Catering by Wescadia

I am a frequent client of Wescadia for the last 10 years and have witnessed a lot of changes in their style and menu. I am quite happy with what they’ve achieved and really impressed with their recent change of management and chef. Now the menu offers an abundance of healthy options (which are not bland, but really shifted my perspective how healthy could mean oh, so zesty and delicious!)
I am extremely happy with the catering coordinator — he is aware of what my organization’s needs and requirements are and absolutely tries to accommodate those in a very elegant and classy way, and goes above and beyond in planning the ambience (not just the food) — which makes a huge difference to leave our group of usually 100 — 200 people pleased with the experience. Our Christmas lunches are one of a kind and memorable — and that is because Wescadia staff helps me shape them that way. I know what to expect from Wescadia, and am happy they are flexible to make my ideas a reality. I also use their drop-​off service regularly and though I’ve experienced glitches occasionally (e.g. substitute desert for another kind) it all works out in the end.
I read all the grumpy reviews and frankly, am surprised at how bad people make Wescadia look. Dealing with catering companies one should ensure all expectations are clarified well in advance, to avoid disappointment — as things tend to happen. I think Wescadia is working hard to improve staffing issues, and it is really improving from my perspective.
Thank you, Wescadia, for bringing fresh food ideas to campus!

If I could give zero stars I would. We had our wedding at Cecil Green and your only option is to use Wescadia. We had many guests coming from out of town and we wanted to make sure that we had plenty of good food in return for coming all the way to Vancouver to share our special day. Wescadia ended up sending half of our food to the wrong venue, and even though they were aware of this at the beginning of the wedding, they didn’t bother informing us until after it was over. Net result: Many of our guests got little to no food, putting a black mark on a once in a lifetime event. They only let us know afterwards and offered to ‘refund the food that was shipped to the wrong venue’. There are some things that you can never look back on and laugh about, and this is one of them. That day will never come again, and our guests who we cherish and left hungry can thank the staff at Wescadia. Never ever use Cecil Green, and never ever use Wescadia.

They are the required vendors for weddings at Cecil Green and are incredibly incompetent.
I have a long list of reasons but will save you the pain and agony of my experience. In a nutshell, they really don’t care about your event or providing any sort of customer service.
The food is only average, and their planning, coordination and communication is spectacularly bad. The deadlines they set for their customers apparently mean nothing to their employees. I am supposed to submit a deposit and signed agreement to a finalized proposal on a certain date… But guess what? By the deadline they haven’t sent it to me! Furthermore, no one replied to my emails days prior to the deadline requesting the final decisions so I could sign off on everything. THEN the incompetent woman assigned to our wedding has the gal to remind me of the deadline when she’s the one holding everything up!
AVOID AT ALL COSTS

I called on Friday to get coffee for Tuesday morning after the long weekend. Not only did I not have my exploratory question of cost answered, but I was told quite abruptly that I had missed the ordering deadline by a mere 2 hours! I personally did not think coffee, no food, required 3 days booking. Heck, I am even willing to borrow an urn and make it myself.
Obviously they do not want my business — don’t waste yours.

Avoid working with Wescadia Catering unless you absolutely have to. As an extension of UBC Food Services, they offer you mediocre food at outrageous pricing. I booked through Wescadia simply out of necessity because I was organizing an event at Cecil Green Park House.
The unprofessionalism was astounding. The coordinator was extremely last minute in his confirmation of the menu and finalizing of the contract (days before the event, and only after I reached out to the company, but he still had the audacity to be pushy with payment), they were completely unprepared the day of and were still setting up fifteen to twenty minutes after our event had started, and they ignored our directions for food service timing. To top it off, the bar staff also had limited resources to do his job and refused to give water to patrons because «he didn’t have any.»
The portion sizes were ridiculously small and the food was only mediocre at best. To put things into perspective for you, I’ve organized another event at The Sutton Place Hotel’s Versailles Ballroom and we paid almost the same amount for a three course meal at the Sutton as we were charged for ONE serving of a seven layer dip and plate of chips.

Wescadia is a catering company that is run by UBC Food Services. The food is okay. The meat/​veggie/​food platters are average. The pizzas and sandwiches are not the best. However, they do the job.
What really bothers me is that they charge a gratuity! After you click on «confirm order» it shows up on the final invoice. If they’re going to charge a gratuity they should be upfront about it. And should there really be a gratuity if they’re not serving and I go there to pick up the order of a few meat and cheese and fruit and crudite platters myself?