100th Episode: Celebrating Our Favorite Moments & Answering Your Burning Questions

🎉 Episode 100: Two Hours of Game-Changing Wisdom You Don't Want to Miss

We're throwing a party—and you're invited! Join Laurie Hartwell, Founder and CEO of the CWP Society, and Krisy, COO of the CWP Society and Master Certified Wedding Planner, for our milestone 100th episode—a special two-hour celebration packed with stories, breakthroughs, and the hard-won advice that's transformed countless planning careers.

Settle in for the full experience as we revisit our favorite moments from 100 episodes, then dive deep into the questions planners are asking right now: How do I price with confidence? Build bulletproof timelines? Command vendor respect? Protect the luxury of personal service in an increasingly automated industry?

Here's what awaits you in this extended celebration:

We get refreshingly honest about the habits quietly eroding your value—posting DIY checklists that replace your expertise, leaning on automations that shift work onto clients, and underselling the one thing that can't be replicated: you. You'll discover why human connection is today's ultimate luxury, how to transform your process from paint-by-number to Picasso, and the art of curating vendor lists that protect every guest experience.

We tackle comparison fatigue head-on and share the mindset shifts that keep you present, celebrating wins, and building momentum that lasts. Education versus experience? We're calling it: that's a false choice. Learn how certification validates your expertise, sharpens your systems, and differentiates you in markets where polished websites mask untrained planners.

Expect practical gold: contracts that truly protect you, communication strategies that keep teams aligned, and boundaries around office hours, capacity, and recovery that prevent burnout before it starts. Whether you're new and hungry for confidence or seasoned and ready for a reset, these two hours deliver the frameworks to serve brilliantly, charge what you're worth, and build a business you're genuinely proud of.

Don't skip ahead—tune in for the entire two hours. The stories, the laughs, the aha moments... this is the conversation that reminds you why you fell in love with this work in the first place.

Want to revisit the favorite episodes we discussed? Here are the links:

Why Buy The Cow 

Authenticity Over Comparison

 Automating Yourself Out of Business 

The Blueprint for Wedding Planning: Education Meets Experience 

Ready to join the community and certification paths that support everything we talk about? Visit cwpsociety.com.

Loved this milestone episode? Follow the show, share it with a planner friend, and leave a review to help more pros discover the insights that change everything.

www.cwpsociety.com | info@cwpsociety.com | IG: @cwpsociety | FB: @cwpsociety

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

You're listening to the Wedding Planner Society Podcast, brought to you by the CWP Society.

SPEAKER_00 0:15

Welcome back to another episode of the Wedding Planner Society Podcast, brought to you by the CWP Society, the world's leading certification program in the largest community of certified wedding professionals. My name is Christy Thomas, and I'm the COO of the CWP Society, and this is a special podcast because this is our hundredth episode. And what makes this so special is we are actually joined today by the founder and CEO of the CW Peace Society, Lori Hartwell. Lori, welcome back. It has been a minute, but I'm excited that you're here.

SPEAKER_01 0:47

Woohoo! I'm so excited to be here as well. I am so glad that I'm able to hang out with you and celebrate the 100th episode of the Wedding Planner Society podcast. This is awesome.

SPEAKER_00 0:59

It's exciting. And today we're actually going to be talking about some of our favorite episodes. And but what's going to be, I think, really more exciting about this is we're actually going to be answering some questions that came in from wedding planners and coordinators all across the globe. So let's kick it off first off by talking about some of our favorite episodes. And the first one I think is funny because of the title, but it is our why by the cow episode. And that was kind of a play on us, the why by the cow when you can get them out for free. But we were talking about how wedding planners and coordinators, not meaning to, but they sometimes give away way too much information that ends up accidentally taking themselves right out of the equation.

SPEAKER_01 1:40

They do it all the time, unfortunately. And I think it's just because so many wedding planners and coordinators are massive people pleasers. And if someone asks us a direct question, like, how should I do this? or who should I use for this? Or maybe a couple sent a wedding planner a DM through, let's just say Instagram saying, Hey, just real quick, I noticed that you work for or with this DJ. Is that something that you would recommend other couples work with? It's going to be really important that you do not just give it all away. And I also see it where they are saying, you know, I'm looking for social media content. So maybe what I'll do is I will write up all the questions that couple should ask their caterer. And I'm thinking, anytime I see this, I'm thinking to myself, you know what? That's probably not going to be in your best interest. And here's why, right? So yeah, I love that episode a lot because it is an enormous mistake that most wedding planners and coordinators are making simply to try to fill up space in their social media.

SPEAKER_00 2:45

Exactly. And what's so funny about this episode, Lori, is that this was actually one of our first episodes. I think maybe watch our first year of the podcast, but it's still happening today. And it to me, this episode is still so relevant today. And I think a big one, like you said, is the social media posts, your blog posts, where they're not meaning to give the cow away. They're, but exactly like you said, they're trying to fill that void and being like, I want to show up in a way where people can see I know what I'm talking about. Right. In doing so, it ends up being like, Well, thank you for providing me all the questions to ask my baker. Why then do I need to hire you as my wedding planner when you've provided me all of this information?

SPEAKER_01 3:22

And you know what? I'm gonna piggyback off of that real quick. You know, another thing that I'm seeing wedding planners and coordinators do all the time that's somewhat similar to this, that I don't think we even mentioned in the why buy the cow episode. But I'm also seeing planners and coordinators selling like how to plan your wedding templates on the website or something similar. And I'm thinking, guys, listen, this is terrible for our industry because basically, what the message sent out is you don't really need to hire me because I can write it all down and give you step-by-step instructions on how to do it from here. So, no, here, download this thing for$30 instead of hiring me to do these things for what I'm actually worth. And so it's really important that you guys stop doing that because it's actually hurting our industry and it's hurting uh wedding planners as a whole.

SPEAKER_00 4:18

Yeah, completely. I'm so glad you mentioned that. That we didn't talk about that, but it's something that I know we see on a regular basis when we check out wedding planners in their websites. And again, I know they're not doing it to harm the industry, but I don't, like you said, I don't think they're realizing, in fact, it is very harmful to the wedding planning industry.

SPEAKER_01 4:34

It's incredibly harmful because there's no way that you can actually explain to someone how to plan their wedding because there are so many variables that we have to be considering. There's a lot of personalization in this. And if someone says, hey, I want X, I'm gonna say, All right, but first I need answers to A, B, C, and D before I can even give you the answer to X, right? There's so many variables that every single couple has that are so different from another couple that I don't see how it's possible to just give someone a little handout and say, here's how to generally plan your wedding. And we as wedding planners and coordinators and whatever title you decide to kind of give to yourself, it is so important that we are realizing that you are undercutting yourself and you are undervaluing yourself every single time you do something like this.

SPEAKER_00 5:30

That's such a good point. Such a good point, Lori. I'm glad we're talking about that. And again, that is the why by the cow episode. I that's something that is still very much relevant today, even though it was one of our earlier episodes. So if you haven't checked that one out, make sure that you scroll down way down because again, this is our hundredth episode to make sure that you tune into that why by the cow episode.

SPEAKER_01 5:49

The next episode that I think is really awesome, and I know it's one of your favorites, Chrissy, is authenticity over comparison.

SPEAKER_00 5:56

And again, this is another podcast episode that is still so relevant today. And it's something to me, Lori, why I love this episode so much and why I'm so passionate about this episode is because I've been there where you're doing that comparison game. And in the age of social media, the TikToks, the Instagram, where everyone looks like they're creating these perfect weddings, it makes you start to almost self-doubt yourself. And it's it's something, it's an epidemic, but it's something that you kind of have to get a hold of because if you let it get to you to a point where it can sometimes paralyze you in a sense with your career, because you keep thinking, I'm not there yet. I'm not as good as these people, I will never be as good as what I'm seeing on social media. And I've seen planners kind of stop or just halt and just kind of be so almost buried in that comparison that they're not seeing themselves or that they're not even able to kind of get out of that in order to be the planner that they were meant to be, because they're comparing themselves to other people.

SPEAKER_01 7:01

And you know what that makes me think of too, Chrissy, is when you are always thinking about, I'm not there yet because I'm comparing myself to all of these other people, you're not living in the moment. You're not present in the moment that you are and celebrating where you are in every given moment. See, every single day we grow just a little bit more. We have additional knowledge that we didn't have yesterday. And so if we keep always looking to the future, that means you're never living in today. You're always living in tomorrow. Well, tomorrow's not here yet. Let's deal with tomorrow when tomorrow comes. I feel like we as planners and coordinators need to do a much better job of celebrating our wins today.

SPEAKER_00 7:49

Yeah. And we need to give ourselves some grace in that aspect too, because when you're constantly looking in the future, like you said, Laura, you're not present in the moment, but you're also you're doing the comparison of like, okay, I'm I'm chapter one, they're chapter 10. How can I get to chapter 10 in five months?

SPEAKER_01 8:06

It took them 10 years to get to chapter 10, you're not gonna get there in five months or 10 months.

