Barcelo Maya Palace Brides

[maredith]

Have you checked out UNOFFICIAL BARCELO MAYA | Your unofficial guide to Beach | Caribe | Tropical | Colonial | Palace It is a great site with lots of info

THANK YOU for sharing this! I've just fallen in love with the Barcelo resorts and this website is so helpful

[Lalachka]

Trying to choose a resort and really like Barcelo and the wedding packages look really good.

 

Has anyone negotiated guest rates with the hotel directly?

Seeing all the reviews here makes me so excited 4 months tomorrow and counting!!

I haven't even seen my dress yet (TAKING FOREVER), and I haven't finished planning yet. However, I kinda took a break from emailing the resort as they were so busy with the weddings Jan-May that I was getting incomplete responses etc. I just emailed them my reception stuff and the seating plan
 

I think ours will come to about 6000$ USD... with exchange rate it will be around 7,000 Canadian...

I wanted to know about everyones experience with the person who conducted the ceremony part of the wedding. We are just having a symbolic wedding IE-getting married here in Langley, BC and then going for the "wedding" in mexico. Which I know is common. As for the ceremony itself, do you have a choice with what the officiant says etc?

How many guests do you have if you don't mind me asking?

 

I really like the Mint Breeze package but with 80+ guests everything is really adding up... Don' think we can get it done for under 10,000.

Hello Ladies!!! 

 

OKAY!! So Barcelo is really starting to annoy me and with all the money we are spending I'm starting to think maybe we should have just gotten married in NJ!!! 

 

First off, I'm still having scheduling issues regarding my photographer! My original plan was to book him a 2 night stay (in order to save on the vendor fee) have him photograph my wedding (Friday) and do my TTD session the next day. Turns out he's got a wedding the following day so he would have to meet me at 7am and it would be at the cenote! 1) that's way too early especially after partying at the wedding the night before 2) I have already booked a particular TTD package, and I am not paying extra for the cenote because my FI doesn't swim so a TTD at the cenote would be a waste! He also said he doesn't recommend TTD the next day b/c brides' face will look tired in the pictures!   OOOH  and on top of that, it doesn't matter if he's on my guest count and has a room booked, I would still have to pay vendor fee unless I"m flying him from the States!!!! 

 

Any who, he says he will come do my TTD on that Monday! So now I don't know what the heck to do! Should I not book him a room and just pay the $500 vendor fee for wedding day? BUT now does that mean I would have to pay a vendor fee again or I can't try to sneak and just get him a day pass??? I don't know what to do!!! 

 

Second, @@KLA1220 you had mentioned that there is a complimentary cocktail hour if you have 15 rooms or more booked! I asked my WC (Aurea) and she said it's only if you have 70 Adult guests booked. Of course I don't have 70 guests booked!!  Could they have possibly changed that in these last few weeks???? 

 

What's really annoying me is that I have 60 people coming and I"m yet to get offered any type of incentive and I'm sure they won't offer unless I ask!!

 

OK so now that I"m done venting...are any of you ladies experiencing the same thing?? What incentives are you getting? 

Hi Lori,

 

Did you end up asking for any incentives?

We will likely have over 60 guests and incentives would def sway which resort we choose...

[NurseNurse0101]

Hi! I have 34 people coming. We chose strawberry package because I am NOT going to mexico to get married or have a reception in a banquet room inside.. despite the cost.

 

I asked about the free cocktail hour as well, BUT, it is only for a certain airline in the US and did not apply to us flying WestJet from Vancouver (because we definetly had more than 15 rooms booked). I am not upset about this because we didn't even want a cocktail hour.

 

Ours is coming to around 6000 USD because we are having 34 people on the beach, 2 extra hours for the reception (5 hours total), only a 2 layer cake, bringing down our own centerpiece stuff which costed about 50$ for 6 tables (versus their 35$ PER table), and we are still debating about the dancefloor.  Either way, its a no frills wedding, and to be honest they don't NEED to be if you are on the beach. My close friend photographed his sisters wedding in Cuba, so we asked him if he could do that for us (since he was already coming anyways).

 

for myself, I already bought clip in extensions and my bridesmaid who is a hairdresser is doing my hair. I am all about makeup, so im doing that myself (I have been testing out foundation in our 35 degree BC weather this week)

 

that's about it!

 

I just got word that Claudia left the resort and now we have a new wedding planner named Marlene. She said she will contact me end of July, as right now she is overwhelmed with wedding stuff and learning the ropes (this is the ONLY thing that is making me nervous), BUT, I know it will all work out and be AMAZIIINGGG!!! 3 month and 9 days until the wedding!!!

 

 

PS- can someone tell me how to quote other posts?

Edited July 17, 2014 by NurseNurse0101

[NEbride]

Hi Everyone!  I'm getting married at the Barcelo on Aug 8 - only 3 weeks away!! I was wondering if anyone has used The Best Moments for hair/makeup recently.  We booked them and paid the deposit in January, but now Martina (the owner) won't reply to my emails.  I've sent multiple emails to confirm the date and time with no reply.  Has this happened to anyone else??  I'm considering making appointments at the spa, even though their reviews aren't the best.  Any suggestions?  

