Festivities Catering & Special Events

From our first email correspondences to the end of our wedding reception, Festivities and their team were AWESOME to work with. And they continued to be awesome AFTER the end of our reception, as they grabbed a couple of our personal items that were left at the venue, and delivered them to our house the next week!
If you want a simple review: we’d use them again in a heartbeat because they were professional, reliable, responsive, and provided a high-​quality service at a competitive price.
For an extended review, read on:
Our tasting with Ashleigh Glod was excellent — the food tasted great and it was easy-​going and we felt comfortable being honest about what we loved, and what we though we would like more of. After the tasting we expressed that we wanted to have ample eats for our guests during our Cocktail Hour and we added a Wall-​of-​Food (in the jars, see pictures, Burrata Vasi was UNREAL) and some additional appetizers. My personal favorite was the Steak & Potatoes twist STEAK FRITS which was a crispy potato chip with seared rare beef and Bearnaise Aioli… everyone was talking about it and friends have tried to re-​create it since the wedding.
Our Wedding-​Day team was:
Coordinator — Merlot D
Captain — Garrett
Servers — Graciela, Haley, Stacy, Tre, Paul & Lan
Chef — Tom
They worked seamlessly to ensure that we and our guests had a great experience. Drinks and appetizers were easy to access, and empties were cleaned almost before they were set down.
Merlot gave us extra-​special attention making sure we had an assortment of appetizers waiting for us in a private space immediately after the ceremony, along with our favorite cocktails and bottles of water. She did the same for our wedding party and it was nice that none of us had to worry about any of that. She also had to-​go containers ready for us to eat between the reception and the after-party…not her first rodeo.
It was an easy choice to give Festivities and their team 5-​Stars.

We recently used Festivities Catering for our Wedding Reception, and from our very first Tasting Meeting until the music stopped at our party we were completely impressed by their professionalism, experience and execution.
We decided to interview (3) Catering Companies, and scheduled Tasting Meetings with each. Dining out and cooking at home has been a huge part of our relationship, and we both agreed that we needed to work with a Catering Company that could make our vision of style, creativity, and presentation come together while also nailing the quality and flavor of our menu. Festivities was the third company we met with, and it was obvious about half way through the Tasting Meeting that we had found our perfect match. We had the true pleasure of working with Lisa. Lisa defines professionalism. She is knowledgable, listens, incredibly genuine and friendly, and knows how to execute. Her entire staff works just as she does, and they know how to put together a spectacular display of food and drink. Not only were we completely «WOW’d» by them but our guests can’t stop talking about how incredible the event was. Being blown away at a restaurant when dining with 4 – 5 people is one thing, but to do it for a party of 140 people is an art that few can accomplish.
I can’t wait to throw another party so I can work with Festivities again.
Thank you Lisa, Thank you Festivities Catering for helping us create an evening that my wife, myself, and our closest family and friends will never forget.

I reached out to Festivities a few months ago, and after speaking to one of their event coordinators who I won’t name here, I was very excited and felt at ease reaching out to them. We had a great conversation, and I could hear her taking notes on her computer, she asked the right questions and ensured I was taken cared of. She explained it would take 7 – 10 days to get my quote which was fine because I was traveling for work and wouldn’t have time to get to it anyways. I got back from my business trip (2 weeks has passed now) but thought I’d give her a few more days — finally almost 3 weeks I sent a follow up email to see if there was a proposal ready for me to review. I ended up getting a voicemail from the sales coordinator who told me she doesn’t remember speaking with me, and that she had no notes on the day we supposedly spoke. How could I forget that really nice conversation we had at the time? What happened to the notes you were supposedly typing during our phone convo? Also, at this time, I was only dealing with them and there was no mix up on my end. If you know me, I’m one of the most organized when it comes to my calendar /​scheduling /​and the notes I take so there was no mistake on my end here. She continued in her voicemail explaining to just move on to another catering company because they are booked (my wedding is more than a year away from this date) and that there are many changes going on with management, «sorry.» Okay? This is frustrating especially when you’re just starting the wedding planning process and this is one of the first experiences to have. Who knows what happened, but after that one time, I wouldn’t even bother again.
Why did I even give 2 stars, I don’t know. Maybe I felt because she called me back gives her SOME credit…

We booked Festivities Catering for our off-​site conference event on the USS Midway — we had dinner stations and passed appetizers for over 800 people. The entire Festivities team was professional, talented and overall fantastic! They created a lovely menu to fit within our budget, worked seamlessly with the event staff at the venue and provided the most beautiful presentation of delicious options for our attendees. Everyone was raving about the food — I personally loved the sushi station!

I’ve worked with Festivities on a few different corporate events, and I’ve always been impressed. Their team members, menu options and food quality are top notch. I know when I work with Festivities that it will be a job done well. All in all, a great team and highly recommended!

