6 Things To Look For In A Wedding Planner

This entry is from our Expert Guest series where wedding and honeymoon professionals share their best tips on creating memories that last a lifetime.

It’s easy to get overwhelmed during your wedding planning process. Along with organizing, researching, and finding the best vendors for your budget, it also comes down to negotiating costs, ensuring that everything is done on time and that the big day runs smoothly – all the while ensuring that your guests are happy and enjoying themselves!

On top of all of this, many of us work full-time jobs and trying to juggle a job with a social life and wedding planning – well something’s gotta give! This is where a wedding planner saves the day.

Choosing A Wedding Planner

There are 3 different types of services that wedding planners usually offer:

1. A wedding planner only for specific tasks, ie. to help you with the catering or with the florals for the wedding
2. A wedding planner only for the big day to ensure that everything runs smoothly so that you can relax and leave the day in the hands of a professional
3. From the moment you begin wedding planning to help with every detail of the wedding

What To Look For In A Wedding Planner

After choosing the type of service you require, apart from your budget, below are six things to consider when choosing your wedding planner:

1. Personality and Trust

It’s important for you to find a planner that you instantly get along with. There are times when you may send 20 emails in 1 night to the wedding planner with details of your wedding, and there are more stressful times than others where the ˜Bridezilla’ in you might come out. This is where you’ll need the wedding planner to stay calm and really listen to you.

You need to also ensure that you’re able to trust the planner as there are times when planning can get difficult. Even if they may be incredible at what they do, ensuring that your personalities click and that you trust them 100% is key.

2. Portfolio

Ensure that you take a look at the weddings that the wedding planner has done previously not only to be inspired for your own event, but to also ensure that their style matches yours.

Questions to keep in mind are:

• Are the weddings small simple affairs, or are they more extravagant and luxurious?
• If you’d like your wedding theme to be focused around colours and florals, see if the planner has done similar themes in the past and if so – to what scale?
• Do they specialize in a certain type of wedding?
• Are they familiar with the wedding location?
• Do they have vendors that they currently work with? If so, would this wedding planner be able to get you a discount for your wedding?
• What size of weddings do they usually work with?

Wedding planners are able to work to ensure every aspect of your wedding is amazing, but they each have their own skill set that they bring to the table whether it be the visuals of the wedding or the food, you need to ensure that it matches what you are looking for.

3. Communication

Communication is integral to planning the wedding of your dreams. This leads to considering the response time between when you call/email/text the planner and when they get back to you. Is this planner too busy? Do they take a long time getting back to their clients? The planner needs to keep you up to date with the preparations and ensuring that you know exactly when to expect a reply will help to lessen the stress.

4. Pricing Structure

Every wedding is different and whether you only want the planner for specific tasks, on the big day itself, or if you’d like the planner to be with you from the beginning will, of course, make a difference in the price. The pricing structure could be any of the following:

• A flat fee
• A base fee plus extra charges depending on vendors and needs
• An hourly rate

If the planner charges a flat rate, find out what exactly would be included in this. Also, find out if there is a payment structure and what the billing method is. It’s essential to be upfront with the wedding planner when it comes to the budget to ensure that both parties are happy.

5. Other Weddings

Be sure to find out how many other weddings the planner is working on, as well as if there are weddings they are planning that happen during the same month as your wedding. If the planner works for a large wedding planning company then their firm may have other weddings in the pipeline- and they will also have a large team to work with. If they are independent wedding planners, then it would be best if they could be focused primarily on your wedding.

You want your planner to be devoted to your wedding to ensure that that the planning and the big day run seamlessly.

6. References

Make sure to get references of recent weddings that the wedding planner has done. It’s vital to call and check how these customers’ wedding planning and big day went. If the wedding planner does not want to give out references – it’s most likely a red flag and best not to work with them. This also ties in with building trust with the wedding planner and giving you peace of mind.

After the big event, enjoy a honeymoon financed by your Honeyfund honeymoon registry.

Bio: Neha Oberoi is the blog manager for the London based international luxury Asian and South Asian wedding planning service Think Shaadi. Originally from Canada, and also having lived in London for a few years, Neha is currently based in Dubai, and loves fashion, travel and beautiful beach days!