The Challenge
Gastler Farm is a family-run garden wedding venue in New England, hosting weddings seasonally between May and October. The farm has been in the Gastler family for generations, and in its current chapter, it operates as a sought-after wedding and events destination.
Owner Leah Gastler was wearing every hat in the business - from planning gardens and managing events to personally responding to every single inquiry. The daily grind of handling emails had become a frustrating, repetitive cycle: the inbox would fill up, she would empty it, and it would fill right back up again.
What seemed like a small task was quietly eating over an hour of her day - 30 minutes here, 30 minutes there - time she could have spent on the creative, high-value work that actually moves a venue business forward. And because she could only check emails a couple of times a day, couples who were browsing venues during a quick lunch break would often move on before she could respond.
The Solution
Gastler Farm brought in Mikla to handle the entire front end of their inquiry pipeline. Mikla plugs directly into the conversation flow that used to consume Leah's day - responding instantly to every inquiry, answering venue questions, and booking tours on the calendar - so Leah's first interaction with couples is when they walk through the door.
What Mikla handles for Gastler Farm:
- Instant response to every inquiry - before competitors even reply
- Natural, conversational lead qualification and venue Q&A
- Automated tour booking directly on the calendar
- Persistent follow-up sequences that recover ghosted leads
- Seamless handoff once a tour is booked
Hear It from Leah
The Results
The impact was immediate - within the very first week:
Tour bookings at least doubled in the first full week and have stayed consistently at that level since.
Multiple inquiries converted directly into signed event contracts within the first week - an immediate return on investment.
The repetitive daily grind of responding to inquiries is gone. Leah now focuses her time on event planning and the work that matters.
Couples arrive for tours having heard nothing from other venues they inquired with - because Mikla responded and booked before anyone else could.
Speed made the biggest difference. Couples browsing venues on a lunch break would get an instant response from Mikla and book a tour before their break was over. By the time competing venues replied hours later, Gastler Farm already had the couple walking through their gardens.
“It's like having the best front-end employee you could possibly have, but at a fraction of the cost. The speed, the efficiency, the follow-ups - nobody's being a slave to their computer all day. That's where this kind of AI comes in handy.”
“I as a human drop the ball on follow-ups so much. People will ghost for two follow-ups and then be like, 'Oh hey, thanks for following up for the third time' and book a tour. Those were clients I would have completely lost doing it myself.”
Gastler Farm - New England
