Beccy & James: Christian's at The Beauchief

Beccy & James: 21st May 2011: Outsourcing Service

There were only 3 weeks to go before her wedding when I first met Beccy and on realising that the Events Coordinator she had been dealing with had left, she promptly burst in to tears .... Not a great start I thought! (One of the things that I would always recommend to venues is that when a key member of their planning staff leaves, they need to inform all the couples who that person had been dealing with, to prevent & manage some of the shock!).

I had to work quickly & calmly to ensure that I re-gained Beccy's trust & eliminated any doubts or stress, so near to her big day.

I started by covering a run through of her day and produced an itinerary, detailing everything that needed to happen & at what time. I don't mind admitting (after the event of course), that at this stage, there were some gaps in the plan! There was no white linen, there were definitely not 100 Martini Glasses for the cocktails .... neither was there a clear plan for the marquee required to house the additional guests on the outside terrace.

The point is, by producing the plan & walking through the day, it was easy to identify what was still left to do, what needed ordering & what staff needed to be involved on the day. Beccy & her husband James, were having the works .. a cocktail hour & casino in the bar & VIP area, a sit down wedding breakfast for over 120 people in The Ballroom & marquee & a large evening reception... This meant that at some stage of the celebrations, most of the downstairs areas at Christian's would be used, so this became a team effort.

Well..at the risk of being boring & saying the same thing, it's only by having the plan in place, that everyone is clear (including the couple), what needs to happen to make their dreams come to true on their Wedding Day.

Come the big day, I can honestly say that they had a ball & that Beccy will be remembered as one of the happiest brides that I've ever seen. I had a lovely message afterwards to say thank-you & that their day had been absolutely perfect...

The last 2 posts have been my first weddings using my Outsourcing Service. I hope you've enjoyed reading about them.

I also hope that from a couples perspective, it gives you confidence that with the right people in place, everything can be pulled together... even at short notice. From a venue's perspective, it hopefully gives you an insight as to how sometimes, outside help can be extremely valuable & that having external support, doesn't always mean someone working on the outside of your team

With thanks to Mike Leng for the photography @ http://www.mike-leng.co.uk