I’ve been a planner for 10 years and in that time a few clients have wanted their dogs involved in the day. The most memorable was 2 pug dogs who wore fairy wings and were trained to walk down the aisle with the ring in a special sparkly collar. So it was with interest that I came across this article in Modern Dog Magazine celebrity planner David Tutera in case you were wondering why I was reading a U.S dog magazine!

A civil partnership I’m planning this summer will also have their 3 dogs as part of the ceremony & pictures but won’t be staying for the party. If you are intending on having dogs at your wedding here are my 7 top tips.

1. Remember not everyone is ‘dog friendly’ so keep the dog on a lead at all times and delegate someone to be in charge. If this is not a family member think about hiring a professional dog walker to be present at the wedding ceremony.
2. Ensure that you keep to your dog’s regular diet and don’t introduce anything new to them. Ahem need I say more then ‘upset tummies’
3. Remember you can’t reason with a dog so if they decide on the day they’d rather sleep under a tree, well let them and resort to your backup pan – you do have a backup plan right?
4. Ensure the ‘dog walker’ takes them for regular walks especially just before the ceremony if they are to play a part.
5. Bring the dogs familiar items like dog bowl and bedding so they have an area they feel comfortable in
6. Ensure the venue are happy with dogs before booking, many rural venues are more then happy for you to bring your dogs
7. If the dogs are to act as ring bearers spend some weeks training them with treats first. If possible take them to the ceremony venue and practice the walk with the music you will have as you entrance playing – loudly. If you can get the dog to walk on command with the background noise there is a much higher chance of success on the day.

Dog lovers out there might like this blog post featuring a dog poem! Falling in love is like owning a dog

Photo Credit: Kerry Morgan

If you are getting married in 2012 have you set yourself some New Year resolutions to ensure the wedding is planned and executed beautifully? If not here are my suggestions:

1. Create a realistic budget and stick to it, more advice on creating your budget can be found via an article I wrote for English Wedding

2. Don’t try and do everything yourself, delegate some tasks to family members or friends who would love to be involved leaving you the fun tasks, you can then act as ‘project manager’ for all delegated menial tasks!

3. Involve your fiancé, it’s their wedding too! Talk about the areas of the wedding which are important to each of you and split up the duties.

4. Make a pledge to spend one evening per week NOT talking about the wedding, you don’t want to get to the wedding night with a deathly silence as you no longer know how to communicate to each other.

5. Remember less is more, do you really need favours, cameras, napkin decorations, wine charmsand trivia cards on the table?!

6. Keep your sanity, do you really have to match the favour ribbon to the bridesmaid dresses? Stop trying to match everything, sometimes using similar tones is more effective.

7. Forward plan, check with your suppliers when they need confirmed information from you, i.e. when is the latest date for the table plan to be printed, when do caterers need dietary choices – use this to then work out when invites need to be posted, allow enough time to print labels and get stamps (don’t forget to check with the post office if it is a regular or large stamp).

8. Remember you are not superheroes, if you become frantic at work or family health issues are making it difficult to organise the wedding, get a professional wedding planner in. Most will offer partial planning services so you are still in control. I cover the East Anglia region, please review my website for further details or for planners in different areas try the UKAWP.

9. Don’t be bullied, you may find family, suppliers and venues will try to enforce their opinions on you. Listen to what they are saying but remember it is YOUR wedding, do what you think is right for your wedding.

10. And finally have fun it’s not often you get the chance to plan a fabulous event with all your friends and family present so don’t get too stressed. If you have a budget and sensible timeline of when tasks need completing you can enjoy planning your wedding.

Recently we gave some advice to the lovely writers at Hitched, talking about winter weddings. You can read all about it here.

I originally posted this in 2009 but thought it was pretty prudent for now as this is when brides are interviewing suppliers for their weddings next year.

As part of their consultation I naturally ask clients if they have a budget, in past years clients would give me a rough budget but I’ve noticed a bit of a trend recently when clients say there is no budget determined. Far from being helpful this makes it very difficult to price what their wedding will cost.

