Wedding Planner VS Day Of Coordinator

We think everyone can agree that planning a wedding is a lot.  And it’s okay if wedding planning is something that stresses you out and makes your head spin!  It’s also totally awesome if you love wedding planning, and plan every last detail, but need a little help executing everything on the wedding day.  We’ve worked plenty of weddings without any outside assistance, weddings with day of coordinators, and weddings with full on wedding planners, and we’ve learned a lot from all these experiences.  

What’s main thing we’ve learned?  At bare minimum, every single wedding should have at least a day of coordinator!  The weddings who didn’t have any outside help at all were hands down more chaotic, tend to run behind schedule, and the bride/groom or family members usually get stuck handling technical things a majority of the day.

How do you know if you would benefit more from a wedding planner or a day of coordinator?  What’s the difference between the two? 

We had a really phenomenal conversation with Heather from Runway Events, an Event Planning, Floral Design and Styling company based in Orlando, FL.  I’m going to link to our podcast with her, but I’ll also summarize it in case you prefer to read.

The Iz and Liv Podcast - Runway Events - Wedding Planners are a MUST!

Let’s Talk about a Day-Of Coordinator

A day of coordinator is someone who will take ALLL of the hard work that you planned and prepared for, and execute it.  

If you don’t have one, you won’t be able to be in the moment and enjoy your wedding day, with your family and friends.  You’ll be so worried trying to make sure that your vision that you spent so much time on is coming together perfectly. 

What generally is the process of hiring a day of coordinator? 

Every company is probably different, but for example purposes, Runway Events starts Day-of Coordinator services 2 months before the wedding date, they’ll take all of your vendor contracts, review all the details of the day, look at your inspiration photos, and have a super in depth consultation.  At that point, they take over talking all of the logistics with vendors, provide timelines, coordinate arrival/departure times with the vendors, answer questions, create floor plans, etc.

Let’s Talk About a Full Wedding Planner

There isn’t too much to say to describe what it’s like hiring a full wedding planner. Heather from Runway Events put it perfectly when she said: “The minute you’re ready to book, the wedding planner or company takes the reins and starts the wedding planning process.” They take care of just about everything!

What generally is the process of hiring a day of coordinator? 

This service is perfect for couples or brides who are super busy and have an idea of what they want but don’t care to deal with all the little details, or who just don’t have the time to take care of all the little details.

The Realest Question: Cost??

While we don’t ask other vendors exactly what they charge, Heather did disclose that obviously a full wedding planning service is going to cost more than a day of coordinator service.

HOWEVER! She mentioned a huge benefit that we never even thought would be a benefit when working with a wedding planning/day of coordinator company. You ready for it?

Discounts!!

Yes, you read that right! A wedding planning company is going to have a list of preferred and recommended vendors. Vendors they’ve worked with, and can vouch for. Why is that important? Because these vendors know how amazing it is to work with the wedding planning company, and will often times offer discounts to couples who book with them through the wedding planning company!

Yes, you can end up SAVING by investing in working with a company that’s going to make your life a million times easier, and make all of your vendors super happy too! Sounds like a win-win-win to me!