#underwhelmed. Festivities catered our wedding at the end of July. Unfortunately they were the least impressive of our vendors.
Pros: The food. The head chef is great. He really understood what our vision was and has a great palette. We had food stations and a late night snack so our guests could soak up all the booze. There tasting room is beautiful and modern. We had two very good tasting and the food the day of was excellent.
Cons: The customer service. Our attentive coordinator left after we decided to go with Festivities and her replacement was pretty apathetic. We had some issues with our contract– getting different ones, etc. The staff who were there the day of the wedding were hit and miss. A few of the servers were friendly and attentive. Most looked bored and annoyed. One server looked hung over and dropped a plate of food on my dress, luckily no major damage.
I would not use them again except for the head chef (feel bad that I can’t remember his name). When you are paying that much money to have your wedding catered you want a consistent experience and that is not what we got with Festivities.

Festivities is the go to caterer in San Diego! The staff is amazing and has the expertise it takes toexecute a flawless event. Kristen is a delight to work with and makes sure that all the details done to perfections. Next time I plan an event — I’ll be contacting her to help me make it a perfect experience for everyone!

I’ve used Festivities for my wedding reception and for several work events. Every time it was super easy to plan and book, and the food has always been creative and delicious. In fact, many of our wedding guests came up to me to tell me it was the best food they’ve had at a wedding in a long time (try the cochinita pibil bites… so good).
I definitely plan on using Festivities for upcoming work events, and really have no need or desire to go with anyone else.

WOW! Festivities Catering provided the food and cake for my recent wedding. Not only was the food AMAZING, I had compliments all night from my guests, but the staff was top notch. I asked for a lot of help (not having a lot of specific items I wanted for my wedding) and they provided fantastic advice and references for everything. Ashleigh was my main person on site and really kept the wedding schedule moving and worked so well with my other vendors. She was AMAZING!
The food was delicious and everything tasted hot and delicious (esp for a buffet). Really creative menu ideas (bacon wrapped tater tots!) and really attentive to our needs.
I would highly recommend them and I can’t wait to use them for all of my future catered events!

I have worked event planning in San Diego for over 7 years. I have worked with most catering companies in town and Festivities is my favorite to work with. They are professional, easy to work with and the food is always great! They anticipate any possible challenges and handle them. I highly recommend Festivities!

I love the creativity that comes with the customized menus I require for events — the chef does a great job catering to my needs. The staff that comes onsite is on top of their job, professional and have a strong attention to detail. Kayleen is always SUCH a pleasure to work with, quick with responding and truly understanding my needs. Love when I get to work with this company, highly recommended!

Working with Festivities was a nightmare. I booked them in 2012 for my 2014 wedding (hey, book early to lock in prices, right??) and over the course of my wedding planning I had SIX coordinators, because they kept leaving or getting fired or wherever they were going. I booked them because the first coordinator I spoke with, who gave us a tour of the space, said we could have a full tasting, including hors d’oeuvres, and they were the ONLY caterer who agreed to do so. When the tasting rolled around, I was told they wouldn’t and couldn’t do that and that we should never have been told any different. It was also a nightmare trying to get the 2012 pricing, and I had to send them countless emails and notes I had taken to prove to them that I had been promised certain prices. Things were offered that couldn’t be delivered. It took forever to get in contact with people. Perhaps the worst of all, our final coordinator was apparently ordered by the company to do a corporate tasting an hour and a half before our wedding rehearsal in another part of the county. She ended up being an hour and five minutes late, by which time, my wedding party and I were already done, rehearsed, set up, and running late for our dinner (it was supposed to start at 6pm). There were several miscommunications (such as the top tier of the cake being reserved instead of served as we instructed them to do), and by the end of it, even though the night went very well, the planning with them was so stressful that, I’m sorry, I cannot recommend this company to anyone. Hopefully this review won’t come as a shock, Festivities, because you guys totally dropped the ball, several times, and you know it.
NOTE: The two stars are for the Executive Chef, I forgot his name, but he was amazing, his food was excellent, and he always made sure to accomodate us as much as he possibly could. Good man. If you’re JUST doing catering and working with him, do it! HE won’t let you down!