After all there is a huge difference in weddings costing £10k compared to £30k and even more when the wedding is £80k+. Without a broad spectrum of a budget I have no idea as to what they want for their wedding. I pride myself on being an honest wedding planner so when a client gives me a budget I don’t set out to spend every penny or intentionally go over budget so I earn more! In fact my budget breakdowns are pretty accurate and we rarely go over the agreed budget.

Think about it another way, I have suppliers I recommend in each price bracket and I only recommend those the client can afford. There is nothing worse then seeing and falling in love with something only to discover it’s out of your budget. For example the bands I use can range from £700 – £4,000. Is there a big difference between them? To be honest yes, my top bands are fantastic but I only recommend them IF the client can afford it.

The same can be said of flowers, you could enter a meeting with a florist saying there is no budget, the florist will then quote giving you everything you wanted, you receive the quote and fall off your chair because you don’t want to spend that much so ask them to cut down. Wouldn’t it have been easier to say this is my budget in the first place?

So, the moral of the story is not every supplier is trying to spend ALL your money. We are only trying to give you the wedding or party you desire but without knowing what you want to spend, expectations are rarely met.

Please be honest with us!

In the week I was interviewed by a journalist regarding how to save money on your budget.

This article is featured on yahoo lifestyle and can be found here

Many of my clients live together and as such have everything they need for their homes, for this reason they decide against the traditional ‘wedding gift list’ opting instead to honeymoon or charity donations. It would seem Prince William and Miss Catherine Middleton are continuing with this trend by launching a charitable gift fund.

Prince William and Miss Catherine Middleton have created a charitable gift fund to help celebrate their wedding. The fund will focus on assisting charities which support the five causes chosen by the couple. These causes are close to their hearts and reflect the experiences, passions and values of their lives so far. Having been touched by the goodwill shown to them since their engagement, they have asked that anyone wishing to send them a wedding gift consider doing so in the form of a donation to the fund.

To learn more about the Charity Fund please visit the website for details on how to donate + information about the charities they are supporting.  

Contributing to a honeymoon

As I mentioned in my introduction, many of my clients have decided to ask for contributions towards their honeymoon. One company I like is ‘Honeymoney’ . Instead of just sending ‘cash’ guests can instead buy experiences like snorkelling or massages or even pay for champagne on the bride & groom arrivals. You can see sample gift lists here.  

Charity lists

There are many companies that specialise in charity gift lists but I’m going to concentrate on just 2.

Oxfam Unwrapped  enables the couple to choose causes close to their hearts, just like the honeymoon list, guests then select what ’cause’ they would like to contribute to. For example one such gift could be school supplies for a child which is just £7.

Categories to choose from include:

1. Animal Lovers
2. DIYers
3. Educators & innovators
4. Eco-warriors
5. Foodies
6. Gardeners
7. Kids
8. Parents & Carers

Photo: Abbie Trayler-Smith

The Alternative Wedding List - Clients have used this charity gift list company in the past, it enables you to support a number of charities at the same time. When you set the list up it enables guests to see how the money could be spent, a sample list can be found here. There are too many charities involved with The Alternative Wedding List for me to write down but it can be found via here .

The beginning of the year is a busy time for wedding planners with floods of emails coming through, this is generally when we pick up most of our new bookings but also suppliers call to chat about what’s new with them.

And we get an influx of CV’s from enthusiastic people wanting to become a wedding planner. Sometimes I find myself giving the same advice; in fact it was from advising so many ‘newbie’s’ that the idea of the UK Alliance of Wedding Planners first came about!

So I thought it might be helpful to give some advice before embarking on this wonderful and rewarding career.

Can I get a job?

Very few planners in the UK take on staff, some have part time assistants and freelancers in the peak summer season but if you think you will get a lovely, well paid job working for a planner think again. Unless you want to relocate to the US perhaps? It is for this reason that most planners start their own business but be patient – I’m coming onto that shortly!

