The Avenue Raleigh — Restaurant in Raleigh

Do NOT book your private event here! We hosted our wedding welcome party at The Avenue and it was a disaster from start to finish. The event coordinator, Alexis, and The Avenue team made big promises, but completely failed to deliver. Communication was poor throughout the planning process, and I had to chase her for basic details about our bar package—details she clearly didn’t even know.

The day of the event, no one was there at our scheduled drop-off time, forcing us to leave décor outside unattended. When we arrived to set up, nothing was where we had agreed during our walkthrough. The champagne wall wasn’t up, welcome table was missing, and the bar menus Alexis designed weren’t out. Then she lied and claimed those signature drinks suddenly weren’t included in our package (despite previously confirming they were in writing) and the bar didn't even have the right ingredients for them.

Our event started and guests arrived before setup was complete. The staff put champagne in wine and whiskey glasses (when our contract clearly states we'd get champage glasses), our slideshow wasn’t playing, and the “complimentary desserts” we were promised never appeared.

AND the WORST part- A sober and pregnant guest was served alcohol when she ordered a Shirley Temple! HOW does that even happen?!? That is beyond negligent and dangerous, there is NO excuse!!

Alexis blamed me (the bride) for the confusion and chaos, when I was the only one keeping the day on track and her team clearly dropped the ball. She was nowhere to be found when guests arrived, despite promising she’d be there to greet them and hand out drink our tokens.

Bottom line: they’re disorganized, dishonest, and unprofessional. Save yourself the stress—do not book your private event...

We highly recommend planning an event at The Avenue! We initially did not plan to have a wedding welcome party, but we entertained the idea and looked for some venues. Since we were already planning a whole wedding, finding something that was easy and accommodating was an absolute necessity. Enter: The Avenue. When we met with Alexis, she walked us through where the event would be held and how it would be sectioned off, and answered all of the questions that we had. She assured us that they would take care of as many things as we didn’t want to take care of (in fact, they did MORE!). We booked with them after browsing their event page and opted for a semi-open bar with a limit, and barbecue pork sandwiches for food. Alexis made sure that our event was PERFECT. On top of being very communicative and helpful, she asked us to send photos so that they could be playing on loop throughout our event, made sure that we had signage for our event, and even coordinated with a photographer to snag some photos of us and our guests that they sent within a week. Our guests had A LOT of fun, and many of them said what a perfect venue for a welcome party! Oh, they also accommodated some of our family who wanted to give speeches, which they happily turned the music down and gave us a microphone so we can hear them. This was the PERFECT event space for an amazing weekend. The Avenue really set the standard for being the perfect venue for any event!

P.S. The team that catered our event, Chris with Souther Sons BBQ & Catering, knocked it out of the park. They made sure to have some food for a few of our diet-restricted guests, and were so nice! The food was delicious and only added to the...

the people working here are absolute horrible people. there was nobody in the bar and they still acted like they couldn’t be bothered to serve us. we tried to order a shot ski and they said they weren’t doing it. when we asked why, because we saw the shot skis on top of their coolers and nobody was in the bar, another server easily agreed to a ski. she asked if we had a tab open and who was paying for it, I said my cousin who would be right back because she walked 5 feet away in the empty bar to grab my grandma for the ski. the bartender had absolutely no patience, even though nobody else was attempting to order at the empty bar, and immediately poured the shots out and said they weren’t going to do it. again …. there’s nobody else in the bar. we decided to leave after this because they didn’t deserve one more dime from us (we had only been there maybe 5 minutes when this interaction occurred). they then threw my cousin’s check at him and got in my cousin’s face, aggressively, and then the male bouncer got in my girl cousin’s face. a 6 foot plus man intentionally SCARING a young female due to confusion.. very scary. they sucked in every way. WORST CUSTOMER SERVICE I HAVE EVER SEEN IN MY ENTIRE LIFE. No wonder the bar was completely empty on a...