SPEAKER_00 8:13

Exactly. So in that period of grace, celebrate those little wins. Like if you're comparing, gosh, they've got 1500 followers on Instagram, I only have a hundred. How long did it take them to get 1500? It took chapter two, three, four, five, six, seven, all of these chapters they live through, but you also have to live through. So giving yourself that grace and knowing that success is not overnight, no matter what social media tells you, it's just not a lot of people think that they need to get there as quickly as possible.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

And so you're thinking of it more as a sprint than you would the journey. I think that we need to enjoy our journeys more, and that is the being present and understand that someone who is in their chapter 10 or chapter 20, it took a very long time. They had their own journey. And if you skip all of the steps that that person had to go through, you're not gonna learn all of the things that that person had to learn and why they might be such a huge success. You have to learn those things. You have to go through a lot of this stuff, this journey, in order to become that chapter 10 when you get to that chapter in the right time.

SPEAKER_00 9:29

And what I love too about this episode is, and I believe we mentioned it in this episode, if you find yourself so deep in that comparison, and especially if it's specific planners or businesses, I I'm gonna encourage you to unfollow those people. As much as they are inspirational, if that inspiration is making you self-doubt, that's not good inspiration. That's inspiration that's going to halt you from being at the where they are at some point. So you can unfollow these people, even though you look up to them. If they are that inspiration is causing you to be to self-doubt yourself, then feel free to unfollow until you feel comfortable enough to look at their work and appreciate them without comparing yourself to them.

SPEAKER_01 10:08

Yeah. You know, we always have choices. We can always decide, listen, I don't have to follow them, I don't have to look at this, or you can change your mindset altogether. And it's probably going to be better for you in the long run if you do change your mindset a little bit. It's just a small tweak, really. But do whatever you have to do to get out of the toxic mind, you know, verbiage that is happening. All of those messages that you are giving to yourself, which by the way, are mostly false. Okay. So if you're hearing, I'm not good enough, I'm not there yet, I'm never gonna get there, gosh, it's taking so long. When am I going to be able to do this, this, and this? You are setting yourself up for failure. What I'd like for you to do is reprogram the way that you have your brain thinking. And instead of all of the negative things, maybe focus on, look how many weddings I've already done so far, and I've only been in business X amount of years. Or gosh, I'm getting much better at this. I can see how more efficient I've become at creating timelines or whatever it might be. You know, tell yourself the positive things, change the entire way you think to skew it a little bit more towards the positive things that are real rather than the things that are negative and maybe still real. You haven't gotten there yet, yes, but it's also you've been in business for eight minutes. So what we need to do is relax a little bit and realize it's going to take time.

SPEAKER_00 11:39

We have to, we have to have patience. It reminds me of one of our, I believe it's a coaching call, one of our workshops where it was someone who said, I'd only been in the industry for less than a year. I and they said I only have four weddings booked for 2026. And me and you both were like, Well done. Even though in her head she was like, It's only four. But it's like, no, that is tremendous. So again, that mindset shift of being a bit more positive to your towards yourself, yeah, it's gonna be very helpful when it comes to that comparison trap and the comparison game. Agreed. Now, another one of our favorite episodes, and honestly, Lord, I feel like you say this phrase at least once a month in our workshops, and that is automating yourself right out of business. Now, that was the title of the podcast episode. We talk about this still to this day on a regular basis. I think this was also in one of our first seasons as well. This is an epidemic that we at the CWP Society, we are trying to make an impact and trying to change this. But what's happening, Lori, is a lot of these tools and these softwares that are meant to help us in our business, some planners are relying on to basically operate their business and they are taking themselves right out of the picture when it comes to how they run their business.

SPEAKER_01 12:50

Yeah, they're replacing themselves really with an app, if you will. And this is not going to be good for you on any level and at any point of the journey that you're on. Now, I understand efficiency, Chrissy. I get it. I love being efficient. It's one of my favorite things in the world to strive to be. But what is really going to be an important piece here is realizing and understanding that being a wedding planner or being a coordinator is a high-touch service. As a high-touch service, if you are basically replacing yourself with, you know, apps, technology, and automations, too many automations, not the correct type of automations, if you will, you are going to be automating yourself out of business. You are replacing yourself. And I see this time and time again. And it breaks my heart a little bit because what I think a lot of people need to have a better understanding of is that especially in today's world, right, everything has some sort of really awesome automation to it. AI and technology alone has really just brought us to a different type of world. And now what luxury really is, is the personal human connection. That's the luxury. And what I'm afraid I'm seeing is that wedding planners and coordinators are not seeing that and not realizing that that's where the luxury service comes in. They are thinking, oh, well, if I just automate everything. So what do I mean by automate everything, Chrissy? I'm talking about someone fills out a form on my website and the couple receives an automatic message saying, thank you so much for contacting, touch and touch. That is not a personal high-touch service, if that's something you're doing. If you're automating those emails, don't do that anymore. What is going to help you as a planner and coordinator stand out from all the other people that are just automating everything and really lowering their level of service by doing so? What's going to happen when they see that they received a personalized email come from you? They're going to be like, oh, this person's different. You mean I'd be dealing with an actual human being. See, in my opinion, and Chrissy, please correct me if I'm wrong. But if I'm hiring someone for thousands of dollars, I don't want to be pawned off with an automatic response. I don't want to be pawned off on an app. Just log into this and you can kind of enter all of your own information. If I have to fill out all of my own forms, why am I hiring you? I can just pay for a$29 app every single month until my wedding is over. This is the problem that I'm seeing. And so what I want planners and coordinators to do is get back to luxury, and that's that personalized human touch.

SPEAKER_00 15:48

And I I love that you say get back to luxury because I think in wedding planners' heads, luxury automatically means dollar signs and how much they're spending on their wedding. No, luxury is a state of mind. Luxury is how we're making people feel, it's an experience. Yes, it's an experience. And if from their from the first experience with you, it's clearly an automated response. I'm immediately not going to feel special. And if okay, that's the first experience. Maybe I let that slide as a client. But then during the planning process, you have me filling out all of these forms, all of these documents as my planner. Am I working? I'm confused. I thought I was paying you, but now you're putting me to work. Do and do I get a 1099 at the end of this wedding? What's happening here? We have to get back to that luxury. And we talked during this episode about what she mentioned, the correct automations. There are some things, of course, we have to make our jobs easier. That with when it comes to invoicing, contracts, things like that, we can automate correctly. The things that people are not automating correctly are those personalized experiences. And Lori, I want you to use the phrase that you typically use when you talk about what we're handing the clients when we are forcing them to essentially be put to work.

SPEAKER_01 16:56

Yes, I have an entire workshop that I do just on this one phrase that I coined how many years ago now? I guess it was like five years ago. Uh, but it was it's called uh a Picasso versus a paint by number. And I find that a lot of couples are paying a planner and a coordinator for a Picasso, but the planner or coordinator is handing them a paint by number instead. And then they wonder why their couple is not as happy, and they're wondering why couples are feeling a little bit displeased or not 100% sure what they're doing, or asking other people questions rather than asking the planner and coordinator. And I'm thinking to myself, oh, I can tell you why. You handed them a paint by number and they paid you for it because so. And so let's make sure that we're giving people what they're paying for. And that's that high-touch service.

SPEAKER_00 17:51

Yep, a thousand percent. And again, guys, that's the automating yourself right out of business podcast episode. Still so relevant today, if not even more so today. I feel like we're gonna be talking about this episode every single six months. Maybe I was gonna say every single year, but probably every six months, reminding planners how to make sure that you're not automating yourself right out of business with the tools and softwares that you use. 100%. Final favorite episode we want to talk about, because if we talked about all of them, guys, we would be here for probably three hours. So we're gonna only talk about four today, but it's actually a more recent episode with one of our certified educators, Crystal Daly, and we talked about how education meets experience. And with that episode, Crystal dropped a mic drop moment where she had mentioned that education and experience are not rivals, they are in fact partners. And Crystal and I got so tickled because we were like, they're peanut butter jelly, peas, and carrots for me because I love Boris Gump. I think she said Ethel and Lucy because she's an I Love Lucy fan. But all in all, basically what we were referring to is the fact that they actually go hand in hand. And what's happening for some reason, Lori, is that's not people aren't understanding that they're thinking that, oh, I have all the experience, I don't need education. And that's just not the case.

SPEAKER_01 19:04

No, because education and credentials actually enhance the experience. It basically verifies and um validates the experience that one has. And you know, you and I run into several different types of people. The two most common types are the people that are kind of newer to the industry who are thinking to themselves, I really would love to be in this industry, but I'm not exactly sure that I know every single teeny tiny detail. And I want to make sure that I'm doing it right, right out of the gate. Then the other kinds of people are they've got maybe five, 10 years of experience approximately, and they say to themselves, well, but I I've already been doing this for a little while. And I think for the most part, I'm doing okay. Why would I need certification? Or sometimes they say, it's time that I actually invest a little bit more in myself because I shouldn't be asking other people, like couples, to invest in me if I'm not even willing to invest in my own company. So I think it's just interesting the different types of people. There are some people that are just anti education and anti-knowledge. And here's what I want to make sure that I express is when you as a planner or coordinator hear a question from someone new that says, Hey, I'm looking to get into the industry. How do I begin? Where should I start? Chrissy, I can guarantee you you know the answer to this. What is the most common, ridiculous statement that you see so many planners and coordinators say?

