Successful wedding planners?

[Chicinwellies]

Would love to hear the pros and cons of your job on a daily basis, how you began, and what training you received? Thanks

I'm not a wedding planner, but I work in 'the industry', and I often work alongside wedding planners.

From what I've seen it can take a while to build up a good enough reputation and network to make much money from it. There seem to be 2 groups of people who start up:

• people who already work in events planning, marketing etc and who already have extensive business networks;
• people who enjoyed planning their own wedding, and think it would be a nice thing to have a go at.

Guess which group tend to be more successful? The person I know who built up a good business quickly was married to a wedding photographer, so her already had networks and contacts.

If you are starting up then it helps if you are really clear why people would use you. Are you targeting the overseas market coming to get married in historic UK? Are you targeting Uk brides planning to be married abroad? Are you targetting people who want a vintage-themed wedding, or an alternative wild wedding in the woods? Have you got a strong network of suppliers so you can demonstrate to couples that you can negotiate discounts (big enough to cover the cost of using you, and bigger than they could get if they spoke directly to the suppliers themselves)?

Good luck.