It’s one of the biggest debates when planning a wedding: should you hire a wedding planner? We’re here to tell you YES.
“They are the key to make all your desires and dreams come true,” said Andie Müller from the Flower Studio. “You have a vision, they will make it happen for you.” While money is a big factor in this decision, there are 8 reasons why you should hire a wedding planner.
“Knowing that someone is in your corner to make sure that what you want to happen that day does,” says Rebecca Lang with Live Love Laugh Events. “Someone that you connect with from the beginning and can trust that they will take your wedding day as seriously as you do. That the vision you have in your mind of what your wedding day looks and feels like is achieved.”
The best way to achieve that wedding day goal is to hire a wedding planner.
Planners eliminate stress
A wedding should be about love and joy. It shouldn’t be about stress. But let’s face it, there’s going to be stress.
“Without a doubt – hiring a wedding planner can lessen the stress of planning a wedding,” says Kristin Wilson from Our DJ Rocks. Wedding planners take on the stress of planning a wedding, so you don’t have to be burdened by the demands of the day.
“Planners become the executive eyes and ears on the wedding day to allow the couple a few hours of fun with their friends before walking down the aisle,” said Lauren from Encore Event Company. “Let’s be honest things go wrong on the wedding day and a planner is there to fix everything before the couple even knows anything happened!”
Looking back at your wedding, you want to remember how much fun you had, not how much stress it caused.
“We want them to be able to look back on this time as one of joy and happiness, not stress and anguish,” P.S. I Love You Productions’ Bonny Bailey-Finck tells us. “Hiring a planner will smooth out the road and let you have a stress-free wedding day where you only have to think about how much fun you are having with the people you love.”
Wedding planners and coordinators take over whatever you don’t want to handle leading up to your big day.
“Imagine yourself sitting back with a glass of wine, talking with your best friend on the phone and she says ‘Don’t you have planning to do?’ and you can laugh and say ‘Nope, I got a wedding planner to do all that craziness.’ You will feel a flow of calm wash over you as you both laugh and continue your night,” says Michael Fried from Sonacity Photography.
Planners save time
Unless you’re born into a life of royalty or extreme wealth, you’re probably going to have to work while also planning a wedding. Whether you like it or not, planning a wedding can be a full-time job.
“A planner can take care of designing the overall design of your wedding, create a project plan, recommend reliable vendors, and save you time in venue search,” said Julie Colon from I Do Events and Party Rentals. The earlier you hire a wedding planner, the more time you can save.
“Hire a wedding planner before you book your venue,” recommends Donnamarie Williamson from CoraMarie Events. “Wedding planners save you time researching venues by narrowing down the hundreds of options to the best one that will fit your budget, guest count, and style.”
The planner can take much of the work off your plate, so you can focus on other responsibilities of life.
Photo by Kristen Weaver Photography
“We recommend hiring a planner from the beginning,” said Tali Gallo from The Bridal Finery. “They can help you narrow down the venue search and recommend you to the right vendors. Time is something we are always short on and they will help with it.”
Planners save you money
Money is probably the biggest reason not to get a wedding planner. But hear us out, a planner may save you money when it’s all said and done.
“By spending money on a professional wedding planner you will end up saving money on your wedding. Your planner will help you stay on budget and steer clear of last-minute costs by thinking ahead,” advises Monica Ann Cullen, from As You Wish, Weddings and Events.
Photo by Dear Dee Photography
Plus, your wedding planner should have good connections to get you deals on other vendors. “A great planner will have great vendor relationships that will at times help you save money. Ten percent here, or 20 % percent here can save you hundred if not thousands in the long run,” says Lang.
Planners let your family enjoy the day
Organizing a bridal party on the day of a wedding is like trying to herd cats. Someone is going to have to do it. If it’s not a wedding planner, then who? Often it’s your family or friends filling in.
“When you don’t hire a wedding planner, usually all the heavy-duty tasks are sadly placed on the mother of the bride or even the maid of honor,” says Amanda Borrero from For the Love of Events.