SPEAKER_00 20:43

They usually end up saying, you just need to shadow someone for a few weddings and get some experience that way. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:49

They say shadow. And I'm like, shadow? What who do you who who should these people shadow? And how do they vet those people? How do you know whoever this new person is shadowing? How does how does this new person know if this person's even doing it correctly? What if this planner who is being shadowed is doing it all wrong and this shadow is picking up terrible habits? What if it all goes wrong on wedding day and this shadow is looking around going, whoa, if this is what wedding planning and coordinating is, I want nothing to do with this? So I think saying start as being a shadow is actually setting people up to fail. And it makes me wonder is that the purpose that someone would be telling someone else, yeah, you're interested in this industry, just go shadow someone for a little while. Are they trying to set these people up for failure?

SPEAKER_00 21:46

You know, it's funny. Crystal and I brought this up in that in the actual episode where we talked about are they wanting people to basically, hey, when I started this career, I messed up a lot. I went through all these trials and tribulations, so you have to go through them too. Almost like an initiation of being a wedding planner is you have to mess up the same way that I did. I because I didn't get my education, then why then you need to mess up and learn the same way that I did. And why? And of course, I think about people like you who, you know, you're you created a program to quite literally avoid people from making these mistakes. When you started the CABP Society, you were decades into wedding planning. And at the heart of it, you wanted a community, but you also didn't want planners to make the same mistakes that you did. And unfortunately, Laura, I don't think a lot of people have that same giving mindset.

SPEAKER_01 22:36

Let's take it even another step further. I think sometimes people go, Well, I don't have certification, and I don't want other people to also get certification because it will only make me look less qualified if someone else gets it. We can't have that mindset anymore, Chrissy. We want, we should want everybody who is in our same industry and sharing our same title. We should all want them to have at least, at the very least, the foundational understanding of exactly the best practices for this field, because it's a very tough field. We should want all of us to have a fighting shot to ensure that the entire wedding industry, venues and vendors alike, look at wedding planners and coordinators as an asset. But let me tell you what is going to prevent that from happening. If people are just going to shadow and take up all of these really terrible habits and do things awful, all that's going to do is make planners and coordinators look bad. So I don't understand, Chrissy. I don't understand why anybody in someone else's same field say, listen, you need nothing. Just go wing it, destroy people's dreams and waste their money. Okay. And ruin our reputation as wedding planners at the same time. At the same time. Do all of that because that makes more sense to me. Right. And I'm thinking, in what universe does that make sense? You know, I can tell you philipsists, say I wanted to go higher and I needed a doctor. And I was talking to the doctor and I said, All right, um, you know, where did you go to school? Where did you get your medical degree from? And if he said, Well, I didn't, I shadowed another doctor for a full year. So I'm totally qualified. I'd be like, What? You know, I don't think I would, I would be like, I appreciate your time today. Have a good one. Bye bye now, right? Like, that's what we would be doing. So I would want to hire a doctor who did go to medical school and does have to take continuing education. I would want that. Now, some people say, Chrissy, well, but clients don't ask if we're certified. So why should I get a certification if clients don't ask? I love that question. It's my favorite one. Because I could tell you this all our certified wedding planners and our master certified wedding planners, when they are meeting with brand new clients, they don't wait for the client to ask. They're not sitting there praying that someone doesn't ask them about certification. What they do instead is mention it as a way to set them apart from all of the uh wedding planners and coordinators who are not educated and don't have the proper credentials that support and enhance the experience that someone already has. In today's world, it's becoming too common and too easy, let's say, to get a pretty website and get a cute little logo because all you need is Canva, right? And poof, I am in business and I'm a wedding planner. And I can say all day long, I've planned weddings. That doesn't necessarily make it true, but you know what? Having some credentials that can be verified now, that's going to help me set myself apart. And especially those who have all of the experience. Let's let's just say someone has 20 years of experience, they've been planning weddings for two decades now. I would recommend that they get those credentials to enhance and back up and validate and verify their experience. Why? Because in today's market, so many brand new people come up, have no education, they shattered someone twice, they do not necessarily know what they're doing, they're getting hired because their website looks just as pretty as the person who has 20 years of experience, because the, you know, the verbiage on the website is just as catchy. There's got to be something that differentiates your experience from someone who just started yesterday. So it's going to be really, really important that people see and understand that certification is more than just do I know something or do I not know something? It is verified credentials so that you can stand out.

SPEAKER_00 26:59

And two things, Lori, about when it comes to shadowing, that I automatically think of. And you you touched on this about if you're shadowing someone wrong, but I also think of if you're shadowing someone on wedding day, and let's say you are shadowing, in fact, someone who is a certified wedding planner, you're working. You're they they typically will not have time to be like, okay, so the reason I chose this linen was because it's a 60-inch round table and we had to have 120-inch round linens. They're they're just like, hey, we need those linens placed. Yep. So it's hard for you to get that education that you need when it's just a wedding day. And not only that, as a certified wedding planner, the wedding day is the easiest part of my job. Right. That's the best part. That's the best part because of everything I did before the wedding day. And if you're just shadowing someone on wedding day, you're not getting that before at all. No, you're not learning anything. You're learning zero. You're not learning at all. So again, that shadowing does absolutely nothing to help you be able to say, Hey, I can be a phenomenal wedding planner. You're not getting that education that you need. And on top of that, Lori, I think about the planners who are giving this advice, just shadow, are typically the same planners who are complaining about what the newer planners are doing to our industry. Agreed. Complaining about, well, this person's charging$500 for full service planning, or they're not reaching out to the vendors when they make the timeline say now all the vendors are mad at wedding planners. Well, hold your hand. You told them to just shadow.

SPEAKER_01 28:21

Yeah. You didn't encourage them to get education. You didn't encourage them to learn from uh, you know, the world's premier wedding planner certification program. You didn't tell them that they need to make sure that they know exactly what they're doing because this is such a tough industry. You didn't say any of that. You just said wing it. Yes, and then and then when they are winging it, it's been wung. I was gonna say that's literally was in my tip of my tongue. They wung it and now they win it. The damage is done. Why are you so mad at them? All of us with experience have got to nurture those who are newer to our industry so that we can raise them up to make us proud. Because at some point, we're gonna have to hand the torch over to the younger people, the newer people. So I think of it, you know, I'm I've been planning, I've been in the wedding industry and planning weddings now for 33 years this year, 2025 is my 33rd year. And that is my whole job is to pass the torch. And because I've made it my mission in life, I have somehow just with by the grace of God and by having an amazing team like you and all of our IADs and all of our certified educators, not to mention all of our magnificent, magnificent certified wedding planners and master certified wedding planners and certified wedding associates and free pro members, all of them, now that they have you know touched some of this education in different on different levels, uh now all of them are trying. Trying to change the industry and raise the standards for all so that we can nurture everybody and really just lift up everyone who wants to be in this field and share our title. Because I uh I'm gonna assume something here. I assume that every single wedding planner and coordinator would always want to make sure that their industry is represented well. But maybe that's just me. Maybe that's an assumption I shouldn't make. I just think that this is something that we should all feel pretty strongly about. But again, that's only my opinion.

SPEAKER_00 30:36

I think that if it's not the way that you think, it needs to be. You need to change your mindset because and we know it, especially in my experience planners. We know that people doubt what we do in our worlds. We know that people question why do I need a wedding planner? We know all these things, yet we're giving this really bad advice at the same time, which in turn is all it does is it's adding fuel to that fire of why hire a wedding planner when they're just going to come in and do all these things that this person who just shadowed everything did and messed things up. So we're so passionate about it, guys. If you can't tell, and we are so passionate about this and just making sure again, Laurie, like you said, that we're lifting and raising the industry, right? Really helping these new wedding planners. And the best way I think we can help the new wedding planners and our entire industry at the same time is by when we get asked, what do I need to do to start my business? telling them you need your education and you need to get certified, preferably through the CWP Society.

SPEAKER_01 31:34

And follow what Crystal Daly said in that episode when she said education and experience are not rivals, right? So we need to make sure that we really, really understand what that means.

SPEAKER_00 31:47

So all right, Lori, you're ready to answer some questions for our hundredth episode. We had some questions submitted from wedding planners and coordinators all across the globe. So are you ready? I am so ready. This is my favorite part. One of the first questions that we got was Should I take the wedding planner certification, even if I am just a coordinator?

SPEAKER_01 32:08

Oh, see, this is actually a really great question. And I'm so glad that this was asked. The answer is 100% yes. And here's why. Any amazing coordinator who does coordination only, maybe you don't want to ever take a full service client, every great coordinator has to know all of the wedding planning that has to lead up to the wedding day. And without great wedding planning, without that knowledge, without understanding all the millions of details that go into it, there's no way that you'll be able to execute and coordinate a wedding properly and efficiently.

