The Covey — Restaurant in Ketchum

My family and I have been to The Covey once previously and had a great experience. The food was wonderful and we loved the environment. However, we will never go back after our recent experience with them. We booked The Covey for my dad’s 90th birthday party this coming December. He is a Sun Valley local and wanted to celebrate in Ketchum. We choose The Covey because my husband had met the chef/owner, Jesse, through a mutual friend and we wanted to support the local restaurant. They require a minimum spend of $15,000 for a max of 50 +/- people. The book out fee is hefty, but a 90th is a pretty big deal so we decided to go for it and have an amazing dinner for my dad. We expected that with this premium cost, we would get a premium experience. We were very wrong.

I contacted their event planner, Emily, to book the restaurant. Her communication to me about the minimum spend and structure of the gratuity was very vague, so we had a phone conversation about it. As my husband has a background owning restaurants, he wanted to understand the structure. In his mind, the gratuity should be based on actual spend, not on the $15K minimum. If we hypothetically only ended up spending $10k, it made sense to us that the tip should be based on the service given. I was simply asking the question and trying to understand the structure. Emily called me back the following day to say that Jesse and she had met that morning and that the fact that I ‘didn’t want to pay the gratuity’ left a bad taste in her mouth and she is canceling the booking and refunding our $5k deposit. First off, I NEVER said we didn’t want to pay the gratuity! I wanted to understand the structure and rationale. She was unwilling to even have a conversation to clarify what, in my mind, was a communication breakdown. She cut me off every time I tried to say anything and had the most elitist, snobby attitude. We have already sent out invitations and now must contact all guests to let them know that The Covey let us down BIG time. I have heard they have canceled other guests’ reservations with little notice (even though they will charge you $100 per person if you cancel on them) – clearly nobody can depend on them to live up to their commitments.

My husband called Jesse twice and sent a text message to see what on earth is going on as they have a personal relationship. We always try to give the business owner time to respond and correct anything that might have gone wrong. We have received no response. What kind of business owner deals with his customers in this way? The arrogance is just astounding. We thought we were doing a GOOD thing trying to support this Ketchum restaurant. If this is how Jesse treats an acquaintance and fellow restaurateur, how is he going to treat his average customer?

We have heard feedback from locals that The Covey is gaining a reputation for having an attitude… good lord, is that right! The attitude is off the charts – it’s clear that The Covey thinks they are above serving locals and would rather rake the tourists coming through Ketchum who might not know any better. Well, good luck to you. Without local support, you are going to find it a tough slog. I will certainly never be back. I am appalled at how this was handled by both Emily and Jesse. As a small business owner and the wife of a restaurateur I am absolutely flabbergasted at the poor communication and disgusting...

My wife and I had previously enjoyed our dining experience at The Covey in years past, but we were recently treated very poorly by the manager earlier this June. I had made a reservation weeks in advance of our trip to Ketchum only to find out on the evening of our reservation that the entire restaurant had been booked for a private group the evening prior to our reservation. I was then lied to by the manager who claimed she had “tried calling several times but wasn’t able to get through”. This explanation didn’t add up for several reasons including no call from the restaurant showed up in my cell phone call log (apparently their manager doesn’t know how smart phones work) nor did they attempt to leave a message. When I presented my phone to the manager showing her my call log, she doubled down on her lie and claimed to have called me “weeks prior” to try to reschedule; however she had stated not 5 minutes earlier that the group who privately reserved the restaurant had only done do the night before our reservation was to be honored (apparently she can also foresee the future?) Not only did the manager lie to my wife and I, but she must have obviously thought we were stupid given the poor lie she was trying to sell us on. Unfortunately the manager could have made it right by admitting the error in their reservation system and presenting us with some voucher for a future visit. Instead she rudely rushed us out the door and never even apologized for...

Mediocre service, ok food. The bad taste started from the entry. I dropped off my wife and two daughters at the front door and swung around the corner to park just to find them outside waiting for me. The hostess refusing to seat them until all members of the party are there. Um okay… We are then led and seated at one of the stone round tables at the patio that seats 8 even though it is just 4 of us. They had an available table for for but refused to seat us there stating that … reservations. Well our reservation was made 2 days in advance too. Another sour note. Then the server spends 5 mins telling us about the special of the day. Which we promptly order just to learn that they sold it out “because it was oh so good”. I guess a little communication between staff and kitchen in a place that has 186 dollar dish is a bit too much to ask. We were given a flask of water and not once someone came to top our glasses. Making customers comfy is not their first priority. And you know how even in less “special” places wait staff comes and asks you how was the food and assures customers are satisfied? Well this place is too good for itself to do so. The food was ok. I got a waygu steak that I ordered at medium and it came as well done. My kids were happy with their pasta so yay for that. But after dropping 200+ on a dinner, it leaves a lot to be desired… I would not return so good luck fooling other out of towners. It cannot be sustainable but it works in...