The Sterling at Arrowhead Golf Club — Attraction in Town of Newstead

I had my wedding at the sterling in October 2021. For the most part, it was great, the food was really good and my day itself was perfect but I do want to warn other brides and grooms about the many issues I experienced with the service team during the months leading up to the wedding. Firstly, the staff turnover is really high. Each couple is given their own personal wedding planner assigned to their day and the first one we had was a girl named Emma. She was very cold, she never did anything “wrong” but for the price you’re paying, you’re expecting them to go above and beyond for you, and she was less than average at best. She hardly ever answered emails or phone calls, was always so curt and cold and would make us feel like we were bothering her whenever we asked a question. My mother reached out to her about something and was told she “doesn’t speak to mothers, only the couple”. Additionally, during my planning there were Covid restrictions and I told her I was nervous there wouldn’t be dancing allowed and I didn’t want to spend so much money for a formal dinner, her response was basically “idk what to tell you” not even really any sympathy. Just really someone who should not be in a luxury customer service type of role. We also planned our rehearsal dinner at the same venue and I was told we had to be in an out in one hour. Like one hour to rehearse, speeches, eat. For 50 people. When I was spending a ton on the wedding! I thought that was ridiculous. She acted as though she was doing us a favor by letting us have dinner there at all. So some time passes, and I reach out to Emma about something and I get response from a new planner, named Dana. I’m told by Dana that Emma was fired. My first thought, yeah that makes sense, she wasn’t great at her job. Dana was actually really good. I was pleased at the new planner. After meeting with her, weeks go by and I see someone talking on a Facebook brides group that Dana left suddenly. This is like a month before my wedding. Dana had quit. So I reach out to the sterling and I’m like guys, what’s going on with my wedding? Who’s my planner? And I get a response from EMMA. They rehired the planner who had been fired for not being good at her job. At this point I reach out to the owner, mind you this is an extremely expensive venue that nickels and dimes you for everything yet I can’t get Emma to answer me about things like decorations and menu etc. In total we spent over $40,000. I get a hold of the owner and I told him I was a bit dissatisfied, my words were “I’m spending over $40,000 with you guys and I’d really like to be treated with good service” he cut me off, laughed, and said “everyone pays $40,000 for a wedding that’s nothing special” I’m sorry what? He came off so arrogant and entitled like I owed him my money. In the end, I had a beautiful wedding day and I would like to shout out the waiters and bartenders who did an exceptional job, but the issues leading up with the planners and owner definitely caused anxiety that was...

To the Sterling Staff/Venue 5/5: Our end of night “captain” as they called it was amazing! She was in charge of packing up all our items and did so in a very organized manner while still condensing since a lot of our items were consumables. Our bartender, Nikki, was great, organized and efficient. Our staff was very quick to clean up any spills or messes. Maggie who helped us book was quick to respond and amazing to work with.

To our coordinator 4/5: To preface this review, I used to plan events as a job with my now wife, we are both very type A about many small details. We had a vision going into our planning session where we first met our wedding coordinator Tanya. When we first met Tanya, we started off on the wrong foot for sure… we had travelled 6+ hours for this meeting and got a call as we were leaving to go to the meeting in the morning that our coordinator was sick, and had been sick all week. We ended up being able to reschedule and she put in the effort to make it happen at one of the events the venue had ongoing; however it had us spending a few more nights in a hotel than we would have liked during the holiday season. The meeting itself was organized and quick, but we felt like a lot of our ideas were being dismissed as it wasn’t a traditional or “cookie-cutter” wedding plan. Being a same-sex couple nothing about our wedding was going to be traditional so we chatted more with Tanya where she was eventually able to see our vision. Fast forward to the day of, it ended up being a rainy day so we had to decide to move our ceremony inside. I think that was really the only time our coordinator talked to me and my partner on the actual day other than saying you’re turn to walk down the aisle and coming to us right before dancing really even started and saying “my job here is done” and going home for the evening. I think Tanya would be great for a standard traditional wedding where you want a lot of hands off planning, but it just wasn’t a great fit for us.

At the end of the day everything turned out amazing and I couldn't have imagined having my wedding...

My partner and I recently had our wedding day at the Sterling! It was literally a MAGICAL day and I wouldn’t change (almost) anything! Overall, the venue is obviously stunning - the windows give so much natural light and it made our photos incredible (all by Nina Sheffield photography). The fact that they offer a package for decor setup/teardown is great because it meant not worrying about that in the morning/end of the night. Dani was our decor captain and she is literally incredible - she told me where everything ended up at the end of the night and she was so friendly and professional. We were also assigned Tanya as a wedding coordinator…my partner and I are SO type-A, to preface this, and we knew every single detail of our wedding. Our coordinator felt a little underwhelming, and I’m sure she has more than one wedding at a time, so I get it and she was professional enough and nice enough, but there were some small digs that gave us the ick. My partner did not want to walk down the aisle with her dad, but when her dad walked in on the day of the rehearsal, Tanya seems actually confused that my partner even had a father. We are already an untraditional couple, as a same-sex couple, so it was uncomfortable that she seemed confused by his presence & by him not walking my partner down the aisle. We also felt a bit of push back when we had talked to Tanya about our customized floor plan with the white glove package; we wanted our guests to stay outside and instead of offering solutions as to how we could or ways this could happen, she provided a laundry list of reasons why they never do. Ultimately, she worked with us but it felt like pulling teeth at times; it definitely felt like she wanted everything to be very cookie-cutter, so if that is your vibe, this place is a perfect 5/5. Again, overall, this venue is beautiful and I wouldn’t change much about the day. It was perfect and the guests raved about the food (especially the hot pretzel bar!!) and the atmosphere, so still a...