Noah's Event Venue

Noah's Event Venue was an event space located at 2501 International Park Place in Hoover's International Park business park. It was part of the Utah-based Noah Corp. chain of more than 40 such venues founded by Bil Bowser. The first Noah's opened in 2007. The Hoover location held its grand opening on November 4, 2017.

As an event venue designed from the ground up, the center featured a large hardwood-floored banquet hall and outdoor terrace with adjoining dressing areas, storage rooms and prep kitchens. Various furnishings, linens, lighting and decor were stored on-site and offered a variety of customized options for ceiling treatments, lighting displays, and backdrops as well as built-in audio/visual equipment. The prototypical Noah's Event Venue was designed by Shelden Architecture of Wichita, Kansas and constructed by the Gabriel Management Corp, also owned by Bowser. Noah represented their business model as a move to consolidate the event business with "product consistency".

In February 2019 a property manager working with several locations notified investors that the company had ceased making property tax and insurance payments. The company sued her for defamation, and she countersued. A lawsuit filed in April on behalf of investors in a Carmel, Indiana Noah's location alleged that the event centers, developed by Rockwell Debt-Free Properties of Sandy, Utah and pre-leased to Noah for 20-year terms, were expanding solely as a means of recruiting new investors to pay off debts from previous locations using the lure of a "tenant-in-common" tax-deferral under Section 1301 of the U.S. tax code. The plaintiffs argued that the businesses themselves did not generate enough revenues to finance their leases. In May the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

Harris Family Investments acquired the property in 2021 for $1.65 million.

References

• Thornton, Grace (November 22, 2016) "National event venue company Noah’s set to open 1st Alabama location in Hoover." Hoover Sun
• Larson, Erik (June 18, 2019) "Tax-Haven Wedding Venues Become Retiree Investors' Nightmare." Bloomberg News
• Larson, Erik (June 26, 2019) "Wedding-Venue Chain Founder Must Fork Over Cash Amid Fraud Claim." Bloomberg News
• Rebman, Stephanie (August 5, 2019) "Metro Birmingham event venue closing." Birmingham Business Journal
• Van der Bijl, Hanno (February 4, 2021) "Former Noah’s Event Venue property in Bham sells for $1.65M." Birmingham Business Journal