Day-of coordinator found! Patty Lee of 8events
I think anybody that knows me knows I’m high strung and totally neurotic. This whole wedding planning business has been stressing me out like nothing else; I can’t imagine the insanity I’d fall into on my wedding day. Knowing this, I made an effort to seek out someone to do day-of coordination. A day-of coordinator (DOC) basically makes sure everything runs smoothly on your wedding, organizing your wedding day schedule and dealing with your contracted vendors. They’re supposed to let the couple enjoy the day instead of worrying about small things or mishaps. There’s no way I could afford an all-out wedding planner (plans your wedding, deals with vendors, etc.), so a DOC seemed the way to go.
Though I started my search in October, I didn’t meet Patty Lee until last week. I was iffy about the ones I met in October, so I looked on Project Wedding for reviews on coordinators. 8events (Patty’s company) had a handful of reviews, half of which were for her floral arrangements. She has positive reviews on Project Wedding and Yelp for her flower work, but someone also praised her wedding planning. I contacted her, and we met up last week at a Starbucks in Sunnyvale.
Patty is very friendly and cute and has a slightly FOB-y accent, and she’s fairly organized. She showed up with an agreement/proposal that listed down all the day-of services, which also included rehearsal coordination. She had example schedules with her from an upcoming wedding she was working on. Her head seemed on pretty straight, so I felt confident that she’s capable of doing the job. She also earned bonus points for being Taiwanese. I wanted a Chinese coordinator to help with all the cultural stuff, and she seemed very familiar with Taiwanese wedding traditions and wedding games. The prices for her coordination services are incredibly reasonable, which is admittedly is the main reason I wanted to hire her. I’m just glad I happen to like her. She also didn’t laugh at my silly, little budget.
Since most of her online reviews were for her floral work, I also asked her about florist services, and she also talked to me about flower options. She was good about answering questions, and she was totally cool with my budget. I mean, I told her my original flower budget, and she actually told me that was plenty! My flower budget is smaller than most other florists’ minimum requirements! Since I know absolutely nothing about flowers, she said she would email me a proposal based off my color scheme and budget.
I liked her based off our meeting. Kelvin was okay with her, but considering how Kelvin is, that’s already a pretty good start. She emailed a proposal a couple days later, but I told her I only wanted to sign for DOC until I take a look at more florists. Her contract is a bit on the “casual” side, but she was good about clarifying points and making changes that I requested. She became our second vendor in our wedding search this week. In terms of DOC, she still seems a little rough around the edges, and she’s not getting certified until June (not necessary, but good for resume). She does have a bunch of weddings she’s working on before mine (including one at Hakone), so she’ll be certified and more experienced by the time wedding comes around (I hope!). She answers emails within a day, which is decent considering this is not her full-time job. She’s also a good option for florist, as she’s inexpensive, already reserved for my day, and is one less vendor to deal with.
As I said, I started looking for coordinators in October. I figured the earlier the better, since I could bug them with wedding planning questions as soon as I signed one on. The one we were previously closest to considering was Amy from Amy’s Wedding & Events. She’s a Cantonese girl who seems a bit more on the quiet side, so communication didn’t seem as strong with her. However, she was very organized and professional (the most out of the three people we saw), and she was not at all annoying. She was also very good about not balking at my budget; I felt fairly comfortable with her. I basically didn’t sign her because of price. Compared to other coordinators with her credentials, she was fairly inexpensive since she only had a year in the biz, but it was still more than I was hoping to pay for my not-that-big wedding. Kelvin was also fairly okay with her.
The second coordinator we saw… I’m not going to name because we don’t really have anything good to say about her. I thought we would have more in common, and she seemed nice in online chat. She was nice in person and all, but when we met, there was pretty much no chemistry. Her experience seemed about the same as Amy’s, but she was charging much more and I didn’t understand why. She was unprepared; she showed up with nothing with her except a notebook. There were no papers or pamphlets describing her services. And she cringed at hearing our budget. It’s like the number scared her or something. She kept asking if there’s anyway we could add more to the budget, and she kept emphasizing “you get what you pay for”. She was also focused on her full wedding planning services, and she pretty much shrugged off the DOC services we were mainly interested in. I was under the impression she was just interested in spending other people’s money to make some fantasy wedding. Needless to say, Kelvin didn’t like this one.
Side rant about her…
[spoiler]At the end of our meeting, we waited for her husband to pick her up, and she explained her car situation. She said they woke up one morning, and the tires had been stolen from her husband’s car. So, his car was in the shop at the moment, and he was driving her car. She went on to complain about how slow 911 is. She said she called 911 about the stolen tires, and she was put on hold for 10 minutes. “10 minutes! Can you believe that? Somebody could have died!” Yes, well, no shit. That’s cuz people like you are hogging up emergency lines with your trivial bullshit. Your husband’s ricer’s tires were stolen hours ago… honestly, what’s 911 going to do for you? Ugh.[/spoiler]
Anna’s coworker recommended Dream It Events, but I shrugged off the suggestion for a couple months because I was looking for someone Chinese (plus I didn’t feel like talking to more DOCs anymore). A couple months later, I realized the Chinese thing wasn’t that important; I could bug family for that sort of stuff. Dream It Events also got rave reviews on several wedding sites and Yelp, and they include two coordinators for pretty much the price of one coordinator, which is great. Alas, I held off too long, and they were already booked for my day. This further stressed me, as I realized my time was running out as people we being booked. After more searching, I finally found Patty, and now I’m set with a DOC. I look forward to harassing her over email :P
New thing I learned today: One Chinese tradition is to have a young boy sleep in the wedding bed the night before the wedding night. This is supposed bring fertility to the couple and encourage the conception of a boy. This custom is often done in modern weddings by getting a little boy to jump or roll around on the bed before the wedding night.