SPEAKER_00 32:45

I a thousand percent agree with you. And too part of that question that stood out to me, and I think it's just kind of goes into either that comparison or that self-doubt is using the just, I'm just a coordinator. Being a coordinator, there's no just there. You are a coordinator is a huge part of executing a wedding day. You are the captain of that ship. So that just a coordinator, sometimes I feel like as wedding planners, we do that, we're not doing it intentionally to dim our own light, but sometimes I feel like that wording can dim you unintentionally dim your light.

SPEAKER_01 33:17

We know that is true. That's actually a really good point, Chrissy. I love that you're bringing this up because I do find that a lot of people say the word just right in front of the word coordinator. And I'm like, you mean one of the biggest parts of someone's day? Because that's not a just anything. Uh, so we do need to make sure that we understand that wedding planning is very important. Wedding coordination is equally as important. Bringing those two, some people do both, some people just do one. But even if you want to be a coordinator, you have to understand all the steps that goes into the planning. And just to make sure that everything is going correct, you know.

SPEAKER_00 34:00

When you when you do step in, you're not, you know, putting out a bunch of fires.

unknown 34:04

Right.

SPEAKER_00 34:05

The next question we received was I've been planning for 10 years. Is certification still worth it for me?

SPEAKER_01 34:11

Well, 100%, because like we had mentioned earlier, certification and education aren't rivals, like Crystal Daly said, but also because it really does enhance and validates and um verifies your experience. It it just lifts all of that experience up and says, now look at all of this. And because anybody can say anything nowadays, and it doesn't necessarily have to be true, but you can't fake credentials. And that's what this is about.

SPEAKER_00 34:40

My favorite part about our members who have gone through when they've been 10, 15, even 20 years into their wedding planning career, and then they get the certification are the emails that we get where it's like, oh my gosh, I just expect that I was going to learn this much. I've been doing this for 20 years, and I still was able to find value in this, and I'm able to now implement things I'm gonna do better within my business. Or we've had planners say, Okay, look at me. I've been doing things correctly, pat myself on the back, well done. Or on the flip side of that, we've had planners who've said, So I've been doing things wrong for 15 years. Right. Um, thank you. Now I'm gonna be doing things a lot better.

SPEAKER_01 35:19

Yeah, I mean, and it's all about making sure we're a little bit more efficient at everything. And think about any career choice, every single career that you choose, whether you're an accountant or a doctor or um, you know, a psychologist, your continuing education is going to be incredibly important. So if you have the 15, 20 years of experience, you can look at this certification as your continuing education to inspire you to uh, you know, spark some extra joy because you know, after a certain number of years in in such a tough industry, we can sometimes feel the weight of the world on us and getting that extra spark sometimes just reignites something in our brain and in our heart where all of our passion lives and it awakens it. And that's exciting in and of itself.

SPEAKER_00 36:12

It really is. And it kind of this reminds me of one of our episodes with our IADs. It was an episode with Pish, who was out of Memphis, and Tracy as well. And they both their journeys were so similar where they had been 15 years in and then found the CWP Society. And Tracy just loved how it's her favorite part about it was that she gets the weekly workshops every single week. She was like, it blew my mind that you know, once I got my certification, now I'm able to keep learning. And that she was like, holy moly, there. And sweet Tish was like, I beat myself up because Tish valued education, but she was getting it from different sources. And she said, by the time I was like, I found the CWP Society, I thought, I've wasted money on all these other you know, sources of education. Is this going to be worth it? And obviously, it very much was for her, and to the point where she was like, I was beating myself up for wasting time with those other programs. And you know, of course, we taught us like, well, this is part of your journey, Tish. Like your journey of going through those bad programs allowed you to appreciate even more so what you have here at CWP Society. So don't beat yourself up too bad. But she was like, gosh, I wish I would have found it sooner.

SPEAKER_01 37:21

And Tish is such a chat, uh, such a talented wedding planner, and she loved our program so much that she joined our team and has become an industry advancement director. And I find that so inspiring because that tells me so much. For some, she is someone who has literally taken all of the other programs and chose us and said, No, I want to be now a representative of you. That's a huge deal. And so, should you is certification worth it after uh having plenty of experience? 100 million percent. I'm not sure that's a real thing, but yes, the answer.

SPEAKER_00 38:06

We don't usually math a lot here at CWP. So I think that is an accurate percentage, Laura. Thank you for that backup. I appreciate it. One of my favorite questions we got was how do I explain to couples why being certified matters? And I love this question because Laura, you know how much I love initial consultations, which is funny because I am terribly introverted and terribly shy. And it and an initial consultation is you meeting people you've never met before, right? But I love them because I love the opportunity to be able to meet a couple, hear about the love story, what their wedding day vision is, what challenges they may face during the process of wedding planning, what their worries and concerns on and are, and how I can help. Oh, I love it so much. And I start off, you know, once I ask all the Mazillion questions I got to ask to kind of get inside their brain, when it's time for them to then learn more about me and my packages and my services, I don't go straight into my packages. I tell them a bit more about me. And my first kickoff is I am a master certified wedding planner. And I show in my presentation all of my certification badges and I explain to them the reason this is going to impact you and your wedding planning as you go on the process of planning your big day is that you know that you have someone on your side who knows what they're doing. Yes, who's educated. And not only am I educated, but I continue to grow and continue to learn, which is why I have a million of these certification badges because I want to be the best planner I can possibly be for the couples who invest in me.

SPEAKER_02 39:36

That's it.

SPEAKER_00 39:37

And that's my why. And sometimes when you explain it to them in that way and letting them know it matters because you want the best planner possible. You want the planner who values you and the investment you're making. And that's why I continue to grow and continue to learn is because it's so important that they get the best version of me possible.

SPEAKER_01 39:55

Yeah, you can say you don't want someone just winging this, right? You want someone who knows methodically exactly what to do, how to do it, and why we're even doing what we're doing, not someone who's guessing their way through it. So always make sure, and you can say to your couples, even if you don't choose me, I'm gonna ask that you choose someone who is in fact certified or master certified so that you are getting the very best possible person to represent your wedding and yours and you guys and who you are as a couple.

SPEAKER_00 40:29

What kind of tickled my brain a little bit when I saw this question come through is I think this is a lot, especially for even newer planners or even experienced planners who are who aren't booking as much as they should be possibly. And it's all kind of boils down to that initial consultation, which is why we spend a lot of time talking about the initial consultation during our certification program, because it is a science in how you book. And planners, we typically don't get into this industry because we want to be salespeople, but there is a science behind how you book your services. So just know if this is something that you are struggling in, we talk about this in depth during our certification program.

SPEAKER_01 41:06

And you can't lie about your credentials. You can't say I'm certified and then not be, because guess what? We have couples all the time emailing us saying, Can you verify that such and such is in fact certified? And people that are looking for the types of couples, that ideal couple that actually cares about who they're hiring. They don't want someone who woke up yesterday who just read a wedding magazine and said, you know what? I think what I might do. They're not looking for so those higher end are looking for credentialed people. Okay, they're looking for someone who invested in themselves, like you said, Chrissy. So people can verify your credentials, they can't necessarily verify experience. Like, how do you verify that? So I think it's really, really important that couples be taught and educated during the initial consultation about why they should be hiring a certified or master certified wedding planner.

SPEAKER_00 42:07

Well, Lord, this question came in, and this is for you. It says, one thing you tell yourself when you first started the CWP Society.

SPEAKER_01 42:23

I mean, there's no way I could have predicted this. I just wanted to make sure that anyone who was interested in this industry and this career choice was able to do so in such a way that they felt like they were able to gain all of the information they they needed, but also had the support at the same time. Well, what that turned into was me never having to advertise. The CWP Society has never once spent a penny on advertising. Uh how did we get to be the world's premier wedding planner certification? It was all of the members. It was all of you. It was anyone who went through the program actually started telling all of their competitors about the program. And it has spread very organically by word of mouth ever since. And, you know, I've this society has been open since 2007. We, you know, are now in 2025 and now we are the world's premier. And never once have I spent a penny, not one Facebook ad, not one Instagram ad. There's never been ads anywhere. I've spent zero dollars. And being able to not spend that money allows me to keep the cost really low as well, super affordable. And I work hard to do that because that's my mission. So, you know, one thing I'd tell myself when I started CWP Society would be watch out, girl, you're not gonna believe what this is gonna turn into. That's probably what I would say is stay true to your passion, stay true to yourself, because you're not gonna believe how amazing this group is. Because I'll be honest with you, Chris. This has become, you know, outside of my family, one of my biggest blessings that I have ever been able to witness. We are, it's not a Lori Hartwell and Chrissy Thomas-driven organization. It is a member-driven organization. Our members drive us, they inspire us. And that's every single time we get to hang out with them, which is every single Wednesday. I get so inspired to keep producing more and more awesome content in ways that they can enhance their business and become even better than they were yesterday or last week. That gets me out of bed every single day. And so, yeah, the one thing I tell myself is, oh girl, you are not gonna believe where this is.

