Planner - Deianna Hamilton
- Business: Your Big Day ATL
- Location: Atlanta, Georgia GA
- Experience: 4 Years
- Profile: Your Big Day ATL
- Website: yourbigdayatl.net
1. Introduction: What's your story?
Hey!!! I'm Deianna Hamilton, founder and lead planner at Your Big Day ATL. I absolutely love what I do and can't believe my love for proposal videos led me where I'm at. My love for weddings started back in 2015 stumbling across an engagement video called "The Surprise Wedding", I watched that video and was obsessed with weddings and love stories ever since. I would watch engagement videos for fun and my mom encouraged me to see if I could get experience in the wedding industry to see if it's something I'd like to do. I love that she pushed me to do that because that led me to reach out to SO many local planners to see if they need interns and ended up landing an associate planner job with a wedding and event planning company. After my first wedding with the planner, I was hooked ever since. After a few wedding seasons, I decided to take a break from the industry and COVID hit shortly after. While finding things to do in quarantine, I decided to see about getting back into the industry but on my own this time and the rest is history.
2. What's your experience as a wedding planner? How many weddings have you planned?
I have been in the industry for over four years and have planned over 30 weddings under Your Big Day ATL after launching a little over a year.
3. What sorts of services do you offer (month-of coordination, full-service planning, or à la carte planning)?
I offer full-service planning, partial-service planning, 60 day facilitation, and design assistant add-ons for clients.
4. How do payments work (a percentage of the wedding budget, a flat fee etc.)? What are the different packages that you offer and which one is your most popular package?
I have a set price for each package and each package requires a deposit. Once deposits are made, I work with clients on scheduling the payments for the remaining amounts. As far as my packages, my partial-service planning with a design add-on addition is definitely my most popular package. It's exciting to see that clients are interested in having YBD ATL work on the visuals of the day because that when the creativity really starts. I love it!
5. Who else is in your team and how many people on your staff will be at the wedding?
I have an incredible team of girls who help on wedding days. It's usually myself and an assistant on wedding days, but I will hire additional team members if it's a larger wedding.
6. What happens if you're sick or otherwise unable to be there on the day of the wedding?
I always have another person assigned to my weddings just in the case of an emergency. My girls are an extension of me, so they can easily step in and execute on wedding days.
7. How many meetings will you have with the couple and how will they be involved?
I don't have set amount of meetings because I know emergencies come up and I don't want to limit my availability to clients during those times. I just require all meetings to be scheduled to respect everyones schedule. My clients are as involved as they want to be. This is their big day, so they're typically involved all aspects but I do have clients that are really just wanting to be "approvers" of everything and don't want to get into the weeds of planning. It really just varies by client.
8. Will you handle the invitations, from wording and ordering to the addressing and mailing? What about guest list coordination and RSVPs?
For my full-service clients, I will handle the ordering and wording of invitations. As far as addressing and guest list coordination, that varies based on clients and headcount of the wedding.
9. Do you handle rentals? Will you coordinate delivery, arrival and set up times with the photographer, the florist, the musicians and the caterer/banquet manager?
I do handle rentals and all vendor information from start to finish to ensure that process is seamless.
10. Can you create a timeline that tells everyone involved in the planning process (other pros, members of the wedding party, to-be-weds and families) what to do and when to do it? How will you make sure everyone sticks to the schedule?
Yes, all of my packages come with timeline creation that is a very detailed play by play of wedding days. I also manage sending it out to all vendors and answer any questions that may arise after sharing the timeline. On wedding days, I am always periodically checking in to make sure we're on track and not running behind. If things do end up running late, I always look for how we can make up for the time.
Gallery
Awards