Festivities Catering recently provided outstanding catering services for our wedding that was held in the Japanese Friendship Garden on July 19^th. From the very beginning, the team at Festivities understood that we did not want a «cookie cutter» wedding reception, but rather, a customized experience that would represent us as a couple.
We worked with Matt Berardi, who acted as the event coordinator for our reception. Matt immediately realized that we had high expectations for the event, and that we wanted everything to be perfect. Because the event was at the Japanese Friendship Garden, the menu needed to reflect the Japanese culture. This was no problem for Matt, who quickly proposed a menu to please the most discerning guests. And on the wedding day, the food was beautifully prepared and presented. Also, it was truly delicious, thanks to Chef Darren and his team!
Festivities handled the décor, and coordinated the rentals for our event. Again, Matt understood our desire to respect the simplicity and elegance of the venue, as well as the culture, so provided lovely wooden farm tables, Japanese lanterns, and an amazing sushi bar, which served fantastic sushi, rolled to our guests’ specifications.
On the day of the wedding, not only did we have Matt to oversee every detail, Festivities also provided a lovely wedding coordinator, Nicole, to assist with the ceremony! This was an unexpected bonus that really made a difference in keeping the evening running smoothly. Every single thing went perfectly — there wasn’t one problem all evening!
Each of our guests commented on the beautiful setting and amazing food that were provided by Festivities. Some of them are real «foodies», so their comments were especially meaningful. In fact, several guests said that the wedding was the best that they ever attended!
I highly recommend Festivities Catering for all events. The entire staff is professional, responsive, and talented! We will be using Festivities again for future celebrations, and are confident that they will deliver the same 5-​Star service that they provided for our wedding! Thank you Matt, Nicole, and Darren, for the spectacular evening!

Festivities catered my wedding in La Jolla. The food was wonderful and had all of our guests raving and going back for seconds. Matt and Max went above and beyond to make sure everything was perfect during our event. They did an awesome job!

Festivities did a fantastic job for our corporate lunch. We did a trial menu run for one Monday and have decided to move forward with long term contracts at both offices of ours.
The menu selection is detailed and extensive which could be daunting but the sales team definitely know their stuff and guide you through the whole process. We worked with the Director of Sales, Matt Berardi, and he was more than helpful and knowledgeable about the food and the service.
Because the menu has so many options it makes it easy to switch up lunch every week, something our offices genuinely enjoy! In addition, you can request things that are not on the menu and the team always suggest awesome side dishes and desserts that would complete the meal.
We needed lunch ready at 12PM and Patrick arrived early at 11:30 so that everything would be set up perfectly. It was such a breath of fresh air to have everything set up and ready on time.
The food was a hit, the entire office loved the gourmet taco bar with a wide variety of toppings and sides!
Needless to say, Festivities was a success and we are thrilled to have lunch from them every Monday!

Ashleigh at Festivities is one of the best event coordinators out there. She’s responsive, reliable, punctual, and ultra friendly — some of the most important qualities a coordinator can have :)
As a wedding professional formerly in the San Diego area, I had lots of experiences working with Ashleigh, and each of our events together were hugely successful, due in no small part to her! Festivities is lucky to have her and I would hugely recommend that anyone that’s looking for an incredible event coordinator look no further than Ashleigh.

I wanted to express my sincere gratitude for the incredible service that we received from your staff for our recent private dinner event. We selected Festivities for one of our annual VIP customer events and our customers really loved the food, ambiance and impeccable service.
It was a pleasure to work with all of your service staff, especially Max. We loved that the chef that came out to inform the guests of the menu. In my opinion, your service and professionalism rivaled the Ritz Carlton service. (We also hosted a private dinner at the Ritz in Dana Point for this group).
Thank you for making this such a memorable experience.

I liked what I ate last night at at food-​beer pairing event. I asked who was the catering company as the location was a rented space and I was not sure who was providing what (except the beer generously flooding by CoorsMiller). So I was told Festivities was the catering company and I have to say that everything that was served was not only perfectly paired (although I think the pairing was actually proposed by the representative lady coming from the beer company) but cooked to perfection and nicely presented. I enjoyed the evening a lot.
These are the pairings I got and that I highly recommend if you have the opportunity to choose the same or similar for your event:
–Micro arugula salad with fresh pears, champagne vinaigrette and St Agur baguette crostini (paired with Crispin Pacific Pear, a natural hard cider).
–Roasted whole suckling pig served over creamy charleston style grits and braised collard greens (paired with Pilsner Urquell).
–Braised beef short ribs in a mirepoix and mushroom sauce over whipped root vegetable purée (paired with Big Eddie Imperial IPA).
–Grilled schrimp satay in spicy peanut sauce and cucumber mint salad (paired with Blue Moon tongue thai-​ed).
–Lemon olive oil cake with whipped mascarpone and tart raspberry compote (paired with Blue Moon frambozen).
All excellent and great friendly and attentive servers too.

