Kevin’s Bartending Services

Looks like Unilocal deleted my original post but I want to inform all potential clients that Kevin, the owner of this company acted in a very unprofessional manner at a wedding I was attending. I witnessed him embrace and sometimes carry some of my friends wives who were obviously uncomfortable with his advances. I heard one of the women say «My husband wouldn’t be happy about that.» At which point I tried to pry his hands from her waist. At the end of the evening my wife was sitting on the floor, Kevin was clearly intoxicated by this point and grabbed my wife’s arm. When I told him to keep his hands off my wife he said something as if it was what I was thinking: «Uh ok he’s kinda ripped, maybe I shouldn’t mess with him.» He attempted to insult me in order to get into an altercation! I’m not sure if this is a regular occurrence but all I know is that he made a lot of people uncomfortable that evening. Something you don’t expect at a happy occasion like a wedding. Please stay away!

Just spoke with a representative, who hung up on me right after I thanked him and told him that his rate was too much for me. Horrible phone etiquette.
Update: the second I posted this review, I got a phone call back from Kevin’s Bartending Services who claimed that the phone call was «dropped»…surrreee

I hired this company for my husband’s 40^th bday. The communication was mainly through Kevin who was really helpful and professional. Mike was our bar tender, he showed up earlier than be said he would and helped with prepping and anything else I needed. He was fun and everybody had a great time with good drinks. We didn’t have to worry about serving and making drinks for anyone which is great, specially for the hostess. Price is good. And you provide your own alcohol which is a plus. Thanks! Will hire again for sure :-)

We originally found out about KBS at a friend’s birthday party before calling on them for Saturday night’s at-​home holiday soirée. We did the paperwork by email and coordinated over the phone in the week leading up to the party. Pricing was reasonable, and we were able to rent a bar for a flat fee in addition to the service itself.
We had around 80 guests to accommodate and were thrilled when bartender Sean showed up early for the setup phase. We opted to supply our own alcohol and mixers. Sean’s concoctions were a big hit, and he was extremely professional, friendly and attentive, letting us know when we were close to running low on anything. We were well taken care of the whole night.
Thank you to the whole team, and to Kevin for being so helpful and pleasant on the phone! Congrats on the increasing success of your company.

This is a long outstanding review for the most outstanding bar tending services I have ever encountered. I booked Kevin and his crew for a very important party in January 2014. It was the kind of event that had a lot of very discerning guests. I was impressed with their excellence, professionalism, and the warmth they exuded not just to me but to every guest. In fact, of all the party’s features, guests had the most praise for Kevin and his crew. I totally agree. Thanks again, Kevin!

Kevin’s Bartending Service really came through in a pinch for a very last minute — day of — event! Super helpful, wonderfully nice and easy to work with.

Wonderful, very nice, and most importantly reliable. After waiting around for private bar tenders to call and get back to us, we found Kevin’s bar tending services online. Kevin got back to us right away, always answered his phone and was very helpful with everything. The bar tender at our party was Mira and she was also wonderful, very sweet, pleasant and on time. We will definitely use Kevin’s bar tending in the future and will recommend him to everyone.

I wrote the following review about 12 months ago but I finally received my refund last month so at least that is a good thing. He seems sincere in his apology, but I feel like the traffic accident story (his response to my original review below) would have been mentioned to me much earlier during my initial questioning of him after he did not show up to my wedding. Regardless, I feel obligated to upgrade the service to 3 stars since he did not forget about me after all these months and has issued the refund.
Posted summer of 2014: This bartender never even showed up to my wedding! Kevin said that he will personally be at my wedding, but a week after he never showed up, he said he was «out of the country» and he blamed «his staff» for not being there…

We booked Kevin’s Bartending Services for an event for 125 guests with about 3 days advance notice. We needed to ensure the bartender had the appropriate insurance coverages required by the venue we were hosting at. Kevin delivered.
Our talks were easy and he put my mind at rest and had alternatives should we have ran into any issues with having alcohol served on premises.
He had two gals come out to tend the bar, they were on time and set up quickly with no direction required from me. They were delightful all night and our guests had nothing but great things to say about them!
Our event was for
2014. I have to say, Kevin’s got it going on. I read the negative reviews here, but when I saw him take ownership in the face of staunch criticism it gave me the confidence to contact him. And I’m glad I did. He saved us big time!
Thank you

I booked Kevin for a surprise birthday party and not only did he arrive early and helped prep but he also stayed longer than we had planned since he was needed. The drinks he made were amazing and the service too. Within and hour he had learned everyones names and made sure everyone was taken care of and before he left he did an amazing job helping out with the cleanup.
thanks Kevin, we will see you again soon…

So, I don’t know what happened, but I wrote a review on here, and I’m not seeing it, soooo…
I won’t write the whole thing out again, so long story short: Kevin was bad at communication (including no contact/​communication/​response whatsoever the week of our wedding), did not give us the paperwork we needed in order to have him at our venue, we had to cancel our contract with him because of the lack of paperwork, Kevin never called to confirm this cancellation nor did he show up to the wedding, and we still have not gotten a refund, response, or anything.
So, DO NOT hire Kevin because HE WILL JUST TAKE YOUR MONEY.
My wife and I have tried and tried and tried to contact him since the wedding (which was on June 7), and we have not gotten any response back. I want to go into further detail, but everyone just needs to know that he did not fulfill his end of the contract, and has not done anything at all to rectify this situation. My wife and I are in fact getting the paperwork ready to take Kevin to small claims court because of this situation, so others, please be warned!

