% that you must pay regardless, horrible wine and "champagne" (it's Cava) selection that is ridiculously expensive... the list truly does go on. Unfortunately, there were multiple times throughout the wedding planning process that we said to ourselves "let's just get through this, we know we are simply money makers for them" and when you're spending that much on a single day, it's a really tough reality to swallow. Staff only respond to mails Tuesday-Friday as they are too busy with weddings to answer over the weekends and need Monday to recover. Always review all of your itemized bills as there are extra charges that are unjustified. They will remove them if you put up a stink, but again, it's a horrible feeling when you have to go through line by line because you know you are being taken for a ride. Very sadly, if we were to do it all over again, we would not work with the Prtizlaff. If you are in a situation where you have an unlimited budget and someone else coordinating for you, it will be a great option. If you are doing it yourself, just know going into it that it will be difficult. It's really a shame because if their customer service was up to par with other vendors in the same area, and up to speed with the beauty of the space, they would really have a phenomenal product on their hands and would, long term, turn a substantial profit. The potential is simply astronomical. Sadly, we signed before reading their reviews, and we painfully understood that too late in the...

Do not book with the Pritzlaff! From the day we booked them we knew we made a horrible mistake. It starts with the nickel and diming that happens as soon as you sign their contract. Every little thing costs extra on top of their steep rental fee. They make you pay for each chair and table that they own, not even rentals!

Their staff, especially their main contact for the space, has been insanely difficult to work with during these unprecedented times. We are in the middle of a pandemic and all we asked was to move our 320+ person wedding to 2021 and they wouldn't allow it, all while they were moving other people's events AND still booking new business for 2021. We patiently waited until August like they asked to move our dates (we began asking in April for our wedding in late October), and we were then told us that they can host a wedding up to 250 people for our October date. We asked if we could still move dates and she told us it would now be $750 to move our dates to next year. The kicker is, since they made us wait, there are now no Saturdays available in 2021 and they will not let us cancel without losing out on our deposit. When we told them 250 people would not work and we still wanted to cancel. They told us 6 weeks before our supposed date that they could now host up to 925 guests in their space. How is that even legal or safe?! The point is, we do not feel comfortable hosting our elderly relatives in the middle of a pandemic. We planned our wedding in Milwaukee only so our elderly and high risk relatives would be able to make it, as we don't even live in Wisconsin.

Your wedding is supposed to be the most special day of your life and the Pritzlaff staff have now made it the most stressful experience. As a professional in hospitality myself, I am truly appalled at their lack of empathy and service. They have no compassion for couples trying to do the right thing and postpone their weddings until a safer time. I hope no one has to experience this horrible excuse for hospitality. I wouldn't wish this experience on my...

I’ll never forget the first time I walked into the Pritzlaff. It was after seeing 5 or 6 other venues that weekend and I walked in and it gave me goose bumps. I knew I wanted to get married there before I knew any details about it. But once I learned more about it, it just got better and better. I loved having the option of getting married in the galleria so I didn’t have to flip the room for the reception. We were in the 325 room which came with outdoor space that included a private cobble stone path and beautiful photo backdrops. My husband and I also opted to do roof top photos which was so nice to do and get away from all the busyness. The space doesn’t need a lot of decoration because of the beautiful exposed brick and beams and truly captured the essence of Milwaukee. The other part of the Pritzlaff that made it so special was the staff. Cori is very organized and it is obvious she has a lot of experience with event planning. Kara was a great communicator and always quick to respond to our millions of questions and was very helpful the day of as well! Louis was our point person the day of and really listened to my husband and I and what we wanted. He was funny and easy going and somehow still managed to direct my huge wedding party so they knew what they were doing. The Pritzlaff was very willing to let us see the space multiple times and were so flexible and accommodating. Every angle and every photo at our wedding was beautiful because of the Pritzlaff wall-to-wall beauty. I could not be happier that we chose the Pritzlaff and we would recommend them...