MILWAUKEE, Wis. — A bride said a local photography business isn't keeping up its end of a wedding contract and reached out to TMJ4 for help.
Jenna Rae investigates the claims of missing photos nearly a year after the couple said "I do."
"I know we've had a couple people pass away that were at the wedding that it would have been great to have more photos of them," Taylon Remus said.
Moments couple, Taylon and Courtney Remus, said should've been captured and are now a distant memory.
It's been nearly a year since Taylon and Courtney Remus got married, and they're still missing photos promised in their contract with SB Photography and Design.
"I had probably called her 10, 15 times, just for confirmation after various emails and no one was calling me back," Courtney Remus said.
Through Rae's investigation, we found out the Remus' aren't the only ones.
"I was looking on 'The Knot' and also 'Wedding Wire', and it was 'Wedding Wire' I ended up finding SB Photography," Andrea Brusky said.
Brusky and her now husband got engaged in 2022. She did what most people do and checked the reviews.
"I loved what I was reading online, so I contacted the owner. She got back to me really quickly. She was really communicative, and I was thinking, 'wow this is really great,' and I booked them immediately," Brusky explained.
Brusky signed a contract with SB Photography in September 2022.
The contract shows she paid nearly $4,000 in full for an engagement session, two photographers the day of the wedding, a sneak peek of photos, three canvas prints, three photo albums, a USB drive with all the photos, and a private online gallery of all photos.
On July 8, 2023, Brusky got married.
"We were good the day of the wedding. The wedding was perfect. The photographers took great photos," Brusky added.
She said she saw a few pictures on the photographer's camera and couldn't wait to see the finished product.
On September 6, Brusky got those teaser photos in an email. Also in that email, SB Photography's owners said they were working hard to make sure that they deliver the rest of the photos by the end of the week.
Brusky said that deadline came and went.
It wasn't until October, three months after her wedding, she said she got the rest of her wedding photos.
"It was just such a long email, with so many different blames, and then they say you should feel bad for us because we're losing our home, and you should feel bad for us because we're going bankrupt," Brusky explained.
At this point in time, Brusky was still missing three canvas prints, three photo albums, and the USB drive.
"I was very frustrated that they're ignoring all my phone calls, they're ignoring all my emails," Brusky reiterated.
In December, five months after her wedding, Brusky said she received the photo albums and USB drive.
She also said one of SB Photography's owners, Adam Aten, told her over the phone that she would receive a refund. An email shows that Brusky's refund would be processed by check.
Now, nearly five months after that email and approaching a year since her wedding, Brusky still doesn't have the three canvasses or a refund.
"So, I decided to reach out to the news and just hope to spread awareness about this company to new brides and for upcoming weddings, because I don't want this to happen to other people," Brusky pleaded.
After we first talked to Brusky, we went online and found that she's not the only bride with bad memories attached to her wedding day. So, we called the company using the number listed on SB Photography's website.
"Hi this is Jenna Rae, and I'm an investigative reporter with TMJ4," Rae said.
We left a voicemail, and then went to the address listed on its site.
When we got there, an eviction notice was on the door. Court documents allege SB Photography owes nearly $9,000 in damages to its landlord.
Moments after leaving the business, we got a call back from Sheryl Kelly, one of the owners. We asked her for an interview.
"I would love to sit down and do an interview because basically, long story short, if you look at the decade before the pandemic, you can see there's not one negative review. You can't even find one negative word about us prior to the pandemic," Kelley told us over the phone.
She went on and told us about the hardships the company continued to experience from COVID.
"We took out my husband's 401k. We took out our life savings. A few years ago, we bought a house and renovated it, and we're going to sell it and take all the profits and just put it into SB," Kelley explained.
It's the same response she gave Brusky, and the same response other brides we talked to received.
"Instead of writing this very, very long email that probably took you an hour or longer to write, how about you work on one of the photography projects you need to finish," Brusky said.
Brusky said she's speaking up now, so it doesn't happen to another bride.
"It has been a horrible experience post-wedding for me, and I don't want this to happen to other people," Brusky added.
"Instead of making us feel better about next steps and what are you gonna do to fix this, it was just passing accountability and blame somewhere else," Courtney Remus said. "When there's a contract in place, business is business."
Despite agreeing to do an on-camera interview, Kelley never committed to a date or time. She did, however, post a two-hour video on Youtube that she said shows what happened to her.
In a text message she told me she is finishing out current couples and is moving on with her life.
That text from Kelley was sent on April 17, 2024, and the couples we talked to still haven't gotten everything they've been promised.
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