As an update– Kevin did reach out with an apology and a discounted service… which I very much appreciate! I understand the craziness of a business expanding– so things will slip here and there. With that said, based on the other reviews, and the few phonecalls I did have with Kevin, I could tell that he has great energy that would translate great at a party as a bartender.
Overall, I’d like to try Kevin’s bartending service again for a next event! Great personalities and energy are always gold. So, congratulations to the expanding business, and I hope that Kevin’s bartending service can iron out all of the kinks!

I had an excellent experience with Kevin! I planned a DIY wedding and bought my own alcohol, so I just hired him and a staff to serve the drinks at my reception. He helped me figure out how much to buy at costco, and was very responsive to many many questions on email. Our bar was a total hit! People kept mentioning to me how much they enjoyed talking with Kevin at the bar. We had a high energy party and he definitely kept up with the excitement. At one point, I spotted him teaching my ring bearer a few dance moves behind the bar, it was adorable!
Anyhow, I had a great time interacting with Kevin. He was super professional, and only enhanced the fun and excitement that was my wedding reception!

– NEGATIVE ONE for business practices/​customer service leading up to event: 6 months of headache, unauthorized credit card charge (see below for details), and no confirmation til 10pm the night before
– THREE STARS for day-​of service. Kevin serviced our guests well and some had such a good time that he even got some phone #s from them. However, he was 30 minutes late, started setup while guests were arriving, thus carrying all the equipment through the event space; blocked parking for another vendor, making her late for her set-​up; gave away bottles of alcohol to guests but offered me (one who fronted $ for his services) some extra mixers; approached me while I was onstage during the raffle to ask if he could raffle off services for two 4-​hr events.
OVERALL RATING = 2 stars. Although I appreciated that Kevin apologized in person to me, the most genuine of apologies and 3.5 hours of service time could not wipe away the 6 months of headache, math-​induced migraines and lost sleep. Although I attempted to push Kevin to cancel on us, I couldn’t cancel the contract due to financial penalty. Kevin also owed us a $ 25 refund after invoice adjustments, which also did not come back to us that night. I do, however, think he felt sorry for ripping us off.
(UPDATE: changed from 2 stars to 1 star, based on the reply received, below)
— — —
So, the sordid tale:
1. Planning a hs reunion, I emailed Kevin and told him we were having an event for a projected 150 – 250 guests with a budget of 750‑1000.
2. Received a quote for $ 1300 but I didn’t sign it for 3 weeks because I was waiting for Kevin to answer my questions about it after several follow up emails. At this point, I was in a huge hurry because I was getting ready leave the country and just wanted to square everything away.
3. Paid the $ 500 deposit and didn’t get a receipt.
4. GOT AN UNAUTHORIZED CHARGE for $ 362 in August. When confronted, Kevin apologized, saying «sorry, I like to get things ready early so I purchased alcohol for you guys.» HOWEVER — I never gave him a confirmed guest count nor did Kevin ever ask what tier alcohol we wanted (top shelf? average stuff?). When we threatened with a credit card dispute, Kevin finally provided a receipt for the initial $ 500 and an apology. (WHY DIDN’T WE DISPUTE THE CHARGE RIGHT AWAY?! Yes, Kevin apologized but the ethical business protocol would have been to refund the money and carry on from there).
5. Ticket sales for the reunion are lagging and it looks like the 130+ people who RSVP’d are not all going to be there. I emailed Kevin ¹⁰⁄₂₆ (a month out) to let him know and to ask how we can continue to work together — no response for 18 days with me following up 8 times. I did the math a bunch of different ways according to the original invoice to figure out per-​person pricing to see how it could be applied to our new (sad) guest count.
6. Finally, when threatened again with a credit card dispute to reverse the charges, Kevin provides an invoice that incl. $ 650 solely for alcohol. for 65 – 80 people!!! He calls me and explains that things have been bought and can’t be returned, and he can’t use the alcohol for future events he may have (but he’s a bartender?). However, he says that I can cancel (but I would lose $ 500 AND I couldn’t trust that I would see the 2^nd unauthorized $$ come back… plus, what would he do with the alcohol that he supposedly can’t return or use in the future?). He also claims that he «bent over backwards» for us (how? by not reading any of my emails?) and blames us for a last-​minute change in guest count. At this point, I reminded Kevin that he wrongly took additional money from us WITHOUT a confirmed guest count, that I said I would provide a month prior to the event. At one point in the one-​sided conversation, I think I even heard Kevin say that he revised the invoice for 150 people (but we projected 80 at best). So. here we are, paying over half the original invoice cost for way less than half the original guest count, and Kevin was unwilling to tell me how he determined his new pricing for us. I shot back an email after our phone call (to document it) and to ask if perhaps instead of our guests getting a 2-​drink limit for them to get 4 or open bar until a certain time, since we are way overpaying for this event. Kevin said he would send me an edited invoice that night but he never did. AND we did not get the $ 25 difference he promised us.
Obviously, there are things that I could have done better, like put in a stipulation about not purchasing alcohol until a final guest count was given. With a more responsive and professional vendor, much of this could have been avoided. Oh, and my favorite part of the phone conversation was when he said «believe me, you’re an easy client compared to all the brides I deal with.» I guess these brides have to email/​call/​text more than 4 times to receive a single reply :(

