Planning a Wedding: 10 Steps to Get Started
Planning a wedding can seem overwhelming when you’re first getting started, even if you plan to hire a wedding planner, you might be wondering at what point do I hire a wedding planner? This blog is here to help you know the first 10 steps to get your wedding planning on its way! While almost all of these can be done out of order, with the exception of a couple, based on years of experience and research, this is the BEST order to start with! So here’s what to expect!
1. Get the Vision! What Are Your Non-Negotiables?
Get your wedding vision. This might be something you’ve figured out when you were little and dreaming of your perfect wedding day, or, it might be a whole new project for you! No worries, this applies to all brides and grooms at every stage as the couple who has a been dreaming about their big day will still need to make a concrete plan and bring life to the feels.
Vision Casting Step One - determine your wedding style. Are you into a more classic, elegant, and luxury look? Do you prefer modern glam? Or maybe a Rustic vibe.
Vision Casting Step Two - From here you will choose your color theme, which will then help you choose bridesmaids dresses, florals, and so much more!
Not only does deciding on your style and vision help you plan your decor, it will help you determine your budget! How so? When you sit down with your fiance to dream up your perfect day, you will also write down the things that are an absolute MUST for you. For example: do you want to make your grand entrance in a horse and carriage? Or maybe your non-negotiable is an outdoor ceremony with an indoor reception space? Real florals, multiple dresses for ceremony and reception, the list goes on! So to be successful in your planning and budgeting process you need to find out what is most important to you so you can plan accordingly!
Now, if you’re overwhelmed with the thought of putting together a vision DON’T WORRY. This is where a wedding planner comes in and saves the day! Your wedding planner will help draw out what it is you’re wanting, or maybe you really don’t care and you just want to leave it up to the pros, then no problem, hand the reigns over to your trusted professional and relax!
2. Create Your Wedding Budget
So now that you have your perfect day dreamed up and your vision coming together, it’s time to sit down and budget. I know, this doesn’t sound very fun, but it is an essential item on the list! From here, everything else falls into place.
Grab a bottle of wine and get together with your significant other and do some math! How much do you want to put towards your big day? What items do you plan to give the most money? You might prioritize your decor over the venue, or your honeymoon over the wedding all together. The choice is yours.
Now, once you have figured out how much cash flow you have for your big day, you can get a guest list together, a wedding planner, a wedding venue, wedding vendors, and so on!
And of course, don’t stress, you won’t really know how much each vendor costs, or how much catering costs until you touch base with a wedding planner who can look over your budget and vision and tell you how much things will realistically cost!
3. Determine Your Guest Count
Understanding your guest list and how it affects your overall cost is very important! If you’re focused on saving as much money as possible, keep in mind that more guests equals a higher catering cost—which is most of the time the most expensive item on your checklist.
The guest count will help you also choose a wedding venue, vendors, caterers, decorators and more. You don’t have to have the final count nailed down, every past bride knows getting RSVP’s from your guests is probably the most difficult and tiresome part of the process. So don’t worry about concrete numbers, just figure out your ballpark number so you can keep to your budget!
4. Choose Your Wedding Date
So this one is a little tricky simply because there are only 52 weekends in a year, and many venues are booking 2+ years out! So it’s ideal that your date is not inflexible, because you might find the venue you’ve always dreamed of, but the date might be taken! The Date truly won’t be locked in until you secure your wedding venue!
Even though you can’t guarantee a date, the season and your ideal date will help you figure out how much time you have to plan AND figure out your aesthetic. But most importantly, it will help you decide on a wedding planner! Which brings me to my favorite step on the list! Hiring a wedding planner!
5. Hire a Wedding Planner or Wedding Coordinator
So everything listed above are important details for your wedding planner to know when you sit down for a consultation. Whether you’re planning to hire a full-service planner or a coordinator, your potential wedding planner will need to know a ballpark budget estimate, your vision and the non-negotiables, guest count, and date.
Here’s why.
