Corporate Event Planning - Be, Be, Be Prepared
by Matt Berkley
The thought of planning a company-held party is enough to make even the most upbeat business owners cringe, and for good reason. The parties your company holds are a reflection on where your business is professionally. Stale toasted ravioli and watered down cocktails aren’t going to achieve the good impression you’re hoping to create. Fortunately, this is a landmine that can be sidestepped. Hiring a professional planner to organize your next event can save you a lot of trouble. Here are a few reasons why:
Hiring a party planner can save you and your company a lot of time. Do you really want you or your employees spending business hours thumbing through the yellow pages and haggling with caterers? Julie Greenspoon-Kelly, founder of Destination St. Louis Inc., a local event planning company, knows firsthand how much time is involved in organizing a successful party. In addition to working with hundreds of small businesses, her crew has organized events for The Boeing Company, Nestle, Enterprise Rent-A-Car and Anheuser-Busch. She says, “Events of any size can be very time consuming to plan. Event planning is all logistics and details. If you have to create the wheel for every event, it is not going to be as efficient as using an event planner.”
Party planners can save you money. Even moderate affairs can have business owners digging deep into their pockets. (You didn’t think that fancy ice sculpture was going to be cheap, did you?) A good planner can help cut your costs to the minimum without sacrificing quality. Dealing with event suppliers on a regular basis, they know what discounts are available and how to negotiate on your behalf. They also help smooth over problems with tricky issues like permit requirements and local zoning regulations.
They can take care of the little details. One of the make or break things for a successful party is attention to the finer points that are often overlooked. Planners tackle these seemingly insignificant niceties head on because they know how important they are to your event. Kelly says her team organizes, among other things, registration desk personnel, entertainment, florals, linens, décor, transportation and off-site event planning. “During the Men’s Final Four in March, we handled more than 20 corporate clients plus the shuttle, which was a monster all by itself. It was an incredible number of details to keep track of and pull off, and we did it and had fun doing it.”
The pressure is off of you. After sitting down with you for a consultation, all the worries of setting up the venue and negotiating with the entertainment and suppliers get put in their inbox. Event planners make it their job to provide you with a memorable party experience, not the frustrating experience of planning the event.
They can open new doors. Planners know a lot about local party venues. By taking on a planner you’re also getting access to their contacts. They can often gain access to locations you wouldn’t dream of. Kelly says, “We spend our days planning events and know nearly every vendor and venue in the city. We are truly the experts when it comes to events, so our experiences become our clients’ experiences. There are no surprises.” As the owner of Global Event Solutions, a St. Louis-based consulting firm, Julie Meyer strives to get her clients the best possible options when planning their events. She says, “When you organize events without a professional planner, you may not realize all the additional industry resources you had at your disposal that could have been a better option for your event.”
Planners work with you. They shape each event to meet your vision. Meyer notes that in addition to managing an event from start to finish, her company also offers “temporary firepower” to supplement the needs of a company’s existent team. She says, “We become an integral part of their planning team and support them in achieving their stated goals. People know when they need extra help for a party and just may want you to help with that particular part of the program.”
No event is too small to be handled professionally. Kelly says that she doesn’t mean to sound arrogant when she states, “An event is ‘big enough’ to call for outside help when you are ready to have it done efficiently.”
Paul Nix, vice president of Sales for Premier Rentals, agrees that it’s imperative to hire professionals in order to get the right message across. He says, “Any size event can use outside help. Remember, event planners are professionals. They know the latest trends, provide dependable resources and have learned from and keep the novice from making common mistakes. Why take a chance on your event failing? For a small amount of money you can almost guarantee success by having a professional on board.”
Make a good impression. “In my mind, events are truly the lifeblood of an organization in a lot of ways,” says Meyer. If your party stinks, it sends a bad message to your employees and everyone else in attendance. Why should they be excited to work at a company that doesn’t take its events seriously? Meyer expands on the importance of quality shindigs, “Events are critical to every aspect of a healthy organization because they motivate, inspire and encourage the company’s employees to reach new heights as a team.”
Shopping For An Event Planner—What Should I Look For?
Experience: Corporate functions are much different than social ones. Make sure they’ve handled similar parties and they can provide you with the services you’re looking for.
References: Ask your colleagues which planners they’ve enjoyed working with. Recall parties you were impressed with and track down their coordinators.
Good Communication: If they don’t respond to you in a timely manner when you first make contact, how dependable are they going to be once the job gets started?
Superior Options: Planners need to be well informed on the latest trends in their industry. As a result, they can give you a wide array of choices to add style to your party without draining your bank account.
Detail-Oriented: Don’t hire someone who’s simply going to show up and watch over the hot plates. Ask them plenty of questions about their services and how they can give your event some extra panache.
Contingency Plans: Don’t depend on a one-man operation. You need to be sure that if something happens to your planner a backup will be ready to take over.
Post a comment