That can have unfortunate results, like Ann Taylor from A Chair Affair, Inc. recounts.
“Early on in our business, we worked with a bride whose mother was very hands-on,” Taylor explained. “She insisted she would take care of the wedding planning details and all the day of set-up. Things went very smoothly until the day of the wedding. The bride’s mother was so busy setting up the table numbers, place cards, candy buffet, and tabletop décor she missed the wedding ceremony. I felt terrible for the family; it was a moment she’ll never get back.”
Photo by Sierra Ford Photography
Let your family, especially your mother enjoy your big day.
Some couples may turn to other vendors to fill-in for the planner. “At times, the DJ or Photographer sadly has to play planner to gather everyone together for specific timeline items and it puts a lot of stress on the vendors in addition to the services they are already providing,” said Borrero.
Remember if it is a vendor, they may not take on the same kind of responsibility that a wedding planner would take.
Photo by Sonacity Photography
“Many couples believe that the Venue Coordinator is going to act as their coordinator, however, the role of a venue coordinator is very different to that of the wedding coordinator,” said Cullen. “They are there to take care of the venue. They won’t be by your side all day since the venue is their priority.”
Planners are detail-oriented
It doesn’t matter if you’re voted the best bride in the world, there’s going to be some detail you forget about.
“A wedding planner is like a silent ninja, battling small wedding day hiccups before guests or even the couple knows there was an issue,” says Williamson. “These include decorating your reception tables, communicating last-minute changes to vendors such as location or time changes, all the way to relocating your dessert display because ants have swarmed the table!”
An experienced wedding planner most likely knows the details that’ll get overlooked to make sure the big day runs without a hitch.
Beth McIntyre from Your Favorite Day has a list of the details that need to be remembered on the wedding day: “Making sure there are enough seats in the front row of their ceremony. Checking with the Best Man, or whoever has the ring, that they do indeed have the ring. Making sure their vendors get fed! Ensuring there is a cake knife, 2 forks, and little plates ready for cutting the cake.”
Let the wedding planner sweat the small stuff. Because on your big day, the details matter.
“A wedding planner will make sure you have water throughout the day/night to stay hydrated. They will be sure that you eat dinner and cake and also get some to go,” says Cullen. “For brides, they will be sure your dress is bustled, you re-apply lipstick before cake cutting photos, there is nothing in your teeth. For grooms, they will be sure your boutonniere is pinned on correctly and that your suit is lint-free before you head to the ceremony. They will make sure the dads have their boutonnieres in place.”
Photo by Carmela Blackwell Photography
Weather is a big detail and planners are prepared to handle it if a storm ruins your outdoor event.
“A ceremony location changed within hours of the start of the wedding due to weather. The couple didn’t have a wedding planner to get the word out to all the vendors and guests so the task was given to the mother of the bride,” recounts Williamson.
“Well, it turned out that no one had the officiant’s number, and 10 minutes to the start of the ceremony the mother had to leave her daughter’s side to drive to the original ceremony site to try and find the officiant. After an hour the mother returned with the officiant but it was discovered that the couple forgot to pack their marriage license and so they could not officially get married that day. It was a disaster: guests were cranky for having to wait for so long, the food for cocktail hour was cold as the catering staff was never notified of the delay and the bride, well she spent the beginning of her wedding just crying.”
Even the most prepared bride can’t be expected to handle every detail on the wedding day.
Photo by Kristen Weaver Photography
Planners are problem solvers
When problems arise, like inclement weather, that’s when your wedding planner comes in. And trust us, something will go wrong.
“As a wedding planner we do more than what the movies or TV shows show,” said Lang. “Most couples don’t know that we are the ones that handle the emergencies that you can’t plan for. Like when the cake doesn’t show, yes that has happened! We removed the cake table so no one would notice something is missing. And then spoke with the culinary staff to see what desserts they had in the house to serve guests.”
The wedding planner is there to call an Uber for your groomsman who had too much to drink or even to help the bride get through the layers of her dress to use the restroom.
