Day of Coordinator

ANGELA255

I am trying to decide if I should hire a day of coordinator.  I am getting married at Lakeway Resort.  They include a catering manager to help me the day of so I am trying to decide if I even need a DOC.  Do any of you have any advice?  Any DOC referrals are welcome too! Thanks.

texgal79

I just posted about this on the SB board, so I will re-post: We have one, and so far, I think it's fantastic and worth the extra $$. I've done quite a bit of work thus far on the design and details, and I am OCD to the point of changing the cake table from a 48" to 68" today with our rental company. But that day I just want to relax and not worry about doing anything. This could also be called lazy. I think it just depends on how much you are willing to do and how many hands you have available to help you with existing family/friends.  Some people luckily do have a lot of free "helpers". Also... I've seen lots of first-hand evidence of vendors going a little nutty contacting you the week of or the day of with questions or last-minute substitutions, crises and demands; I have no useful family to haul stuff/drop off stuff/organize/set up (my mother is the most useless of all); I don't want the wedding party to feel like hired help; we have multiple events that weekend as you do; and we have a ton of out-of-town guests with whom we want to be able to spend as much time as possible. We are having the ceremony and reception in the same place and doing a "flip", and the coordinator and her team will make that happen much more quickly than just the caterers. She's also taking care of the special things I want set out, like notes and flowers at each place setting and lanterns on the walkways, the guestbook, programs, etc. We don't have anyone else to do that stuff.

hildeedee

I would check with the catering manager and see what exactly they do. If they coordinate with your other vendors and help with timing, then you probably don't need a DOC. If they just make sure the food is set up properly, then I would suggest one for the reasons above.

I'm using Becky Sosa with Stress Free Events and she is very reasonable and seems to really know what she is doing.

mistyleon

I think it all depends on how much help you would like to have and how focused you want your help to be on you and your needs.  FI and I are getting married at the Four Seasons, which has a staff member dedicated to weddings/events, but we also live in Dallas (it looks like you might too), have pretty demanding jobs, and our families are both out of state so we aren't counting on them for much more than moral support on the wedding weekend.  So, we decided to hire a full service coordinator.  Some might say it's a total waste but I guess we are needy.   As far as the wedding weekend itself, we really liked the idea of being able to "attend" our wedding rather than being caught up in the details.  If the DOC fits within your budget and you think it will make your wedding weekend more stress free I wouldn't talk yourself out of it just based on the venue's catering manager.  I'm sure he/she is very attentive, but probably also has about a 100 weddings to focus on throughout the year.  As hildeedee pointed out, it also depends on exactly what your catering manager does beyond make sure that the food and certain aspects of the venue are set up properly.

kellster22

Kim at Austin Social butterfly. I say if you can afford it, let the DOC take on any problems and needs. Why have any added stress. Very affordable for day of services.

FromPenceToPrice

I used Rachel Stepanov of Buon Affaire Events and she was fabulous.  We only hired her for day-of coordination (even though our venue had an event planner) but she still handled things like geting final payments to vendors the week of the wedding, and confirming timing with everyone, things that I don't think a venue's coordiantor does.  When anything went wrong (like our towncar not showing up to take us from the church to the reception) she fixed it ASAP (her assistant gave us a ride, and she made sure we weren't charged for the car that picked us up from the reception and took us to the hotel).

jedaniel

I think if you are getting married at Lakeway Resort, they will handle everything for you.

Future Ramsey

We're using Becky Sosa too! She's very personable and has been super helpful so far. Her rate was definitely worth letting someone else care about all the details on the day of.

kiarrai77

I am just having my most type A friend help me as my DoC. She has a small background inplanning but mostly just there to handle all the things a hostest should.    And it is for free!

TXAnn

I'm getting married at Lakeway on Saturday (!!!) and would highly recommend getting a separate coordinator.  Our Lakeway contact has been very nice but also very unresponsive at times.  I feel like I need to follow up with multiple emails and phone calls sometimes... not fun.  Plus they will not help you follow up with all the vendors and be at your side to make sure everything goes smoothly.  They just deal with table set up, seating, food/drink details.

I'm using Rachel Stepanov and she has been a lifesaver in following up with Lakeway over and over and over again.  I've already told her multiple times that she is the best money I've spent on the wedding