A Bride's Best Friend

Thanks to Rev. Tomkin Coleman  – a Minnesota wedding officiant – for his guest post about why day-of coordination for your wedding is a “must”! There are many reasons why you need a coordinator – but here’s some great examples from someone who often sees it all go down when there isn’t a coordinator in sight…

Why hire a wedding planner/wedding coordinator? Well, from my point of view, as an officiant who has performed hundreds of wedding ceremonies in the Minneapolis and St Paul metro area, it can make a huge difference. Asking friends or relatives to help out doesn’t work that well – it’s really too much responsibility to ask of a loved one, and once the big day comes, they would much rather be spending the time with you socially and spend the time with everyone else, as well.

Let’s say the cake doesn’t show up (yeesh!) It’s so nice to have a professional who, first of all, noticed that it was missing, and then had the contacts to either get the baker to fix the situation, or get another cake there somehow, some way. That’s not the kind of thing just anyone can handle – you want someone who is really experienced, knows what they’re doing, and isn’t distracted by family dynamics or by old friends they’d really like to see.

When a couple doesn’t have a wedding coordinator, it’s all too easy for guests or attendants to ask the bride what she wants, which can be an appropriate question in the days leading up to the wedding, but on her wedding day, she just wants to enjoy the day, not deal with responsibility.

Here’s one story, from my experience as a Minnesota Wedding Officiant – a couple had their wedding reception at a hall that doesn’t usually host weddings, and everything was going fine, until the cake was served and the guests realized they didn’t have any forks. The forks that were used for dinner were already gone when the caterer left, and so suddenly there wasn’t anything to eat the cake with. Without a wedding coordinator, the mother of the bride had to rush around and get forks, right in the middle of her daughter’s wedding reception, but if they had a coordinator, she would have not only been able to get emergency forks (as it were), but would have seen the situation come up ahead of time and no one would have ever known about the mix-up.

Every wedding is unique, and so unique situations show up at every reception that couldn’t be anticipated weeks ahead of time – and it’s these things that can’t be anticipated that is what a coordinator is especially good at.