Tag Archive for: partial wedding planning

I’ve postponed my wedding due to Covid-19 – now what?

Our hearts go out to all of the couples who have made the decision to postpone their destination wedding in France because of Covid-19. Many couples have the weight of changing their date, and all of the work that represents, solely on their shoulders. This can add to the stress of an already stressful situation!

You might not have thought about having a full-service wedding planner as part of your vendor team because you planned to do much of the work yourself, and perhaps for budgetary reasons. It’s true that we’re best known for our Full Wedding Planning services, however we do offer a variety of Partial Planning services depending on your needs. We also are happy to announce a new offer, in response to the couples who have had to postpone their date.

Here’s a quick recap of our Partial Wedding Planning services:

Planning Support
Hourly packages (1/3/5 hours) which provides access our expertise in wedding planning. We discuss your planning concerns and offer best practices and vendor recommendations. Our hourly planning support can also be used to conduct research, request and review quotes and manage vendor communication. From 300€ per hour.

Month-of Coordination
This service starts 30 days out from your wedding date and allows you to hand off the project to an experienced coordinator. We review the schedule of the day – or help you create one – and double check all of the vendors and services that have been booked. On the wedding day, a team of coordinators will be on site to oversee that all goes according to plan, freeing you up to be fully present with your friends and family. From 3500€.

New! Postponed Wedding Support
This service is for any couple who has postponed to a later date, whether it’s a Fall 2020 wedding or a 2021 wedding. We provide support and guidance as you update your vendors due to the date change, help put into place any vendors not yet contracted or find replacements for any who are not available on the new date, set the logistics plan and orchestrate the on-site coordination so you can fully enjoy your day. Contact us for more information!

How to plan a wedding in the uncertain times of Covid-19

Many countries around the world are more than a month into confinement, and it seems that it’s having the desired effect of flattening the curve. We can be cautiously optimistic but the reality is that it will still be a little while before things are “back to normal”.

We’re still facing a lot of uncertainty, but couples who make it through confinement are coming out even stronger. And if the trend we’re seeing in China holds true for the rest of the world, 2021 is shaping up to be a particularly busy year for weddings.

We’ve shared some advice on postponing your wedding and while some couples have opted to shift their date to later in 2020 or even 2021, there are still some couples who are holding out hope that they will be able to maintain their late summer wedding as planned.

We wanted to share some additional advice on planning your wedding amidst the ongoing crisis. Our recommendations come from having 14 years of wedding planning to our credit, but since every situation is unique, only you can know the right decision for your celebration.

Holding out hope for a 2020 wedding

We completely understand if you’re holding out hope for your original 2020 date. Many countries are expecting encouraging news in May, which will give more visibility on when businesses will be able to open to the public, and when international travel will be allowed.

The advice we’re giving to couples in this situation is to set a deadline of at least 2 months out in order to give yourself (and your planner) enough time to get the rest of the planning finalized, and your guests enough time to arrange their travel.

Postponing to a 2021 wedding

If you’ve made the decision to postpone your wedding to 2021, you’ve likely already made a majority of the design and vendor decisions. Most vendors are applying deposits to the new date and are not charging change fees. However, if you’ve already set the design but decide to go in a completely new direction, there may be a cost for the extra work. Along with shoring up the new date with your previously booked venue and vendors, you’ll also want to get any other remaining vendors secured for the new date.

Planning for a 2021 wedding

The majority of our postponed weddings are being shifted to 2021, mostly into May and June. So if you have your heart set on a weekend wedding in Spring/Summer 2021, we encourage you to get the planning started as soon as possible.

The first step of planning your wedding is getting the venue and date set. With the expected swell of couples for 2021 and the current international travel restrictions, we’re encouraging couples to think a bit differently about venue search and selection. In-person visits may not be possible in the immediate term, so consider doing a virtual/video tour with your top picks to get a feel for the spaces before booking.

If planning site visits is an essential part of your wedding planning experience, this will likely push your decision date out. In order to increase your chances of booking in your preferred month we recommend considering a weekday wedding. As celebrated event designer David Beahm noted in a recent Harper’s Bazaar article, “Perhaps Wednesday weddings are going to be the new thing for a while, and there’s nothing wrong with that.”

Weekend, Wednesday or any other day of the week, we offer different levels of support depending on your planning needs. We would love to hear about your vision for your day and see how we can help with your plans!

 

What wedding planning services do you need?

If you’re in the beginning stages of research for your wedding, you may be wondering what wedding planning services you need. Here at Fête in France we break out our services into two categories: Full Planning services and Partial Planning services.

Full Planning services

Are you looking for an experienced professional to help you navigate the entire wedding planning process, from start to finish? Then Full Planning services are for you. These services generally include venue search and booking assistance, but may also start after your venue and date have been set.

With Full Planning services, you benefit from our expert insight from day 1 to the big day. Our Full Planning services allow you to be the executive decision maker, ensuring that the wedding is a true reflection of who you are as a couple, and our role is to project manage, keeping an eye on timelines, budgets and the overall cohesiveness of the events.

We break out Full Planning services into three phases: Design, Planning & Vendor Management, Event Coordination

We start the Design phase by discussing in detail the ambiance and atmosphere you’d like to create for your day. We also review any inspiration images you have already collected, and add additional ideas to round out the initial design. We rely not only on your wedding inspiration images, but also your interests and hobbies, family heritage, and any other element to make the event as personal as possible. We also discuss the flow of the day, to ensure that your experience on the day is as seamless as possible.

Once the design direction has been set, we shift into the Planning & Vendor Management phase. In addition to providing general advice and best practices, an important part our role is to streamline the time-consuming tasks of research and vendor communication. We offer curated suggestions based on the design direction and conduct all additional research needed to unearth the hidden gems to make your wedding a memorable experience.

The final phase is Event Coordination which means that we’ve made it to the big day! Our team of coordinators are on site to oversee vendor deliveries and setup, and ensure that all goes according to our carefully constructed logistics plan. Having a well-thought-out schedule is one of Fête in France’s strengths, and clients and vendors alike appreciate how on point our timings are. A solid and well-communicated plan is also essential because the more you plan for upstream, the more space it creates to tackle the inevitable unforseen situations that pop up during an event.

Partial Planning services

Not all couples need or have the budget for Full Planning services, so we also offer a selection of Partial Planning services. Below are a few of our most popular Partial Planning offers:

Venue Search: Accompany you through the venue search and selection process, including a scouting trip of 2-3 days to visit short-listed venues.

Planning Support: Hourly packages (1/3/5 hours) which provides access our expertise in wedding planning. We discuss your planning concerns and offer best practices and vendor recommendations. Our hourly planning support can also be used to conduct research, request and review quotes and manage vendor communication.

Month-of Coordination: This service starts 30 days out from your wedding date and allows you to hand off the project to an experienced coordinator. We review the schedule of the day – or help you create one – and double check all of the vendors and services that have been booked. On the wedding day, a team of coordinators will be on site to oversee that all goes according to plan, freeing you up to be fully present with your friends and family.

What planning services do you need?

Contact us for an initial consultation to tell us about your vision for your day!