“The wedding dress bustle often falls on the bridesmaids who are busy enjoying the moment by taking photos and celebrating with champagne,” says Gallo. “The time is very tight between the ceremony and the reception. The wedding planners know how to bustle and can have the bride off to her reception on time.”
Even as the wedding couple, sometimes you may not even know what the wedding planner does to make sure everything runs smoothly.
“You may not know this but wedding planners go above and beyond what they are paid to do,” said Fried. “An example of when I saw a wedding planner go above and beyond was when a caterer had dropped off the food and they were supposed to stay and clean up everything. They left and all of the dirty dishes were just left on the tables, the wedding planners not only took the dishes to the kitchen but washed all of them!”
Photo by Sierra Ford Photography
Planners are taskmasters
By the time you get to your wedding day, everything should be laid out in a perfect schedule, thanks to your wedding planner.
“They don’t just organize things before the wedding. They are there the day of and make sure that all of the vendors are on their schedules and everyone is ready for the role they play on the day of,” says Kristine Napier from Honeywood Photography. “I call them the wedding wrangler on the day of the wedding.”
They sure do have to wrangle, to make sure everyone is where they need to be according to a well laid-out plan.
“A wedding planner sees to it that all immediate family members/wedding parties are aware when an important festivity is about to take place,” says Cullen. “I have quite often grabbed a Maid of Honor and whisked her to view the cake cutting so that she doesn’t miss seeing it.”
A wedding planner is also kind of like the conductor of an orchestra. They make sure all the vendors arrive at the right time to make music happen.
“For example (a couple) might have booked the DJ from 4 to 9:30 pm, but the ceremony starts at 3:30 pm and they need music as guests arrive,” says Wilson. “This is something that a wedding planner would be able to catch in advance so that you don’t end up with the last-minute cost in your DJ Final Planning Meeting.”
For your wedding, take the day off from being the taskmaster, and give it to the planner. That’s what they’re there for.
Photo by Lillie Shawn Imagery
Planners are prepared
Not only are planners your wedding day taskmasters, but they’re also prepared. “Wedding planners are always 10 steps ahead and are already making a plan for something you would have never thought of,” says McIntyre.
An experienced wedding planner has seen it all and knows what to do when a crisis arises.
“This is an example of what could have gone wrong without a planner. We had a wedding where the cake vendor never showed up, which we found out was because they had scheduled for the wrong weekend,” said Bailey-Finck.
“So I called a bakery and had them bring out one of their display-only cakes so that the couple had something to show on the cake table. I then went to Publix and purchased a sheet cake so the guests were still able to enjoy the cake at the end of the reception. If there had been no wedding planner, there would have been no one with the contacts necessary to get the display cake and no one who could or would have gone to get the replacement cake.”
Photo by Erika Grace Photography
Like the name says, wedding planners plan. They know what to look out for.
“Nothing is worse than hiring a vendor that refuses to work with your other vendors due to personal bias or just doesn’t show up,” said Williamson. “Your wedding planner is there to assist you in putting together an elite team of professionals that know how to work seamlessly together ensuring your wedding day is stress-free.”
When you think of it, the wedding planner could be more important than your choice in DJ, photographer, or caterer. That person is responsible for making sure everyone else, from the vendors to the bridal party to the guests, are where they need to be and doing what they need to be.
As Bailey-Finck recaps, hiring a wedding planner is like a wedding gift to yourself. “(A wedding planner provides a) peace of mind and lowered stress during the day of the wedding; helps with adhering to budget and potentially saving money throughout the process; helps the couple stay organized and meeting deadlines, and takes care of problems and conflicts that pop up along the way so the couple doesn’t have to be directly involved.”
Let the planner take care of the wedding day hiccups so you can cherish your special day.
“I tell my couples to hire a wedding planner because special moments shouldn’t be left up to chance,” said Fried. “Having someone that can help guide, direct, and execute every detail so that you and your fiancé can focus on what is most important: saying I do!
Written by Daniella Hume
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