SPEAKER_00 44:56

This is a buckle up, Lori Hartwell, because this is about to go into Mars. This is about to take you like the industry off to a level that yeah, and it has, but it's hard.

SPEAKER_01 45:07

This is hard work. Being an educator for the, you know, wedding planners and coordinators across the globe is incredibly challenging, very difficult, but it is uh, and no one can even understand how difficult it is.

SPEAKER_00 45:22

I think it's more, probably more difficult for you than say some of these pop-up educators because you you take so much pride in making sure our our members have the most updated, most informed information that's gonna help all of them, not just within their little market, not just within their little area. You want to provide them with accurate information that's gonna help them grow and learn. And you're also not in it just to can just to get money, clearly. Because this our certification program is 32 and a half or 30, I think 32 and a half hours worth. So it's worth way more than what we charge. So I I think it's harder for someone like you because you're not in it for the wrong reasons.

SPEAKER_01 46:04

I I am definitely not in it for the wrong reasons. I mean, uh, there are certifications that are less than half the length of hours that charge$7,000. And so if you put that into the reality, uh I should not be charging less than$600, not even a thousand. I'm not even up to a thousand. And and my pricing has stayed pretty much the same for the last probably five, six years. And the reason is is because I am not here to become a millionaire. What I'm here to do is make sure that I can make the best, the top, the premier education for planners and coordinators accessible to anybody who would want it. And that's why we have those payment plans available and uh we make the price already affordable so that the payment plans don't seem still out of reach. It is so incredibly important that we all want to raise ourselves up. I am constantly educating myself on the globe so that I can bring proper information to all of our members. And I just think that people don't realize how difficult this type of work is creating curriculum and making sure that you're putting out the right information, information that's going to benefit the learner, not benefit the teacher. And I think that, my friend, is the difference.

SPEAKER_00 47:32

Yeah. I didn't realize until I started working for you. I mean, I knew obviously how much you poured into it, but how much goes into what we pour into. Our members don't think people realize how much goes into it. So, no, for my, I appreciate everything.

SPEAKER_01 47:49

You're praying for us every single second, every single day, if they knew.

SPEAKER_00 47:56

One other question that we received was how do I know when I'm ready to raise my prices? That's a good question, Chris.

SPEAKER_01 48:03

First of all, you know, having credentials that can back up the right fees is going to make an enormous difference. But you also want to make sure that whatever you set your pricing at, your market can actually bear. And that's something that I don't feel like a lot of wedding planners think about. And one other thing I want you to think about too is you've got to know your own numbers. You need to know how much is going out to sustain your business. And then you need to know how much is coming in. You need to understand what the difference is there. Is that going to help pay your bills at home? There's so many variables and situations and details that have to go into this particular question. So start with this. Get your certification credentials, then you can at least charge the pricing that you should. You'll know what that pricing is because we talk about it for six straight hours about your packages and pricing and the curating your pricing and packaging portion of the 32 and a half hour long certification program. But you definitely want to make sure you're not pricing yourself out of the market or too low. There is uh a Goldilocks situation here. There is, you know, the price is just right. And you've got to know that and understand that. And that's why, too, we offer one-on-one business coaching to all of our certified members so that if you want us to look at your specific area, look at your specific packages, we can help you with that pricing.

SPEAKER_00 49:34

One question we received was how do I handle vendors who do not respect me as a coordinator? Oof, I'm sorry. That's not fun.

SPEAKER_01 49:43

Oh, it's not fun. But you know, here's how you handle them. Number one, not let's not ever make an assumption that someone is talking to us in a way that is not respectful and that they're doing it on purpose. Let's not assume that they're doing it on purpose. Let's let them know how it might be making us feel. Let's talk to them about how important respect is amongst the dream team. But I can tell you this if someone is going to be repeatedly rude to me, uh, not treating me the with respect or kindness, just you know, general humanity level stuff here, I'm not gonna ever use this vendor again. And one of the things that I like to sit down with my wedding press, because I vet every single wedding professional who is on my list. There's not one professional on my list that I have not had a personal conversation with that I did not check out extensively. Uh, when I tell you I bet them, I vet them. Okay, I've checked, I know everything now.

SPEAKER_00 50:49

So it's like we're detectives. It's uh we get the background check, we check the credit score, all the things. No, I'm kidding, but it is a it is quite intense in the betting process.

SPEAKER_01 50:59

It is intense. And so, because here's the thing, and you've said this a million times, Chrissy, not every vendor is worthy of my clients, right? And so we have to be so incredibly careful who we allow on this dream team because one bad egg can ruin the whole thing. So it's really important that we first that our wedding pros don't be willing to just work with anybody just because they say they are a pro. Now, if someone's treating you poorly and they are not responding well to other people, that's okay. So let's look at that. Uh, they're not responding well to you, they're not responding well to anyone. That means that you need to never work with this person again. So if another couple comes to you and says, We've hired I'm a terrible DJ.com, and you remember what a horrible experience that was, you can just simply say, Well, I understand completely. One of our policies states that you have to use someone off of our approved vendors list so that we can ensure that you're going to have the best possible version of your wedding day. We have an amazing wedding professionals to choose from. Based on the list that you provided me of wedding professionals that you hired before meeting with us, there's several of them that are not on our approved vendors list. And so we won't be able to personally take that wedding. So let me give you some numbers and some names of other wedding planners and coordinators that might be able to help you with this. Now, why is that important? It's important that you understand that couples, most of the time, at least this is my experience from 33 years of experience, right? Uh, a lot of my couples said, Well, no, just tell me which ones aren't on your list. We won't, we we can cancel with them. We need you. We we want you. And I am also not going to get into any bad talking behind any wedding professionals back. I'm not gonna say, listen, don't, I can't even believe you hired that DJ. He is the worst. I can't even believe, I'm not gonna say a negative word about anybody. If someone says, oh my gosh, why why aren't they on your list? I'm gonna say, oh, think about it. Thousands of people aren't on my list. I can't have everybody on my list. There are certain people that I have picked out because I think that they're the absolute best and the most reasonable price for the quality of work and their reputation, their talent, all of it. I've vetted all of these people because I know exactly the type of client who's looking for me and I know who would be great fits for my clients. And because there are no do-overs in weddings, right? There on wedding day, there's no, oh, let's do that one more time. There's not that doesn't exist, nay, nay. So, what we need to do is ensure that that isn't even going to be necessary. I want to make sure you have the greatest day right from the very moment you wake up to the moment you lay your head on that pillow at night. That has that day has to be amazing. And I can't guarantee that with some other people. So if you would like to stick with the people that you have, great, awesome, well done. I'll understand completely. But if you would like to go with my list, I'd be happy to take you on as a client. You just wouldn't be able to use anyone who's not on my list. And every single one of my clients has said, oh my gosh, I love that you're that selective and that picky because you're right, there are no doovers. See, couples don't always think about that. And by the way, if I get any pushback from a couple who's like, oh, I want to pick whoever I want, you're not my person anyway.

SPEAKER_00 54:35

Yes, can I amen to that? And I think what what too with this question is like, you know, what do I do with someone who's not being respectful to me? That is where we have to remember when we're business owners, especially, we are our own HR person. We have to have some boundaries in place for what we will and will not tolerate. And one way to avoid having to work with someone who's a poo-poo face, as you quite often say, Lori Hartwell, is by having this improved vendor policy.

SPEAKER_01 55:03

But one of the things that I want to make sure coordinators and planners are remembering while we're talking on this subject, Miss Chrissy Thomas, is we are the repeat customer. So if someone doesn't understand, if a vendor, let's say, doesn't understand that and is treating us poorly, why would I keep returning to them to make more purchases with my clients, right? I wouldn't. I wouldn't. And we as planners and coordinators need to have a little bit more respect for ourselves, to where we are not accepting that type of treatment from anybody. At no time should someone be raising their voice at me or talking to me in a disrespectful way. I'm a human being who deserves to be treated with kindness. So, no, sir, I don't accept that. And I am absolutely okay if a client says, Well, I would rather have the bad vendor. Cool, man. That's awesome. Have a wonderful day and I wish you all the best for your wedding. It's very simple. Well, there are two that stands out. Well, there's three. There's three that stand out to me uh that can publicly or break a wedding or make a wedding where every single person at the event can feel it. Okay. And that would be right off like number one, the most, the biggest make or break uh wedding pro would be your your entertainment provider, right? So if you have a bad DJ or a bad MC of a band, that's gonna not go well.

SPEAKER_00 56:41

I mean, think about it, they they have a mic, they have a microphone, everyone there can hear their mistakes, and it's loud.

