Our one day Wedding Planning Training in association with University of Plymouth has turned out to be a huge success.

Free spaces fill up with matter of hours and we have a waiting list for the upcoming courses until spring next year.

However, this is not the main milestone to asses its success. The comments that we have received from the students after the training, show what the participants actually gained and how thriving this experience has been.

 "It was an amazing, and really worthwhile experience for me, I came away with more drive and passion that this is the area of events management I want to go in to then when I arrived.
It was wonderful to be given the opportunity to have a small insight in to wedding planning from some one who has started their own business. " - Amelia Ghazala November 2009

"I thoroughly enjoyed the Wedding Planning Training course. The bit I enjoyed the most was actually getting involved in planning the wedding we were given in our packs. I learnt a lot about all the things which need to be thought of and arranged when organising a wedding. Thank you very much." - Clare Thierens November 2009

"The training was really helpful and informative, it was funny and very interesting. It worked very well what it covered and how it was laid out" - Laura Heard November 2009

"I think it was very worthwhile. It made me realise exactly just how much goes into wedding planning and  how long it would take to make all the little details perfect. I thought doing all the research was very interesting. It was great to be able to ask Samm any questions we had." - Anais Hay December 2009

Now, for the third year running, the Westcountry Wedding Awards 2010 is open for entries.

To judge by the numbr of entries and votes pouring in - this year's Awards promises to be even more succesful then the past two. Currently with nearly 80 entries and hundreds of votes, the Westcountry Wedding Awards is an excellent proof to demonstrate the outstanding quality of wedding services in Devon and Cornwall. 

This years Awards will close for entries on 17 March 2010 and for votes on 24 March 2010. Finalists will be announced on 31 March 2010. The Awards Ceremony will be held at Crownhill Fort, Plymouth on 14 April 2010. 

The Westcountry Wedding Awards are Devon and Cornwall’s most prestigious awards for client service excellence. The Awards recognise those businesses which go the extra mile for their customers, providing outstanding quality and inspire their customers to want to actively and positively promote them. 

For more information and how to enter, please visit www.westcountryweddingawards.co.uk

 A note from our lovely cople, Kate and Graham who got married this August in Polhawn Fort, Cornwall.

" We simply cannot begin to thank you enough for everything you did both beforehand and on the wedding weekend itself, to help make the whole experience so special for both of us!

It was brilliant fun working with you to co-ordinate everything and we hope that you enjoyed it as much as we did." - Kate and Graham-

To see the photos from Kate and Graham's wedding, please have a look at our gallery: Kate and Graham, Polhawn Fort

Oh what a night!

The stage was set in a way never seen before at Plymouth Gin Blackfriars Distillery.  The starlight cloth back drop was perfect for the borrowed church stain glass window finished with a large plasma screen projecting logos of the awards sponsors and the names of the finalists.

The evening commenced with canapes and champagne presented on an illuminated table, providing opportunity for all the Finalists to relax and schmooze ahead of the awards.  The awards were given an amazing build up by Rory Campbell of Encore Management and 'The Party Guests" who performed caberet and opera before ultimately leading into the awards with a rousing rendition of Puccini's Nessun Dorma, thus creating a buzz of appreciation and anticipation.

Finally the time comes to present the awards and a hush falls upon Plymouth Gin, you can almost feel the Finalists holding their breath. Richard Smith Home Brand Director of Plymouth Gin steps up to declare his venue officially launched as a wedding venue, talks of the build up to the awards and introduces Samm Riley of Wedding Matters to award the winners.

One by one elation and disappointment are simultaneously felt as each category is awarded.  For the winners often a genuine sense of shock and for the runners-up perhaps a little natural disappointment.   For all there was a feeling of having had a great evening and that the awards were doing great things for the Westcountry Wedding Tourism.  Many have already been spurred on to enter and do better next year.

All in all the event was a resounding success for Wedding Matters, the Event Sponsors and of the Finalists with a sense of feeling that our region had taken a step forward and are looking forward to reaping the rewards.