1. They will need to make sure they aren’t booked on your potential wedding date.
2. They need to know if your budget is realistic for their pricing and services offered.
3. Knowing your vision and non-negotiables will help them craft your budget into something more concrete and realistic
4. Your guest count, as well as all of the above factors will help them create a contract and pricing package, as many planner packages can be custom.
Full-service wedding planners will help you bring all the loose details together, so its best to bring them a few of the basic information so they can form a proper proposal and plan!
6. Secure Your Wedding Venue
The Great thing about hiring a full-service wedding planner BEFORE you book your venue is that they can help you narrow down the search in half the time! Additionally, your wedding planner has probably already worked with many of the venues in your area and knows which ones are the best and worst!
Securing your wedding venue is going to be the FIRST thing you’ll put money towards other than hiring your wedding planner—of course you can book a wedding planner after your venue, but it’s just so much easier for the couple the other way around! But before you hire any other vendor i.e. DJ, Florist, Caterer, etc. the venue is top priority! Again, there are only 52 weekends available in the year and those dates go oh so quick.
Additionally, knowing the location will help the rest of your vendor booking as some vendors won’t travel to a certain point. And of course, most venues have a closed vendor policy which means you can ONLY use their caterers, staffing, and/or bartenders. You don’t want to double-book!
7. Create a Mood Board
Step seven is very similar to step one. You will create a mood board and give it to your wedding planner, or you can skip this step and let your wedding planner do it FOR you entirely. But typically in this scenario, you and your trusted wedding professional, a.k.a wedding planner, will sit down together to discuss in detail your exact wedding vision. After this meeting, your wedding planner will create a “design deck.” A design deck is a real tangible mood board—it will include color swatches, table cloth swatches, photos of centerpieces, etc. It’s essentially your mood board on steroids.
This process is very important because your wedding planner will then take this to your wedding vendors—decorator (if they’re not doing the decor), florist, etc. This ensures that all the vendors who are bringing your vision to life are on the same page and that your dream day comes together seamlessly!
8. Hire Wedding Vendors
Next up on the step-by-step guide—hiring wedding vendors! This can be either fun and exciting or very stressful! Another reason we highly recommend hiring a wedding planner is for this one alone! Wedding planner’s will save you lots of headache in this department, as the wedding industry is incredibly saturated with talented and not so talented vendors.
Your wedding planner will save you the headache by recommending vendors they have worked with countless times and that they trust! And on top of this, they can typically get you a major discount! If you’re hiring a wedding planner who is new to the business, they might not have as many connections, which is no problem at all, they will still do the work of tracking down your vendors and vetting them so you don’t have to!
If you’re planning everything yourself, you can find some good vendors by checking Instagram and Facebook. Make sure they have a credible social media presence, as well as reviews!
Here is a list of the highest-demand vendors for your wedding day in no particular order:
9. Plan Your Honeymoon
Now that you have all of your major wedding items taken care of, it’s time to plan your honeymoon! You’ll want to make sure you do this far enough in advance so that flight prices don’t go up, there’s still room on the cruise ship, and/or, you’re not left in a pinch picking whatever you can get!
Honeymoons often get left on the back burner, but trust me, you don’t want to put your last pennies towards this one. After planning a wedding for an entire year+ you deserve a vacation with your best friend. DON’T. SKIP. the honeymoon!
If this is something that overwhelms you, contact a travel agent, or maybe reach out to your wedding planner as they might offer that service!
10. Go Wedding Dress Shopping With Your Besties
We saved the best for last! Most every bride is excited to try on stunning dresses with their closest friends and family, so make a day out of it!
Make sure you schedule an appointment in advance as most wedding dress shops will not take walk ins! Shopping for your wedding dress should be done no less than 6 months in advance and that’s pushing it! Shoot for 9-12 months if you can!
There you have it! These are the first 10 steps to planning your wedding, once you get these steps down you’re pretty much. all taken care of, you’ll just need to meet with your wedding planner a month or two in advance to get your wedding timeline squared away, week of timeline, family travel itinerary, and a few other items together.
You’re now set up for success! If you’re still wondering what to do or need some other questions answered, send us a message and we’ll answer your questions as well as write a blog on the topic!
The pros are here to help, so contact us today!
