Wedding Planner vs. Venue Coordinator
What are the differences?
This is a big one. A lot of couples question when they start planning their wedding. So, you are now engaged, congratulations! One of the first things you do as a newly engaged couple is schedule your wedding date and book your wedding venue. YAY! Most likely the venue you booked includes a venue coordinator for the day of your wedding. Sounds great right!? And it sure is great but understand that a venue coordinator is very different from a wedding planner. It may sound the same, but there are BIG differences here. Let me help differentiate these titles for you so that you are more familiar when planning your big day.
A Wedding Planner is hired by YOU!
The venue coordinators job is a very important role, nonetheless. The biggest difference is that the venue coordinator is onsite to manage and ensure that everything is going well with the couple regarding the venue.
The wedding planner is hired by YOU and in contact with you throughout the entire planning process; which includes vendor communication, structuring and building a detailed wedding timeline, confirming rental and vendor arrangements, and much more.
A Wedding Planner is aware of each vendor, contracts, and commitments.
A great wedding planner is usually involved at least three months prior to your wedding. At that point, we typically would review all your contracts and get VERY familiar with each vendor, what they are providing, and what time each vendor plans to be on site. All these things are necessary to create the detailed timeline to ensure a smooth flow of your wedding day. A venue coordinator is aware of most of these things but a wedding planner will know all the ins and outs of every detail, as we are the ones preparing your detailed timeline which evolves around every one of these details.
A Wedding Planner is proactive and solves problems.
As a wedding planner our initial reaction when seeing potential issues is to help and solve it! We have your back through and through. We are also there with you in the beginning of the day, ensuring that everything is going well with you while you are getting ready, confirming transportation arrangements, making sure that your escort cards are set up for your guests arrival, all the small things that aren’t necessarily assigned to a vendor on your wedding day. A venue coordinator does some amazing things as well, as they are there to ensure that all of the venue commitments are fulfilled. As a wedding planner, we are committed to being there for you every step of the way.
Talk through your options!
These are just a few differences that can give you some insight when deciding to hire a wedding planner to be by your side throughout your planning process. Regardless of the differences, these two professionals should work seamlessly together as they are ultimately committed to making your day as seamless as possible. As a wedding planner, these few reasons can provide you with some knowledge on reasons to hire a professional to help you with your planning.