We used Festivities Catering for our wedding last September (I feel terrible that we are so late in writing our review!), and this is what we found:
1. Very professional and personable staff
2. Flexible
3. Reliable
4. The food was absolutely amazing. Just about every guest came up to us during the wedding and let us know afterwards how great the food tasted!
5. We even had a special dietary need that needed to be catered to and Festivities was incredibly accommodating without charging extra.
6. The presentation of all the food, drinks, etc. was phenomenal. I think a lot of catering companies can make the food look cheap with cheesy tablecloths, crappy tables, and ugly serving dishes. Festivities was top-​notch and made everything look expensive.
7. Kayleen was our coordinator and she was great with follow-​up, really friendly and easy to work with, and she was there on our wedding day to help make sure everything went smoothly (which it did). Thanks a ton Kayleen!
I really can’t express enough how happy we were with Festivities Catering for our wedding. One of our biggest concerns was making sure our wedding had great food, and they definitely delivered. If I ever had to put on an awesome party again and it required catering, I would trust Festivities 100%.

I had a wedding recently wanted to give some time bf reviewing. also, if ur interested in weddings, I provide links 2 other reviews below. FYI, did a lot of research bf committing. If u have specific? s (eg list comparing locations/​vendors/​$$), pls PM me, apologies if I don’t get back immediately as I don’t check Unilocal that often
re: festivities, overall not great experience. Had a REALLY hard time with logistics (and added stress) and food wasn’t that great on actual wedding day
1) Communication issues
A) alcohol: I requested (not festivities, really should have been them) for a walk through the schedule via phone (wed before wedding), esp since festivities didn’t do physical walk through (i couldn’t since I was in LA, but my brother offered to do so who mapped it all out, etc.). I told them I wanted hard liquor in 1^st mtg months bf (soju cocktails as signature drinks + other hard liquor) and in that call. the next day (during rehearsal) was told they were going to tack on another few 100 for the hard liquor. it was a shock, unnerving and definitely something I did NOT need to hear or deal with. they ended reduced to 200+, but then overcharged me by over 100 and so I had to follow up on that.
B) set up: I gave them THOROUGH maps&color coded schedule wks in advance (they told me since I gave that they wouldn’t need a physical walk through but clearly should have) but found staff confused, and would ask me about things though it was on the map and my day of coordinator was available (clearly festivities on site coordinators did not point her out to staff). If there was confusion, it should have been explained to staff bf since the materials avilable weeks bf. also gifts table was clearly shown to be set up across from bar in the map. It was not there, not checked, and on site coordinators had no idea where it was supposed to be, until I pointed out (after the ceremony) it should have been somewhere else. I had a reason for putting it there and the change of location completely threw a lot of things off (ppl coming up to me w/​$$ thru reception). i had friends who were supposed to staff it but didn’t know where to go as well.
C) schedule: I checked w/​festivities in the 1^st mtg to check load in at 4:30 and guests arrive at 5:20PM (I found some caterers were not comfortable with the timeline and so cut them off) in addition to comprehensive schedule provided. However I was told by festivities ON MY REHEARSAL DATE that would not be possible. I remembered JFG said many caterers cook outside first which cuts down on time. So I was VERY confused when I heard on the rehearsal day they couldn’t because they needed more time for cooking (needed to open up earlier and fork over another 450), but said outside cooking wasn’t allowed when suggested. I checked AGAIN with JFG, they said ok, and called festivities on my behalf. festivities should have checked rather than panic me on my rehearsal day.
D) on site coor. said they would clear up rose petals that were tossed during the wedding during a tasting, np. On wedding day, I found that they changed their word so had to have my day of coordinator pick them up by hand (had no broom since we hadn’t anticipated that)
2) Food was subpar. The apps were ok, the app rice was too hard, which I had given feedback. My fav part of the dinner was edamame salad, I had not expected. The mains marinated short rib on the whole tasted a bit boiled, and was not as tender as in the tasting. The worst was actually the pork, which I was looking forward to (was good in tastings). My husband declared it was inedible, a lot coming from him bc he eats everything. anyone who had any criticism about the dinner (most guests were too polite to talk about but family gave honest feedback) talked about how incredibly salty the pork was. I gave a lot of feedback about how the food should NOT be salty bc Koreans are sensitive to that but was apparently disregarded. Also we bought a TON of cookies (from cravory) which they promised at the tasting would be toasted (like tasting). wasn’t the case, and also only gave us a couple bags of leftover (there should have been MUCH more since many guests left by then)
Positives:
On + side, wedding tables were set up well, staff was fairly professional& main server in particular was very kind. The guests had a good time but that was likely the alcohol, band and lights. Another note: you can use other rentals bc classic is $$ (c below)
Other vendors:
Location — JFG (4*)
Catering — Festivities (2*)
Day of Planning/​Flowers — Desiree (5*)
Photography — Resolusean (4*)
Stationary — Selwa (5*)
Rentals — San Diego Party Rental (3*)
Lighting — San Diego Events Lighting (5*)
Music — Rock out Karaōke (4*)