We booked Kevin’s thru a party planner, Ebonie of In Chic Party Planning in Lake Elsinore, for my wife’s graduation party. Had a great experience and will be using his services in the future for sure.
Not only did he do a great job he went above and beyond all my expectations. Interesting some of these 1 star ratings but I hired a planner, let her handle it, and no one had less than half a glass full :)

We hired Kevin and his bartending service for our wedding last August 31^st, 2013 (after finding him on Unilocal of course)! He was excellent to work with and brought a level of professionalism to the alcohol serving for the night. It was great not having to worry about people getting dangerously drunk which was one reason why I wanted to hire professionals.
Kevin also worked with me in putting together a signature drink for us and by asking the right questions we were able to get a prickly pear margarita which looked and tasted awesome!
We had about 140 guests which required 2 people so Kevin had an assistant but at no time were there any long lines at the bar or people waiting long for drinks. I do have to say this review would be 4.5 stars because we received a shopping list of what to buy for our party and either everyone was hardcore drinkers or the list was made for a smaller party because we ran out of glasses and some soda so some people couldn’t drink for a while. It may have been okay because it kept some from getting even drunker!
Reading a review below I can agree with Abby G. he was a little hard to get a hold of, I see his response says he’s trying to expand so that is understandable, but Kevin make sure you stay true to your core values that made you this successful. Best of luck in expanding!
I do have to say he did a great job of keeping the guests entertained at the bar and I got nothing but compliments about the bartenders!

Kevin makes your party such a success that you are trying to come up with an excuse to hire him again before your party is even over. Seriously!
My husband and I decided to hire Kevin for our backyard wedding of 50 people. We are a very DIY couple, but so happy that we had Kevin there providing drinks, entertainment and a level of service that surpassed expectations. He blended in as if he was part of the family, calling everyone by name and making sure they were never empty handed. Any requests were taken care of expediently and so many people there requested his card for their future events. Best money spent the whole night.
We love Kevin!

Had an outdoor wedding that Kevin did for us and it turned out great. He sent one of his bartenders who did a great job and was received well by all.
The thing that stood out for me was how quickly he was able to setup my bartending services. The bartender that I hired originally flaked out on me and Kevin was able to get me setup in no time at all… definitely a great relief while trying to plan a wedding. I would also like to add that his services were cheaper than my original bartender as well.
Thanks, you have earned my recommendation.

I really wanted to like Kevin’s Bartending Service. I was stoked about all of the positive reviews and thought they would be great for my wedding. The price was great and Kevin was very responsive via email.
Sadly, I was not satisfied at all with the bartender at my wedding. She was not in any way speedy and did not seem overly confident behind the bar. At one point, my guests were serving drinks to other guests to try and help her out. I had bought plastic cups in case we ran out of glasses at the end of the night and she was using those at 7pm, when there were plenty of glasses left. Drinks were being served without ice, and people were not being given the colorful stirrers I had purchased. This was by far my worst wedding vendor of the night, and had I let it, it could have ruined my evening.
Then to top it off, I was sent a generic email from Kevin asking me to review the service, thanking me and Dillon for our business. My new husband’s name is not Dillon and I do not know anyone named Dillon. Oops.
I definitely would not recommend the service. Pay a little more and get a legit bartender, I wish we would have.

We had our Wedding Celebration at our home New Years Eve with approximately 80 guest! Brian was our bartender!!! He was great!!! Great Attitude! Professionally Dressed! and Stocked with a Full On Bar!!! He took all request! Made all the drinks, Poured all the Champagne! He was awesome! I would definitely hire him again!!!
We had our idea of what we wanted to pay, but you can’t put a price on service!!! They were truly worth every dollar and then some!!!
If you need a Bartender, don’t hesitate to call Kevin! We Happy and Our Guest were Happy too!!!
Thanks Kevin and Brian!!!