For further details visit the Wedding Matters Westcountry Wedding Awards

After entering the Wrapit Wedding Industry Awards and beating off 22 other wedding planners to make the shortlist we attended the awards ceremony in London. We had a great night and whilst we didn't win we were really chuffed to have got so far and by the comments our clients had made about us:

* I don't know what I would have done without Samm - I really wouldn't have known where to start.  She coordinated my wedding from start to finish, taking on board all my personal likes/dislikes and coming to me with plenty of ideas and suggestions.  Feedback suggests our guests enjoyed our wedding as much as we did - that has a lot to do with Samm!!

 * Although we don't get married until New Years Eve this year, we have been working with Samm for over a year.  There are 5 women within my team getting married within the next year and the entire team agrees that I am by far the calmest and most relaxed and I reply, "that's because I have a wedding planner!" For someone who is as much of a control freak as me, the thought of losing control of the entire decision making can be daunting, but that is not what Wedding Matters is all about.  We still make the decisions, but we don't have to do all the boring or stressful things that go with it.  Samm is 100% dedicated, has fantastic ideas, contacts and sources but most importantly, she listens...and hears what we say.  I am really looking forward to having Samm at our wedding at the end of this year and I have every confidence that it will be even more than I'd ever dreamt because of Samm's dedication and professionalism.

 * Calm, effective efficient, innovative....just perfect

 * Wedding Matters were professional and efficient in their approach and made our wedding day truly special. They were really creative with our budget; and put in the extra ideas and effort when it really mattered.  Guests are still saying it was the best wedding they went to and it was like going to a wedding out of Hello magazine!  Little did they know how much we spent - this is all testaments to Wedding Matters.  

 * Wedding Matters created the wedding day we always dreamed of and more. They emulated our style exactly and continually went that extra mile to make everything perfect. They absorbed the planning stress and ensured the day itself ran like clockwork. This meant we could just relax and enjoy every second. I cannot recommend them highly enough.  

We were blown away to receive such comments. Of course we had already asked these clients for testimonials which they happily provided, but when presented with an annonymous medium by which to comment, they were even more complimentary! In future we will pay someone to obtain feedback on our behalf, as it is truly amazing what people won't say directly to you, strange but true!

After the success of the Vows Awards in Scotland and the Wrapit Awards in London, we launched the Westcountry Wedding awards to recognise excellence among wedding suppliers in the growing Wedding Destination that is Devon and Cornwall.

For the people who live and work in the Westcountry London is a long way away and they don't always appreciate the fast pace of life in the capital. Local people like to employ local people and like to take up the services of local people. With this in mind they also like to be treated as a separate entitiy not just an extension of the UK. This local feeling is what gave birth to the Westcountry Wedding Awards and what has given it popularity; awards created by local people for local people.

For wedding suppliers who are excelling in what they do winning an award potentially opens the doors to a whole new market for business. It also starts to create a classification for wedding businesses so that couples getting married have some idea of the quality and standard of the wedding suppliers they come across in the course of their research. Whilst this is not an overnight fix, in the long term we aim to take the pain out of planning a wedding event and put the fun back into it, by not just providing information to couples, but providing pre-qualified information to couples.

From an industry point of view awards draw a line in the sand between those getting it right and those that aren't, it praises the hard work and efforts of those getting it right and provides a benchmark to aspire to, for those who aren't there yet. This kind of challenge to a marlket only improves things for suppliers and couples alike. Good luck to everyone.

The awards close for entrants on 15 March 2008 and the ceremony will be held in April at the Plymouth Gin Distillery.

www.westcountryweddingawards.co.uk

Popular Perception of Wedding Planners

Many couples looking to get married often fail to consider using a Wedding Planner as they perceive it as an unnecessary luxury cost only affordable to celebrities and the very rich.

Reality of PROFESSIONAL Wedding Consultants

These days the reality is very different a professional wedding consultant can guarantee to bring considerable added value to your wedding.  Ultimately a PROFESSIONAL Wedding Consultant will:

·    Save you thousands of pounds
·    Achieve a superior quality Wedding Event for you and your guests
·    Take the stress out of planning by sourcing proven suppliers for even the most challenging and unusual requests
·    Free up your time and that of your guests so you can enjoy your wedding

Wedding Planning in the UK

Wedding Planning in the USA (often called Bridal Consultants) has been around for well over 50 years and is considered to be a relatively mature industry.  In fact, fewer and fewer average middle income couples in the USA would now even consider getting married without the use of a wedding planner.  

