I was just told that we have a new bride for the beginning of the summer which is exciting! We are meeting with the vendor this week- a great winery here in OKC.

Last year, I created a 6 page checklist to ensure that we have all the information needed when planning a wedding after we had a big mishap. The bride was not aware that it was her job to retrieve the wedding license at the court house, so even matters of business that do not have to do with the planner is on the checklist.

I will conduct a meeting later in the week to get all the information from the bride. It is exciting because local Oklahoma bridal magazines like to feature brides. I will ask the bride if she would like this option. If so, I get to create a press release for her wedding to send to the magazines!

This week we are heading to Dallas on Friday to meet with a decorator for the November show. I will spend the next day or so fixing up some press material- creating flyers and informational material.

Hopefully the decorator will want to come do the show for us. We found someone who wants to start a market here in Oklahoma, and we thought this would be a great way for him to display his work to the vendors.

Keep your fingers crossed!

We are trying to confirm a date for the show. The venue said it should be confirmed by Monday.

This week, my boss is on a business trip collecting fabulous information! However, school kept me here in Norman. My job is to go through the vendor list... all 600 names... and make sure all have e-mail addresses attached to them. Then proceed to put these e-mails into the company contact list. It should be very exciting... and my hands might fall off by the end of the week.

From here, we will be able to send out Save the Date cards starting in the beginning of March. We will have a contracted venue as well as a confirmed date by the end of next week, which is the same time we will make a trip to Dallas.

We are going to talk to a decorator who is interested in doing the decor for the show. We have become obsessed with the color magenta.

The Show!

It is exciting to make progress on planning the bridal show for November.

Once we have a finalized date- I'll let you know.

As of now, I am starting to create promotional material to send out. First off, my boss wants me to create referral cards for our vendors. We have visited a couple of places that have given us their referral cards to give to our clients, so we plan to create the same type of thing. From this, we will be able to assess where our business will be coming from.

Also, I will be creating the promotional material for the show. To start, we will create the "Save the Date" card to give to vendors as well as a list of the new things we plan to offer at this show.

My boss was listing off her pet peeves at wedding shows, and the problems seem to be easy things to fix. We are hoping to have a show that will stand out above the rest. Once our plans are finalized, I will spill it all out. Yet, since everything is still in the planning process, I need to keep hush hush.

By the way, creating media lists are not fun. Even though PR reps are often the people who get the story to the reporter- they still don't like us. :(

Snowed in!

Last week ended with ice and snow which has kept me in Norman.

Thankfully last week I was given a lot of tasks I could do at home.

We sent out Christmas invitations to a party as well as holiday cards at the end of 2009. From those, we received a good chunk of them back because the address was not correct. I have been going through our vendor list (over 600 names) to make sure there are no holes in our information as well as correcting the addresses on the letters sent back to us. This way, we will be prepared whenever we send out invites to a pre-bridal show cocktail party.

We have confirmed a couple sponsors and found the space for the show. Thankfully we have moved the show to November. This way, we will be able to promote and advertise effectually. We are now brainstorming for a theme. One of the sponsors are willing to make it an annual show if we are successful.

I also addressed 200 letters to brides from a list we received from one of the magazines we subscribe to. It is strange to think of costs such as labels and stamps. It is something I had not thought about before I worked here- the costs add up whenever you own your own business. I am happy that I am getting a dose of reality.