Top 12 Reasons Why You Should Hire a Professional Wedding Planner
The top reason is that they save you money! Do I really need to give you another 11???? There are various ways they can do this, but a good Planner will always pass on any savings directly to you. The average wedding costs in the region of £20,000, so to save some hard-earned cash would be great, right? Even though there is an upfront cost for a Wedding Planner, you will inevitably be able to recoup this additional cost with their expert service.
Time. A Planner can do a lot of the legwork for you – research, helping you generate ideas, setting up meetings, chasing quotes, confirming plans, co-ordinating suppliers, recommending suppliers, or even holding some of the initial meetings with suppliers for you. The average wedding takes over 200 hours to plan, and in a climate where brides are planning their own weddings whilst holding down a full-time job (as well as having a life!), chasing emails and taking phone calls is not that easy.
A Planner is fully aware of all the costs involved in planning a wedding, so they can help you set an effective budget. By having a realistic budget in place, you are more likely to stick to it and start your newly married life with no wedding debt!
4. Etiquette. Are the etiquettes of getting married driving you to distraction? A wedding often involves several generations, and if the do’s and don’ts of getting hitched are likely to cause offence to anyone, a Wedding Planner will help guide you towards a day that even the most prim of aunts will approve of.
5. The Wedding Planner’s experience of such events will ensure that, in the event of any disasters, they have a contingency plan. No bride wants to think about what might go wrong on their big day, and with a Wedding Planner you won’t need to. They will seamlessly work behind the scenes and do their utmost to ensure your day goes exactly to plan (or as close to plan as possible!)
6. A Wedding Planner can negotiate directly with suppliers on your behalf. They will only work in your best interests, to your brief, so they can professionally conduct negotiations to ensure you always get the best deal on service and price.
7. Being part of the Wedding Industry, a Wedding Planner understands the right questions to ask potential suppliers to make sure that no detail is forgotten. They are experts in their field, so they also know what the technical terms involved are with all the different services you might need for your big day, to save you from getting confused with the jargon or, worst still, making a mistake with what you require or the quotations.
8. The creative input you can get from a Wedding Planner will add that extra special touch to your day. It will make your day more personal to you and more memorable for your guests. Combining their knowledge of key wedding trends with the couple’s personality ensures that innovative and creative ideas are presented to you that you may well have never thought of. What also makes the skills of a Wedding Planner unique is that they don’t just get all fluffy with blue sky thinking; they also know where to source the services to make their ideas a reality.
9. A Wedding Planner’s knowledge of the local wedding industry is second to none. Unlike an online directory, a good Wedding Planner will personally know each supplier they recommend (from a professional point of view). This enables them to make sure that the companies they are recommending to you are competent, able to deliver the service you want, offer a competitive price and are generally nice people to deal with. Nobody wants to spend their money with a company that doesn’t offer you the best customer service – service with a smile goes a VERY long way! After all, it is their reputation on the line as well, so they have to make sure that they are only recommending the best that your budget will allow.
10. Having a vast array of suppliers at their fingertips allows a Wedding Planner to provide you with the best option for your budget. Their ability to cost-save will ensure your wedding comes in on budget. With their experience and creativity, a Wedding Planner can present you with numerous cunning ideas to save you money without you having to compromise on your vision for your special day.
11. Not everyone is a born planner … Wedding Planners are! If planning your big day is bringing you out in a cold sweat, then approach a professional. Wedding Planners LOVE planning! As well as being an inherent skill, it is a passion. It does take practice dealing with so many different elements for an event, and it is not something easily tackled by an amateur. I won’t scare you with all the things that could go wrong, but just answer this question. How much of a catastrophe would it be if the bar at your wedding ran dry by 8 pm or your DJ arrived an hour late?
12. Finally, it is soooo important to remember that you should be a guest at your own wedding. You need to enjoy your special day (that will have cost you a substantial amount of money), spend time with your friends and family, leisurely sip your champagne and have time to sample all the canapés (something I failed to do on my own wedding day). As the bride and groom, you do not want to be dashing about checking everything is on schedule or worrying about the above-mentioned band being late! Having said that, this is equally not something any member of your Wedding party should be doing either (it is also highly possible your groom’s best man will be getting his fill of Dutch courage for his speech, so may not have a clear enough thinking head for such issues). A Wedding Planner can discreetly work behind the scenes to avert a crisis and keep everything running to schedule. I have heard professional wedding suppliers even comment that they far prefer working at a wedding where there is an independent Wedding Planner involved because they know that everything will run on time and seamlessly (especially important for your photographer and caterer). Having a professional to co-ordinate your special day will be a worthwhile investment.
I hope this list of the 12 top reasons why you should hire a wedding planner is helpful to you at this exciting stage of the planning process. If you’d like to learn more about how I can help you plan your wedding or coordinate your wedding day, you can explore my services here.
Happy planning!