In the UK wedding planning as a professional industry is still in relatively infant stages of development.  The past 10 years has seen a huge increase in training and development with a number of Universities and Colleges offering Wedding and Event Planning degree and tertiary courses.  

Today the UK has a very small number of PROFESSIONAL Wedding Planning Companies.  The reality is that there are few barriers to starting up as a ‘Wedding Planner’ and everyone from ‘Mary the florist’ to the girl whose just gotten married and been inspired to start a business are calling themselves ‘Wedding Planners’ often offering misguided advice with sometimes disastrous consequences.  Don’t get caught by the fly by night wedding planner.

How to avoid a Fly-by-night

Don’t get us wrong – we are all for growth of the Wedding Consultants industry!  That said so called wedding planners starting up and promising a service they can’t deliver has disastrous effects on couples weddings and does little for the credibility of Wedding Consultants on the whole.  

A few tips to spot a unqualified planner are:

• The use of stock photos (Bought from a photographer) or photos from friends weddings on their websites
• Don’t have a website or ‘it’s being worked on’
• Their email address is a free web email (hotmail, yahoo, BT.com etc)
• They can’t show any photo’s of weddings they’ve planned
• Their phone number is a mobile number only

Questions to Ask

To help you choose a professional wedding consultant we have put together a list of questions to assist you compare the different coordinators you speak with:

Experience and Training

• How long have you been a Wedding Planner?
• Is this your full-time or part-time job?
• What did you do prior to being a Wedding Planner?
• How many full-service weddings do you personally plan each year?
• How many wedding day only weddings do you coordinate each year?
• What formal training have you had?
• Are you a member of a recognised wedding trade associations (i.e. UKAWP)?
• What is the largest wedding you have managed?
• Describe the best wedding you’ve ever managed.  Why was it the best wedding?
• How do you keep up with changes in the industry?   

Staff and Attendance on-the-day

• Do you employ other people who help you plan events?
• How many event managers do you bring with you to a wedding?
• Is there an extra charge for additional staff?
• Do you personally attend every wedding?
• What if you become ill or cannot come to the wedding?  Who will stand in for you?

Money

• Will you save us money, and can you advise us on where best to spend our money?
• Do you charge for an initial meeting?  Is this applied towards the cost of coordination should we hire you?
• Do you accept commissions, kickbacks or professional discounts from any vendors you refer?
• Do you charge for expenses or travel?
• What is the average amount for your services?
• What is your full-service fee?  Does the fee include the day of the wedding?
• Do you charge hourly, a flat rate or a percentage of my overall budget?
• How are the payments structured?  When are they due?
• What is your refund policy in case of cancellation?

Added Extra Value

• Do you sell wedding suppliers (invitations, theme decorating, lighting etc)?  What discounts do you give to clients?
  

Wedding Planning, Design and Coordination

• How many hours does it take to plan a wedding?Describe the most difficult wedding you have ever handled and why it was so difficult?Will you help design the overall theme, décor and flow of the wedding ceremony and reception?
• Will you provide me with a detailed budget outline?
• Can you advise us on issues of etiquette?

Working with Vendors

• Who signs the vendor contracts?  Do we pay the fee for the entire event and then you pay each vendor or do we contract with vendors separately?
• Are you present at all vendor meetings?
• Do you make initial contact with all vendors and check price and availability or do you give us a list of vendors to call?
• Describe some of the problems you have had with vendors not fulfilling their contract and how you handled it?
• Do you have preferred vendors who will give you discounts?  Do you have a variety of vendors for all budgets?
• Are you able to work and negotiate with vendors we may have already chosen?
• Will you ensure that all our chosen vendors are coordinating with each other?

On the Wedding Day

• How many hours are you onsite the day of the wedding?
• Do you help with setup and break down?
• Will you bring emergency kit?
• Will you provide me with a contract that details the services you are providing?

References

• Do you have any references from former clients?Are you affiliated with any other companies (or venues)