You could not be more excited to open up your wedding planning business. Or maybe you already have! And you’ve been loving the clients you get to work with. Not to mention it’s a great feeling to be your own boss. “This is the life,” you think to yourself.

But then, you also can’t ignore an underlying feeling of overwhelm and dread, knowing that you’re kind of on your last thread with the number of weddings you need to work.

While overwhelm can happen for many, many reasons (all of which I talk a ton about on this blog and my podcast), one of the most common culprits I see with relatively newer wedding planners boils down to one simple thing: they’re offering too much. Specifically, they’re still offering day-of wedding coordination — and offering this service isn’t how to grow a wedding planning business.

If you’re still offering day-of planning and in disbelief right now, let me start off by saying I’ve been in your shoes before! When I first started Blush, my wedding planning company, I offered day-of wedding planning (and actually until about 18 months ago!). I thought it was a great idea to get some quick, extra income. But there are several reasons why this is hindering you from growing your wedding planning business. (And a life you love!) Let’s get into the reasons why that is.

Why day-of coordination shouldn’t be a thing

First, let’s go over why day-of coordination shouldn’t be a thing. We’ll talk about the two most common reasons I know this type of service won’t be the best route to go if you want to grow your wedding business.

Being a day-of coordinator essentially means you’re working with stranger

While other, longer-time-commitment offerings leave you more time to get to know your clients on a deeper, more personal level, when you work with a day-of client, you don’t get to make that genuine connection.

Plus, dropping into wedding planning and execution just a few weeks before someone’s wedding, trying to handle all the details they’ve already spent months (or even years) planning is just a recipe for insane stress and eventual burnout.

You already know how much time, effort, and energy goes into planning a gorgeous wedding you and your clients will be happy with. Ultimately, you’ll want to make sure you have plenty of time to execute their preferences, dreams, visions, reflect their personalities, and achieve their goals — all without sacrificing your mental health.

You don’t get to charge what you’re worth

We know one of the main attractions for hiring a day-of coordinator is their price point. A $500 wedding planner is going to be much less intimidating than a $3,000 wedding planner at first glance to a client.

But, as I will repeat over and over until I retire (and probably beyond), you deserve to charge what you’re worth — and no price point is worth sacrificing your sanity.

Day-of coordinators face a ton of obstacles, and to create a sustainable business (and life!), you’re better off charging enough, so you can achieve all the other things you want to achieve in your business. Whether that means taking more time off, outsourcing, or hiring more team members, having a price point that encompasses your value is so important.

So while it may be a convenient way to get extra income in the short run, the cost just isn’t worth it in the long run.

What should you do instead of offering day-of wedding planning?

So, what should you be offering or focusing your energy on if you’re not offering wedding day-of coordination? Wedding management and/or full-service planning!

It’s with these services that you can achieve pretty much everything you can’t with day-of planning: creating a genuine connection with your clients, charging what you’re worth, and mitigating the overwhelm of having a tight deadline.

For example, at Blush, we offer both event management and full-service wedding planning. With these more comprehensive services, we’re able to provide a seamless and worry-free experience and double as our couples’ trusted partner as we plan the most important day of their life.

Example wedding planner process: what our process looks like at Blush

To give you a better idea of what the process could look like as a wedding planner instead of a day-of wedding coordinator, here’s what our process looks like at Blush.

Connect

First, we’ll go over expectations, get to know our clients’ and their partner to see if we’re the perfect fit on a complimentary discovery call.

Planning & Managing

Our clients can trust us to manage the details because we have plenty of time to plan everything. Plus, we can be their go-to gals when they have a question all throughout their months of planning.

Celebrate

Once their wedding day arrives, we’ll have had enough time to make sure everything should run smoothly! During the actual wedding, we can focus on timeline and flow rather than trying to fix disasters that could’ve been avoided with ample time.

Final thoughts

Hopefully, this helped you get a better idea about why you should quit offering day-of wedding planning and focus more on your comprehensive services, such as wedding management or full-service wedding planning. Your time is valuable, so make this the year you start charging what you’re worth and reduce the overwhelm in your life!