SPEAKER_01 56:49

Uh so yeah, it's not just like a whisper of mistakes, it is broadcasting the mistake on speakers. So I would say that's number one. The second one would be food. I feel your catering company, if they run out of food or the food is not hot or it is it tastes terrible. Every single person at that event is going to feel it and see it. And then third is us. Yeah, yeah. A wedding planner and a wedding coordinator, we can make or break a wedding because if we are the types of people that are like, ah, schedules, festivals, right? And we're not even looking at the timeline, we're not even caring about how this is going, and everything is running really behind, and there's no easy flow from one place to the next. And all of the way, no, don't don't die, Chrissy. I know I'm giving you like heart palpitations, but this happens constantly, especially when someone's not certified, they don't have the education. I'm seeing so many coordinators and planners destroy weddings because they are not having a full understanding of exactly what's to be what's supposed to be happening, when is supposed to be happening, and why it's supposed to be happening in that way. So those are the top three, in my opinion, that that really do make a big difference.

SPEAKER_00 58:11

Yeah, I a thousand percent agree because when you think about the guests, they remember how much fun they had, if they had fun at all, and they remember if the food was bad. And they also the guests remember how the day felt. I looked many couples for their wedding when they were guests at the weddings I attended because they said, gosh, everything transitioned so smoothly, it wasn't awkward, it everything was so much fun. Who were these vendors? Like they'll the guests remember how they felt. And I think wedding planners, we have a lot of control over the guests experience and if they feel awkward or the transitions are weird, or if they're running behind. Oh my gosh, that's a big one. That is what we have control over, so that's a lot.

SPEAKER_01 58:51

Because when we're running behind, or when the timeline is running behind, then the all of the in the hired wedding professionals are going to feel a bit disjointed, a little disorganized. Things are not going to be falling into place exactly the way it can. And see, I've felt the yummy, delicious thing where all of the 5,000-piece puzzle is coming perfectly together and the picture is showing up. I've also been a guest at weddings where it did not go well, and I'm sitting there twitching, or I'm in the corner.

SPEAKER_00 59:25

I have to sit on my hands, Lori. If I'm a guest at a wedding, I have to sit on my hands because I want to get up and start working. There was one wedding where it we walked into the reception space, so it was time for the reception to start, and none of the candles were lit. And I reached for my apron, and Chris was like, What are you doing? And I was like, I don't have my apron. He's like, Because we're not working. Oh, that's sad. I just know the intent of the centerpiece was for these candles to be lit. And he was like, Sit down. And I was like, let me go find the wedding planner and tell her that none of the candles are lit. And he was like, sit down.

SPEAKER_01 59:59

I love it. It's hard. It's hard. That's why I can't really be a guest at a wedding ever again. And I know this myself. And I've even hurt my daughter because my daughter was a guest at a wedding last April. And she calls me and she says, Mom, I'm I'm you, it is such a good thing you're not here. Let me tell you what I'm experiencing right now. You you would be crying. You'd be in the real position. I'm like, don't even tell me, kid. I don't even want to know.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:26

It's so funny. Chris is the same way because it's rare that I get to go to a wedding because I'm usually working a wedding. So he's attending a few weddings where I'm not at, and he'll text me, you'll be so happy you're not here. And I'm like, oh gosh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:37

So true. So true.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:39

All right, let's go over to our next question. And this is a fun one. What is your wedding planning superpower? I kind of know what yours is.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:46

You know what mine is.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:48

Okay. Well, I'm curious to know what you think mine is. This is good.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:51

I think your intuition, and because I think that is an incredible skill when it comes to wedding planning. Because I feel like wedding planning is so much more than people realize. It's so much more than checklists and timelines and logistics. It's also about personalities and people. And your intuition of being able to read a face, read a shoulder drop. I feel like that had to be such a benefit with planning for your clients and making sure that you heard them, even if they weren't saying anything.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:21

Yeah, you, you know, and first of all, thank you for saying all of that. And I think intuition is a very, very big superpower for sure, because being able to read someone without words allows me to anticipate problems. And I'm very sensitive, Chrissy. I'm an extremely sensitive person. When I say sensitive, I don't mean I'm gonna cry at the drop of a hat. That's not the kind of sensitive I'm talking about, but I'm sensitive to people's needs. I'm sensitive to people's emotions, I'm sensitive to people's feelings. And a lot of people do not share their feelings verbally. Okay. They're sharing them a lot of times in body language and facial expressions. And so it is and it was definitely extremely helpful for me since you know I started planning weddings back in 1993. And I'll say it's a skill that I have definitely honed over time. I I'm I was not as intuitive in 1993 as I am today, right? But it has definitely helped because when you're at a meeting with a couple and their mom and mom says something, I usually, as soon as mom says something, I'm also just doing a quick glance at the couple. How did they respond to what mom said? Did it, does it look like they were in complete agreement with mom? Does it look like they did they wince a little bit? Did they look down? Did they look away? I'm looking at all of those things and I'm thinking, all right, now I know how to take the next move based on that uh quick look or what have you. It's so important because we have to, part of our job is to anticipate what people are going to be thinking, to anticipate their objections, anticipate their excitement. And that way I can be the very best wedding planner for them. Otherwise, I am just winging it and hoping to God I figure it out properly.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:23

I think my wedding planning superpower.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:26

It's grace. I'm just gonna tell you right now. Yeah, I'm you told me mine, so I'm gonna tell you yours, Nana. I feel like you do everything with grace, everything is just done in such a way that you make each and every single person in your presence feel incredibly special, unique, and heard.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:48

And I and I think that's something in wedding planning. There's this, and especially if you are not educated and if you're just winging it, you're thinking of this what a serotypical, and I'm putting that quotation mark, wedding planner looks like, and probably what you've seen on TV, and that's someone who's bossy, who's just like, do this, do that, pointing fingers. And that is that's not what makes a phenomenal wedding plan. It's just not because, like you said, Lori, when we talked about these vendors, it's a team, this is a dream team. And as the wedding planner or coordinator, I am the captain of that team, but I still have my team because I can't do this by myself. So there's a way that you can lead and do so in a way where you're doing it with kindness and you're respecting vendors and what they're bringing to the table, also, because I I cannot make this beautiful table without the full team of people. I cannot do what I need to do unless my vendors are also doing what they need to do. And if I'm being bossy and rude and disrespectful, they're not gonna want to work with me anymore. Well, you definitely grace.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:46

Leading with grace is going to be the superpower that I hope most planners try to embody. That is the definition of a great leader, in my opinion, is one that can do so without demanding it. It's that they're inspiring to, you know, inspiring others to follow. That, my friend, is leading with grace, and you do it well.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:12

Thank you. Thank you, Lloyd Hart. That's very nice. Our next question we received was what do you do when a couple wants something you know won't work? Me, I think educate, educate, educate. I'm talking educating my couples, but the only way you can educate your couples if is if you're educated yourself, just an FYI. When I look at wedding planning, because a lot of couples have never done this before, they never plan an event of this size with this many moving pieces. So when they hire a planner or coordinator, they're looking for someone to help guide them during this process. And if they are wanting something that you know won't work, it's up to you to educate them on the why behind why it won't work. And you do so in a graceful and kind way, the same way that you would with vendors, instead of just automatically being like, no, this is stupid.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:02

And some people try to say things, but they're still coming across condescending, like, oh, um, we don't really do that anymore, or that's not you there's ways to express and educate and to explain to couples something that won't work, and yet allow them to keep their pride and allow them to not feel stupid. It's really, really important that you do that. So if a couple definitely wants something that you know 100% won't work, you can just, I would say, let's just come out with it. Just go, listen, I completely understand why you would even want something like that. Now, I have tried this in the past, and let me tell you what happened. And then I kind of go into all of that, and usually at the end of it, they go, Oh, yeah, you know what? I didn't even think about all of that. Yeah. I say, Well, that's not of course, how would you have? It's not like you do this for a living, I do this for a living, but that's why you have me is to make sure that we're preventing these types of things from taking place. But gosh, I totally understand why you were thinking this may be a good way to go.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:14

This conversation often about aisle runners outside. Oh, heck yeah. And me educating them on like, okay, so let's talk about why this won't work. And again, like you said, explaining that to them, the why and what happens. And they're always like, Oh, I didn't think about that. Thank you. I'm so glad I have you. I'm so glad I was able to ask you this question, like before I went out and bought something.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:35

Exactly. And showing them pictures of what a lot of times this is going to end up looking like is going to be worth a thousand words, one picture alone. So definitely don't hesitate to go, you know what, we've tried that before. Let me show you what this looks like. Or, you know, someone else just did that. And I was a little sad that the pictures turned out the way they did because there's no way to flatten that out. So, you know, educating couples is going to be incredibly wise. You know, I had a couple uh once that said, I want us to have this really beautiful, formal sit-down dinner, but I only want to have seating for half the guests. I'm like, so, and we had to have a whole conversation about why that doesn't work. And when I walked through exactly what would have to happen in order to accommodate that request, the groom immediately went, Oh my gosh, I had no idea about any of that. I'm like, Yeah, you know, it is it is a thing. So, and we really had great conversations. And part of what I love about planning weddings is that part of things. Yeah. Helping clients understand what will work, what won't work, but why, why it won't work. You can't just leave it at nope, we don't do that. Nope, we that won't work.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:49

Or do it anyway, knowing that it's gonna that something's gonna mess up. I think a lot of planners sometimes are scared to have these conversations with their couples because they're like, Well, it's their wedding day, this it's what they want to do.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:00

