Convivium Urban Farmstead — Restaurant in Dubuque

Let me tell you a bit about our experience with Leslie at Convivium Urban Farmstead.

The day I stopped to have a look at the place I immediately knew it was the perfect 😍 place for my daughter’s graduation party. It could be entirely indoor in case of bad weather or outdoor in case of great weather or a mixture of the two effortlessly blended by the layout of the property. I had written a “note” which turned into a wordy letter to Leslie that day. Knowing that they are a nonprofit, community centric organization and being such I explained in my note that I am a single mother of three (widowed) children. I myself recently battled and barely survived cancer, my ex husband & my mother both also had cancer at the very same time believe it or not. Unfortunately I am the only one who survived. So the fact that my daughter graduated while going through all of that is close to miraculous. I basically asked if we could use the facility for a few hours (at a time they would be closed normally) for a small or reduced fee, I was unaware of their rates at that time) I received no response. Now I understand that a “sob story” doesn’t equal free free free…and I am not a person who expects that. However, I was eventually able to reach Leslie by phone who was all business and apparently read the letter, but didn’t care enough to respond let alone work with us on the fees. She sent me over a contract for $100 an hour for the use of the facility and she made sure to tell me, “Your time starts the moment you set foot on the property so if you plan on decorating you have to pay for that time.” Wow 🤯 I don’t speak for anyone else, but that is a lot of money for a space and felt super disappointed. Three hours with no decorating $300 and then we’d have to buy food. I kind of begged and offered to volunteer if we could get a half hour early to decorate, now don’t forget this place is closed and empty at that hour anyway. Ended up getting a relative to help out and we did kind of a buffet style set up. I picked some appetizers, entrees, desserts and also brought a cake. The bill with adding on the food was $700+. We did nothing fancy either.

The day of the event was a hot and sunny mid June day, which is entirely why we didn’t just go to a free park. Cancer has left me disabled and I am not able to do heat. My daughter, who’s special day it was, has a skin condition in which intense heat makes her skin gets these aggressive hives that are painful. It’s bad enough that she was excused from gym class all through high school (that’s when you know it’s bad). When we arrived it was well over 80 degrees inside. The gentlemen attending to us was super nice and quite frankly freaking out because he knew this was not going to go well. When I first approached him he said that the AC was on and just catching up. Ok, fair enough, especially since I was a whole half hour early to decorate. Now what happened from here was three hours of people including the staff member trying to determine if we were more likely to die of heat stroke inside or outside? Should we open the doors? I did not get one degree cooler in the $300 we were there. People stopped by and promptly left due to the heat. Toward the end of the event I approached the staff member and he looked mortified to say the least. He said, “I’ve been waiting and expecting you all night. I called my boss early on and told her about the situation so she is aware and you should reach out, because I’m sure you will get some sort of refund. This was terrible.” I told him I wasn’t going to attack him and I knew he was just suffering along with the rest of us. By the way the food was excellent!!! If I wouldn’t have been on the verge of heat exhaustion I may have noticed they forgot one entire entree ($65+) as well. I have emailed Leslie the “co-founder” of this non profit organization twice since then to inquire about a refund and she has never bothered to answer me at all, even though email is her preferred method contact. So this is my next step. Fair is fair and...

I have only been there twice. Once was for a story time that the public library put on and it was fantastic (this was years ago-prior to COVID). Then most recently we came for a tour and stayed for lunch. Four families with a bunch of kids. The moms had planned to make the ordering SUPER simple, but the waitress was so stressed out and said we had to order in the order we were sitting. It was nonsense and took way too long. My order alone was going to be so simple (four waters and four sandwiches-all the same sandwiches), but yet, I had to keep an eye on the ordering process the entire time to see if one of my kids was up and with having two little ones under three it was just ridiculous (and my kids are very well behaved). It wasn’t like the food came out in that order. We reassured the waitress that we could pass out our food if we could just order the way we wanted, but she was so stressed and said no. They have board games and that day they were located by the kitchen door, which is not our kids fault that they congregated there to check them out and play. While I’m sure the staff would like for kids to play games at our table, our kids also enjoyed being right there to pick out the games, but a waitress was frustrated that the kids were in her way. Why put them next to the kitchen door? It didn’t seem as kid friendly as it was our first go around. While I love the concept and I loved touring the gardens and seeing the chickens, I don’t think we will be back. It wasn’t a very welcoming place from the start at least...

We spent a weekend in Dubuque and were really looking forward to brunch here after researching it — I loved the concept and mission. Unfortunately, our experience was very disappointing. We were promptly seated but then ignored while tables around us were cleared and guests who arrived after us were served.

After about 15 minutes, I had to walk up to the coffee bar to order drinks myself. Even then, other people’s drinks were made before mine. I mentioned to staff (three separate times) that we weren’t being served while others who came after us were — yet nothing changed. Eventually, I brought the drinks back to our table, but after another 15 minutes of being overlooked while others were attended to, we decided not to stay for food.

Despite raising the issue multiple times, we never received an apology or acknowledgment. The concept is wonderful, but the service experience...