[LoriGran]

Trying to choose a resort and really like Barcelo and the wedding packages look really good.

 

Has anyone negotiated guest rates with the hotel directly?

How many guests do you have if you don't mind me asking?

 

I really like the Mint Breeze package but with 80+ guests everything is really adding up... Don' think we can get it done for under 10,000.

Hi Lori,

 

Did you end up asking for any incentives?

We will likely have over 60 guests and incentives would def sway which resort we choose...

Hello! 

 

I did not negotiate guest rates with hotel. I went thru a local travel agency in my town which worked out a lot better. I did ask for the incentives and they didn't budge on that. My WC told me I would receive a complimentary cocktail hour only if I had 70 Adult guests only. That's the only con I have regarding Barcelo. They don't offer many incentives. Hope that helps. Good luck planning! 

Hi Everyone!  I'm getting married at the Barcelo on Aug 8 - only 3 weeks away!! I was wondering if anyone has used The Best Moments for hair/makeup recently.  We booked them and paid the deposit in January, but now Martina (the owner) won't reply to my emails.  I've sent multiple emails to confirm the date and time with no reply.  Has this happened to anyone else??  I'm considering making appointments at the spa, even though their reviews aren't the best.  Any suggestions?  

I'm getting married on next Friday and I hired Best Moments. I thought I was the only one!!!!! Their response time has been awful!! When I first booked back in October I emailed back and forth with Martina but now I don't even receive responses. I found that when I message them on Facebook I get a quicker response until my last message which they have not responded to! I'm a bit annoyed by them at this point.  

[NEbride]

Hello! 

 

I did not negotiate guest rates with hotel. I went thru a local travel agency in my town which worked out a lot better. I did ask for the incentives and they didn't budge on that. My WC told me I would receive a complimentary cocktail hour only if I had 70 Adult guests only. That's the only con I have regarding Barcelo. They don't offer many incentives. Hope that helps. Good luck planning! 

I'm getting married on next Friday and I hired Best Moments. I thought I was the only one!!!!! Their response time has been awful!! When I first booked back in October I emailed back and forth with Martina but now I don't even receive responses. I found that when I message them on Facebook I get a quicker response until my last message which they have not responded to! I'm a bit annoyed by them at this point.  

Happy Wedding Day!!! Hope you're enjoying Mexico!  

 

Martina finally replied to my email!  Im definitely annoyed at this point too.  Did Martina ever tell you that The Best Moments has an "agreement" with the Barcelo so no outside vendor fee would be required?  I asked my wedding coordinator about this and she said that there is no agreement, but The Best Moments pays the fee sometimes.  I asked Martina about the fee and of course haven't gotten a response yet.  The main reason I booked The Best Moments is because I wouldn't have to pay the $500 outside vendor fee...still thinking about making appointments at the spa if it turns out I do have to pay the fee.  Did you pay the outside vendor fee?  What a mess! 

[Tbt123]

Hello brides!

 

I've been scouting this forum quite a bit - I'm getting married in July 2015 but have been getting so much useful information from this forum that i thought I'd share some as well!

 

I asked the hotel directly about outside vendor fees and here's what i've gathered:

1. Photographer: $500 or 2 nights at the hotel. Note that if you have more than one photographer though, I think it's probably a better deal to pay the $500 fee because you'd need to pay the entrance fee for each guest for 2 nights (since the room fee includes food/drink etc). I don't think you could get away with only paying the fee for one.. If you have an additional session, if they want to return to the hotel and aren't staying there, you need to pay the fee again (so if you're thinking of doing a TTD session, it might be better to leave and go to a cennote, for example.)

 

2. Videographer: same as photographer.

 

3. Hair & makeup: when I asked 2 weeks ago, i was told the outside vendor fee was $150 for hair & makeup

 

4. DJ: For an outside dj, its $100 per hour (electricity fee)

 

Hope this helps some of you!

[LoriGran]

I'm back from my wedding!!!!!! I stayed at the Barcelo for 7 days got there on a Tuesday got married last Friday and got back yesterday!! Everything was PERFECT!!! I will be posting my review in the next few days and also posting pictures on my planning thread.

 

Feel free to ask questions!!!!     

[Kristen112808]

Hi ladies!!  We're trying to figure out transportation from airport to resort for the Wednesday before our wedding when a large group of us (25+ people) are coming down for our Saturday wedding.  Has anyone rented a bus for a group?  Or just take separate vans?  I thought it'd be more fun to ride down with the whole Wednesday group:)  Any tips would be appriciated!

[BarceloJan2015]

Hello Everyone,

 

I am getting married in January 2015. 5.5 months and counting. I am trying to decide what to do about a photographer and videographer. I wanted to see what the resorts was like but the website doesn't work and I have emailed them like 3x and no response. I have been looking around for a package with a videographer and photographer but some of them can be quite pricey. You think it would be cheaper in mexico! Has anyone found any decent companies with ok prices? any suggestions would be great.