What a exact I'm so glad that you just said that.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:05

Because I I some they're either scared to because that puts them in a position of like, okay, we're gonna have to have a little bit of disagreement here, but again, there's a way to do it without it becoming a disagreement. But also, some people have the mindset, well, it's their wedding day, they they're gonna do what they want to do. Wow, and I have to remind people they hired you for a reason because they don't know what they're doing. So it's up to us to have these conversations with our couples, don't be scared to have these conversations again. That's why being educated is so important because we have to educate them a lot of the times.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:37

I love that you said that. And you're right, a lot of it is fear. I don't want to upset. I'm a people pleaser. And if I tell them this may not work, that I might get pushback. I don't know how I'm gonna feel about that pushback. Will I respond well? Will I jump on the defensive? So it's a lot of times it's a lack of trust in ourselves that prevents us from doing the right thing, which is talking to our clients about why it won't work. But that's where certification can come in and really boost that confidence so that you know how to approach these types of situations where you're not feeling badly about that. Yeah, exactly. Good, good. I love this comment. This is so fun. This has been a fun hundred episode. This is a good one. I like it.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:19

All right, Lloyd. The next question is what's your go-to solution when the timeline goes completely off track and I immediately start sweating because this is I have nightmares about this. I will say this does not happen with my weddings, but I have nightmares about this.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:34

Yeah, I think every wedding planner has nightmares about this, Chrissy. But if we look at just real life, you know, IRL in real life situations, this should never happen. If you're a certified wedding planner, a master certified wedding planner, this would just never take place. Our timeline does not ever go completely off track. Why? Because the planning leading up to the wedding day was done so intentionally and so thoughtfully and with a lot of uh methodical techniques. Okay. Now, on wedding day, if the planning was great, and you that means you only hired and allowed the client to hire pre-vetted wedding professionals who were on your approved vendors list and there was not a hurricane or an act of God that came in and stirred things up. If none of that happens, right, then there is literally no reason why a timeline should go completely off track. Now, sometimes there are situations where we're like, okay, this situation is happening. Maybe uh we've got someone who's hyperventilating or we have things that are completely out of our control. But that's why we wedding planners know exactly where to put special buffers in our timeline. And that what does that do? That prevents it from not going completely off track. Another thing that tells me why your timeline has gone completely off track is maybe you have a communication breakdown. Maybe you're not communicating the right things with the right people at the right time. So you've got to make sure that if you're going to be in this career, definitely get your education, your certification, your credentials, so that you know exactly the type of communication that needs to go into each and every single portion and piece of this planning process. So my timelines don't go completely off track. And if yours does, I really highly recommend getting your certification.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:36

Yeah, because again, there is so much to a timeline. And I see it, Lori, because as you know, our listeners may not know this, but I help out one of our venues in my local market where I do their tours and some of their bookings, and I transition all of the planning documents, like core plans and timelines, to our day of venue manager. And when I get some of these timelines, and it's all it is is the photo timeline from, and I get these from the wedding coordinator because we require a wedding coordinator. Wow. And it's just the photo timeline, but it's not the details that a venue manager needs of when the caterers are getting here, when the bar is arriving, when do we need like the full scope of a timeline? I always and I reach out to that coordinator, you know me, and say, Hey, I'm Chrissy, I'm the CEO of the CWP Society, I'm also a wedding planner. I you should definitely check out CWP Society. And I do that because their timelines are so minimal. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:25

They're not they have no information. No, it that and that is going to hurt a day. That's gonna hurt our event date because if you do not have every single piece thoughtfully put out there and put into a very detailed timeline, something is gonna fall through the cracks, something is gonna go off track. But again, you're right, that is why certification is so important. And I find that even experienced coordinators, Chris. Yes, and sometimes I feel like they might even be the biggest culprits, the uncertified, experienced planner are the biggest culprits of having the ugliest, most horrible timelines I have ever seen in my life. And I feel like it's really important that no matter what chapter you're in on your journey as a planner or coordinator, always finding ways to level up is going to be an incredibly important conversation or not an incredibly uh important thing that you do. Yeah, you never stop that. At 33 years into this career, I am not stopping raising my own bar. I am always looking to improve and take my service to the next level. So we all need to make sure that we're doing that together.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:52

And it's funny when it comes to timelines, and and I joke, but it is completely accurate that my timeline is so detailed. If I were to get in a car accident on the way to the wedding, the EMT could pick up my timeline and execute the day. One but it's 100% true. I have a lot of fear of that for some reason. I'm just imagine myself being like, Here's my timeline, go to the venue.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:15

I'm okay. The details are in the timeline. You can't even give you directions to it there, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:15:22

Like usually my assistants could pick it up and do it. Realistically, if something were to happen to my it would be detailed enough where my assistants and the vendor team would be able to execute things because it's so freaking detailed.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:34

That's just important no matter what. You just gotta have that.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:38

All right. Our next question is one skill that every wedding planner needs in 2026 as we gear up for the new year, which is absolutely insane that we're so close to it.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:49

I would definitely say self-awareness, oh, and uh and certification.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:57

Oh, self-awareness is good, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:00

We we need to make sure that we see ourselves that we know what we do wrong, where our gaps are, uh, and actively work towards filling those gaps. I mean, it's probably not gonna happen overnight, right? And I know we should never expect to be an improvement instantly. Again, it's a journey, even small little tasks of self-improvement are little miniature journeys that we go on that take some time. But if you put a blindfold on and say, no, I don't even want to look at my gaps, you are going to bring your business down. But also, sadly, and this is what I don't think a lot of people realize is you're actually bringing the entire industry down with you. We have to care about our industry as a whole and avoid not, you know, avoid this whole, I'm I'm fine, I don't need anything more, I don't need to learn, I don't need to grow mentality. It's just never gonna work.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:03

Yeah. And can I be honest here? I feel like sometimes even if you are self-aware, it but you may not realize the gaps you're missing because you're not educated.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:11

Oh, that's okay. So what you're saying is people don't know what they don't know. Is that what I mean?

SPEAKER_00 1:17:17

Okay, exactly. And sometimes it does take gaining the certification for those planners who've been 10, 15, 20 years in to be like, oh man, I've I this process I've been doing is so much harder, or I've been doing this completely wrong. Sometimes you don't recognize those gaps unless you know that there are actually gaps in your business. And that to me, sometimes takes you actually start getting your certification and getting that education.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:42

Well, Chrissy, I couldn't agree with you more on that. And I didn't even think of it like that when this question was posed, but my goodness, that couldn't be more true.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:52

Because I hear it all the time from our planners who've been doing this for so long and are like, man, and you can see the defeat in them of like, gosh, I've been doing this, this has been so much harder than it needed to be, or this could be so much easier, or even like I thought I was all alone in this, and now I have a community of people who can help me. Like, I feel like sometimes that that I hear that quite often. Yeah. The other question that we received was how do I transition from being in corporate world where or I'm also a teacher or a nurse to wedding planning? And we see this often with more experienced planners. And my my first thought when you want to transition from something like that, it's automatically your next step needs to be getting your certification. And when I think about your roles, whether you're a teacher or nurse, or you're in corporate America, you were educated to do those things. So if you want to start a whole new career journey, then go ahead and get your education. That way you can start off on the complete right foot. That was me, fortunately. I was in the banking world and I was I was doing very well in banking, but I wanted to be a wedding planner. And my first step was finding the certification because I knew what even just me being in the banking world, like I started off being a teller and kind of moved my way up. Every bit of my journey when I was in my corporate job required me to learn, it required training.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:10

Um I think you had a degree behind all of that as well. And so, yes, you do need education for sure. And I really wish people would would um embrace the fact that just because it's weddings and it sounds like it's fun, as a wedding planner, it is actually this career is rated the third most stressful job in the world. There's a reason for that, and I think that the reason part of the reason is that a lot of people are trying to do it by making it up as they go along. Well, I maybe I should do this next, and then maybe after this, this is how I should handle this. And they're just winging it. And you know, I was just having a conversation with my husband this morning about the importance of education, and he he said something really funny. He said, even if we had to go and buy a crib, we would have to follow instructions. And then when I brought that conversation up to you, you said, think about it, even if you were cooking something, yes, you have the recipe, not necessarily the recipe, that's what education will give you. You know the ingredients. Okay. I mean, there's five ingredients. You have the pot, you have the the stovetop. So that's great. We've got everything we need, but if you don't know how much of each ingredient to put in or what order to put each ingredient in, is that food gonna turn out the way you you think it will? You know, so definitely if you're gonna be transitioning into this role, I am the type of person who would want to know everything I could possibly know about what this is going to entail so that I am starting off on the right foot. And and I find that those are the types of members that join the CWP society, are the ones that value knowledge and value continuing education. I find that I don't get the members that are like, I know everything. They're not my ideal people. They're just like when I plan weddings and someone is sitting across from me looking to hire me, and they're like, I want to hire all of these horrible wedding pros. I know that they're not the right ones for me anyway. And I don't want them to hire me. But I really am wanting the best for every single coordinator and every single wedding planner, whether this is a career choice that you're just now transition transitioning into, or if this is a career that you have had for the last 10 to 20 years, I highly recommend getting those verified credentials so that you can make sure that everything you do from this day forward is going to be on the level of excellence.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:59

Yes, absolutely. Or one of our next questions that we received was what's the biggest mistake you see even experienced planners make?

