| NUMBER ONE BEST TIP FOR YOUR READY ROOM |
With all the excitement of the wedding day, what is the best tip I can offer? Well, I will base this on an experience of a bride from several years ago. When she heard of this suggestion of what not to bring in the ready room, she readily agreed! She made this her rule and asked that it be enforced!
On the day of her wedding, she was so happy to let just about anyone in the room where she was getting ready. It was a very large room at this venue. It had 3 tables with mirrors and little benches. It also had 2 full length mirrors and two dressing screens, (this venue really thought about everything) for the bride and her “maids ” to get ready. She was getting ready, and so were all six of her ladies. They were nearly all ready and some photographs were going to be taken before the ceremony of the bride, her family, the ladies, the men and of me and the bride, the photographer and the bride and more so she had to be ready about 2 hours before the ceremony.
Everything was going great. Her sister was in the wedding party and she brought in her son who was a little over a year into the room with everyone. Their father came in all dressed, once he heard everyone was mostly dressed. He took off his jacket, hung it over the chair, walked over to the couch and picked up his grandson, sat down and put him on his lap. Everyone was so happy and chatting away, all looked good. — So what was the big rule? The rule is no drinks with any color in them. – No coke, no cherry Pepsi, No cool- aid, no Gatorade, except the clear kind. It was said to everyone, if you need something to drink, bring water. Everyone should have their own water bottle. And everyone did. Except the bride’s nephew, he had juice in his sippy cup. It was red juice! The little boy took a big sip, held it in his mouth, opened his mouth and spat all the juice on grandpa’s clean white shirt! His tuxedo shirt. A matched shirt, that matched the entire wedding party. Everyone just looked at the mess and went “Oh no,” What do we do??? I immediately went into action. I asked the father to carefully remove his shirt. I got on the phone to one of several cleaners I called. I stated I had an emergency with a shirt and red juice. One of the cleaners agreed to do it and stated his fee. I had the brides credit card on file and had it with me so I could charge the cleaning to her. I contacted someone in my office to come to the venue, pick up the shirt and take it to the cleaners. I was told it would be done in an hour. My staff stayed in the area and once an hour had passed, she went back and the shirt was just being pressed and ready for bagging. It was absolutely clean! She drove the shirt to the wedding, the father put it on got dressed and was ready for about the last 8 poses from the photographer. Then after the ceremony they created special photos with the father. I didn’t tell anyone about the “hic-up” we had 2 hours before the ceremony. If any of the guests found out about it, it wasn’t from me or my staff.
So now you know what emergency can come up on your wedding day and why the wedding planner needs to have a credit card from you to pay for incidentals that come up. The bride later said how grateful she was that all of this could be taken care of. — Had the wedding been out in the country, or the nearest cleaner was a 30 minute drive (and I do have venues where that is true) then we could have not provided this service. Maybe you should rent 2 or 3 more shirts, in case you have a problem like this come up at your wedding. Just a thought! Thanks for reading. God Bless!