Congratulations! You’re newly engaged and on cloud nine with excitement for your future! And amidst your excitement you know it’s time to book your wedding vendors, but you might be overwhelmed with where to start – we we are here to help!
As your planners, we often facilitate your inquiries, consultations, quoting, and booking of each event partner. The five key questions below are some of the ways we start the conversation when establishing your wedding day dream Team! We hope you find these questions valuable and encouraging when planning the most memorable day of your life. And as always, you know we’re here to help!
1. Are you available for our date?
This is a great first question to ask because if the professionals is not available from your wedding date, you’ll save both their time and yours in the consultation process. If your date is not yet set, share the month and year you hope to get married and schedule your date based on their availability. This of course is only encouraged for your priority vendors, meaning your venue, photographer, and planner as you’ll work most closely with these professionals during the planning process and on the day of your event!
2. What’s included in your services?
Understanding what’s included in the vendor’s services will help you to decide between your wedding needs or wants. While it’s not best practice to negotiate pricing, it’s always encouraged to ask questions about the standard of excellence a professional delivers to their clients.
3. What are your service rates?
Be sure you’re not exceeding your percentage based maximum for each vendor. More about that concept here! Essentially, remember to allocate 40-50% of your all-in budget to your venue and catering and plan to spend 5-10% of your budget on every other vendor category. If your dream vendor is out of budget, see if another vendor expense can be adjusted to make room for one that matters most to you and your fiancé!
4. How often will we hear from you throughout our wedding planning process?
Setting expectations around communication and planning milestones is important early on. Not only will it help you determine whether the vendor is a good fit for your event, but having the conversation upfront will allow you to mark your calendar for important meetings and deadlines – peace of mind that you’re on schedule.
5. What information can we provide to you to make the planning process easier?
A humble yet essential question. Some vendors may ask you to submit an inquiry form prior to booking and others may have you complete a questionnaire a few weeks before the wedding day. As your planner, we use a cloud-based wedding management system where we can keep all vendor agreements, invoices, notes and next steps. Before asking you to log into our project, we collect all booked vendor agreements, invoices, and documents from you in advance so that you can see your planning progress all in one place! Exhale – you’re in organized and well-managed hands!