Supplier’s Rating: Special Events by the Planner

Dear Online Diary,

Before we met Ms. Love and Ms. Beth, I’ve been reading a lot of not-so-good feedback from their previous W@Wie and GTalker brides. Thanks to their valuable suggestions and payo, we were able to design an all important game plan.

On the day of our first meeting, Ms. Beth went ahead and explained their OTD package – the inclusion, the freebies, the plan, requirements et al. I like the inclusion. It seemed promising especially since both of our families aren’t too wedding savvy. We will need their expertise on the day (since I’m pretty much ok on being a hands-on bride, I need trusted people to execute our wedding vision).

After the meeting, Ms. Beth sent a handful of wedding planning excel files for me to complete and send back to them. The files are structured and I can’t figure out how to complete most of them. Eventually, I only sent the Guestbook file back to Ms. Love (sorry, I did not care about the other files, hehehe).

How did they fair? Let’s see… Before the wedding and after the files were sent, there was no initiative coming from their end. I was told that Ms. Beth went back to Singapore so Ms. Love will handle my concerns there after. I was a bit of insecure especially because I read posts of other brides sharing about how helpful their OTD coordinators are, even if their weddings will be a couple of months or a year after. I wished they are like that.

There was an instance that I sent an email to Ms. Love requesting for a meeting a month before our wedding but my request was denied because according to her, they have a busy schedule but she offered to help me via email. That was it. I sent another request two weeks prior to our wedding and this time, I asked them to prioritize me as well since our wedding is fast approaching and they haven’t had a single clue what I want for a wedding. Well, it worked since we were able to set a meeting with Ms. Love (Ms. Beth was still out-of-the country by that time). Simply put, the contracts and wedding-related information were endorsed to Ms. Love less than two weeks before the wedding. This is partly my fault because I also have a busy schedule. :)

Fast forward to our wedding day…

As soon as we checked-in to the hotel, I sent our hotel room numbers to Ms. Love via text message so she could inform all our suppliers. Unfortunately, not everyone was informed because two of our major suppliers sent a text message that morning asking for our hotel room numbers. Medyo nakakahiya so I texted Ms. Love about it. She assured me naman that she will resend the information to the concern suppliers.

Going further, they arrived at the hotel next to Mama Val’s team. I sighed with relief as soon as I saw Ms. Beth and Ms. Love (since most of their previous brides suggested that the wedding will turn out great if both Ms. Beth and Ms. Love will lead their team) and immediately endorsed all our DIY projects and wedding items.

Ms. Kaye was assigned to be my assistant. I only have good praises to her because she’s hard-working, patient and talagang mabait. She did a great job being my assistant even when she was under the weather – she was always ready to hand a tissue whenever needed. She kept me calm the whole time we were traveling from the hotel to the church especially when I was waiting inside the bridal van and everyone else was inside the church minutes before I walk down the aisle. Believe me, it was nerve-wracking but she has this "calming aura" I just can’t explain. She also dressed up my mom (aka "momzilla"), who was very frantic about her gown. I know you've heard about brides turning bridezilla. Our case is different, for all the good reasons (no thanks to that good-for-nothing mananahi in divi). I’m really thankful to Ms. Kaye for being patient with my mom. :)

Ms. Beth and Ms. Love are the team to beat. Ms. Beth was not feeling well but she showed up, which we truly appreciate. Together, they managed our wedding pretty well. I practically felt zero stress the whole time (save for some things that they have no control).

{Special Events by the Planner at work}

However, there are a couple of not-so-good things worth sharing. Aside from Ms. Kaye, Ms. Beth and Ms. Love, the team is pretty much inexperienced. Hubby said he and his family weren’t happy at the hotel preps because no one was looking after them or at least update them of what to do.

At the church, Ms. Kaye was the only one left to manage everything so she had to leave me unattended to check on something.

At the reception, the seating arrangement weren’t followed accordingly. Upon reviewing the photos, I saw that some people were not with the proper group. Too bad, we plan to send copies to each families and group of people as gratitude for attending our wedding.

Here's our rating:
Supplier: Special Events by the Planner
Stress Level: tama lang
Customer Service and Satisfaction: tama lang. You can always reach Ms. Love through her mobile number. They are hardworking on the day of the wedding. Just short of experience (for some team members) and no initiative to follow up on me during the planning.
Overall: Still recommended (just like what their previous brides mentioned, make sure you'll have Ms. Love and/or Ms. Beth on your wedding) :)

X.O.X.O.,