So, if you don’t want to start your own business I suggest you contact large event companies or venues in your area that cater for weddings.  This gives you the opportunity to gain some experience whilst receiving the security of a regular salary.

What about work experience?

Well this is tricky, I get probably 5 C.V’s per week from people wanting to work for free to gain some experience. But in the government’s wisdom of supporting small businesses & young entrepreneurs like YOU, this is not possible as we would have to pay the minimum wage of £5.75 p/h  

So even though YOU want to work for free for just a week or two part time, you can’t. Another possibility is to be a volunteer whereby you choose the hours & days you assist the planner, for more information on the definition go to here. It is frustrating as planners know you want to see what it is like for a wedding planner day to day but independent planners can rarely afford to pay £5.75ph for an untrained helper.

Approaching other wedding planners for advice

Ok I mentioned I get contacted a lot? So here are the pet hates of mine, a sure way for me to hit delete! 

• “I REALLY enjoyed planning my wedding; everyone said I’d make a fantastic planner.” Do you know HOW many times I have heard this line? Go on, take a guess… lets estimate 5 x p/w x say 50 weeks x 8 years = 1,250. Can you hear me scream? Please don’t say that line to me!
• Dear Sir/Madam – I have a name and yes it is plastered all over my website, twitter, facebook, linked in…… not sure? Please just call me Bernadette
• I really want to be a planner, how do I do it, where do you get your clients, what should I charge, what services should I offer, where should I advertise….. the list goes on. Any planner out there will tell you I’m always happy to give advice but be specific, ask me a question and I’ll normally answer you but within reason!
• Can I see a copy of your proposal – err no!
• What is your profit? Go away, none of your business!
• Pretending to be a bride – big no no, it’s disrespectful to small businesses out there. I know some online training courses suggest you do this but at the UKAWP we feel this is very bad practice.

Show me where to be like J-Lo

Oh please don’t tell me you don’t know who J-Lo is as I’ll be showing my age! Ok fabulous singer, did a film called ‘The Wedding Planner’  

So if you are serious about becoming a wedding planner and not approaching this as a hobby or whim then you need to do some serious research and get prepared! Here are my top tips but I have seriously condensed it (for proper training go to the UKAWP) 

1. First step is sign up to the UKAWP Business Practicalities course, I know I’m biased as the training director but I think the courses are fabulous. This course really explains how to launch as a wedding planning business. View here for more information. Don’t believe me? Just look at how super fabulous our members are, most of whom have attended our training courses. We run the courses spring and autumn, all the tutors have been in business for at least 8 years so we do know what we are talking about. We pass on real life experiences throughout the weekend and answer any questions you or the other students have. Do view the brochure for more information; don’t forget if you don’t attend the spring courses you will have to wait until the autumn….

1. Research into planners in your area, what is their websites like? What services do they offer and what prices do they charge? What is their USP? How can YOU be different? How can you stand out from them?
2. Start playing with company names, jot down ideas on a notepad and keep with you for those random moments when in bed/on the train/cooking dinner when you suddenly think of an idea! Then check if this name is taken via companies house + also check if the domain name is free. Don’t choose a name you can’t have the matching website to! Make sure it is easily spelt, not too similar to another, not cheesy and I advise not to limit yourself to ‘wedding’ as what happens if you want to do parties? Just my personal opinion.
3. Ensure your website is professionally designed, after all you want to start your business professionally.
4. Meet other planners for coffee in your area, far better to be friendly then start your business under animosity
5. Subscribe to the UKAWP blog for tips and information on industry events
6. Sign up to twitter and start following some respected planners & suppliers out there.
7. Attend the UKAWP training courses – did I mention that already?
8. Be patient, it wont happen over night
9. Really think about your pricing and take into account any costs, i.e telephone, broadband, travel, stationery & your time

I hope this helps – best of luck for those embarking on this rewarding career.