SPEAKER_01 1:22:08

Well, there's so many. I see a lot of terrible timelines, terrible, terrible timelines. I see very poor communication between them and their wedding professionals. I am seeing a lack of knowledge. I am seeing that they don't understand what to put in their packages. I'm seeing awful, awful, awful contracts.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:34

That was my first thought was the contract that I see was how I'm seeing contracts from these experienced planners where I'm like, if you were to go to court, this contract would not protect you at all. How have you made it this far? Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:47

Exactly. So those are some of the biggest mistakes that even the most experienced planners are making right now. And they don't know that their contract is terrible, right? Until someone like you or I can review it. But uh, because they're having an attorney look at it. If they're even doing that, okay, all right, all right, okay, I'll give that to you. If they're even having an attorney look at their sad contract, my question is is that attorney specializing in hospitality law? Okay. So do they know a lot about wedding planners and the field that that we personally are in? Do they understand all of the experiences that we experience? And if they don't, then they're not going to be able to write up a contract that's going to be able to protect you from those experiences. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_00 1:23:31

That makes total sense. And I feel like too, if they're if they're not having an attorney even look at it at all, then they are just drafting it from like Googling it or chat GPTing it. And then as they go on, they're like, Oh, I want to add this clause. Oh, I need to add this clause based off this experience, based off this experience. And they're adding all these clauses, and sometimes the wording just doesn't make any sense. The wording is not going to protect you, the wording doesn't protect your clients, or the wording is not going to even hold up in a court of law.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:57

A lot of times, too, Chrissy, is that some of their made-up clauses actually counteract one another. So if clause 14 does not, you know, let's just say you've got clause 14, and then we're reading down where now we've got clause 20, but 20 almost deactivates clause 14 because it's saying something that's contradictory. You are hurting your own business and you are opening yourself up to liability that is just not necessary.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:25

This is another question. I really like this question a lot. And it's how do I find my confidence when I'm new to this? And I'm I guess because I've been new to this. So I know exactly what that feeling is like when it's like, I don't know what it is that I'm doing. I feel like confidence has to do with a lot of you knowing what you're doing.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:42

And I feel like realistically, the only way that you know what you're doing is if you get your certification. I I look at my journey, and that that was my journey. I genuinely remember I had booked a wedding before I gave my certification. And I booked it on the spot because it was one, it was my it was a wedding photographer friend had a client and was like, Hey, she's looking for a wedding coordinator. I know you are getting ready to start your business. She's gonna call you. And I was like, huh, huh, huh? I had nothing. Okay. So she called and I she was like, I need a day of coordinator. I'm putting that in quotation marks. How much do you charge? And I was like,$500. Didn't even have a real consultation, didn't even ask her any types of questions. I was so unprepared. And I booked her and I thought, you don't know what you're doing. And thank God the certification was coming up before her wedding.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:30

And I gave my certification, and within the first five minutes, I was like, Well, this is going to change your entire life. And I did, clearly, but within the first 10 minutes of the actual wedding day, I thought, you severely undercharged yourself. Oh, yeah. I got really, really lucky in that this person had hired great vendors, vendors who are still on my list to this day. I got so lucky in that aspect because thank God for them. Because I you know, thank God also I got my certification as well, because I came into that knowing what I was doing. But I mean, I remember when she booked me thinking, I don't know what I'm doing. Right. And I panicked. And I feel like that knowing what you're doing builds up your confidence. It really does. It really just does.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:13

I mean, I remember what it felt like to be new, and it's a scary place.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:18

And feeling that lack of confidence is, and most of the time can be uh a business killer because your your couples can sense it, can't they? Yeah. So because of that, you know, I definitely that's why I'm such an advocate. This is why I do what I do for a living, is so that I can help people who have maybe some low confidence, they don't know exactly what to do, how to do it, why to do it, when to do it. I want them to know all of the answers. I want that, uh, so that they can have a fighting shot. I can't teach personality though, Chrissy, right? I can't I can't teach you how to be a good person. I don't know how to instill integrity in humans, but I can tell you the how, when, what, and why. That I can do. And so that alone will give you the confidence that you need if you're new to this.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:11

And also too, knowing that you're part of a community of wedding planners who are rooting for you is a big one because I see sometimes in these groups, especially in Facebook, where there are new planners who are, you can tell, I can tell by the way they're writing it, they are frightened, they are nervous, and they ask a question that to me should be answered with kindness and respect, or hey, you just need to get your certification. But they're met with that was a really stupid question. They're met with that. And all I can I picture in my head they're confident, I picture them sinking as they're getting these answers, and that does not build up their confidence at all. We're just making them feel even worse than probably what they already felt like. They were scared to answer this question or ask this question to begin with.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:57

They were scared or they got the answer, just go shadow someone. And I'm like, you better stop it. You better stop. Why? How is this a help? How are you helping this beautiful person right now? I just think we should be a lot kinder to people who are newer to this industry and and try to remember back when you were new. How did you feel? What kind of direction would have benefited you the best? You know, and most likely it wouldn't have been go shadow a complete stranger and just try to figure out how to even do that in the first place, right? But it would have probably been gain your certification right out of the gate so that you are instantly plugged into a community who genuinely loves and cares about you and wants to see you succeed. That right out of the gate can help someone and boost that confidence to a level that is so inspiring. And I love newbies, Chrissy, because well, I remember I was the newbie on the block 180 years ago, right? And I remember how the experienced group, only one other wedding planner that existed, but they were a team, and they were very cold to me. And they did not open their arms. And that's why I love newbies, is because they have fresh approaches, they can see things from a different mindset. And I love hearing what my newbies go through so that I can actually help guide them to honor their fresh outlook, their fresh, more innovative way of thinking, but also make sure that they have all of the information that's going to help actually support that and keep. that sustainable that is so important to me but not very many other organizations and Facebook groups have that ideal and that that actually breaks my heart so yeah when you and I see people being a little less welcoming than they should be uh you and I's hearts literally break yeah completely and I think about your journey too Lori when you started you were 18 I was 18 that is baby and when I think about 18 years old that that to me means that's usually at 18 you don't have a lot of confidence usually you're anxious you're a little bit nervous and you're launching a business and I the fact that you were met with that makes my stomach hurt it makes me sad but you were a child I would have been like come let me help you yeah I it was it I was on the struggle bus there is no getting around that I was I was I was challenged at every turn I was not welcomed with open arms until people saw that I was attracting the types of clients that they wanted and then all of a sudden you know oh maybe we should welcome Lori and I'm like well you're gonna have to treat me a little bit better uh and not be such a poopoo face because I'm not gonna be taking any of that nonsense right but it really helped me grow into the wedding planner that I am today and it helped me grow into the educator that I am Jay because I have been on the other side. I have been brand spanking new I had to fight tooth and nail to become an enormous success. So I know what it takes to actually you know achieve these types of of dreams. Let's just they were my dreams so you may didn't know how to achieve those dreams so that you can keep this business in a sustainable way.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:44

Our next question kind of ties into being new and it says should I work for another planner first or start my own business?

SPEAKER_01 1:31:51

That's a really great great question. I think it really depends on you as a human being so I have a pretty simple answer and Chrissy feel free to kind of just jump right on in here but I feel as though if you know that you eventually want to own your own business then you have a couple of choices. Yes you can go ahead and work for an already established wedding planner but please be honest with that wedding planner letting them know that you have aspirations to one day open your own company. That way the owner of the company can make their own educated decisions on whether or not you are the right fit for their company today. So please don't go in with keeping things under your hat because when you do decide to move on from this existing planner and you say well I've always wanted to own my own company they're gonna say why didn't you tell me because I probably would not have spent the last five years training you if you were just going to move on and become my competition right so I think we all owe it to not only ourselves but to anyone who is willing to take a chance on us honesty. We owe them honesty. So that's option one. Option two is just to go ahead get your wedding planner certification we have the 2026 wedding planner certification program out right now we got released five months early and it is designed specifically for those who are wanting to own their own business either one day or right now okay so I would go ahead and if you know as another option go ahead and get your certification and think to yourself I could work for another planner for five years building up their reputation building up their referrals and uh their testimonials and reviews or I could jump right in with my own company and start developing my testimonials and reviews and recommendations and referrals. So it really depends on the person. Yeah and there's no right or wrong answer to which direction is the best way to go. It really has to do with making sure that you're being true to yourself because I want those wedding planners and coordinators that want to eventually own their own company I want you guys to remember that when you are working for an already established planner you are not able to take any photos or testimonials from that company to use toward your brand new business as you open up five years later. You can't take those are owned by the planner who you worked for you can't take that you can't use any of it. So you have to ask yourself okay do I want then to work for someone else for five years and then start from scratch five years from now or do I want to start from scratch right now and start building my own business. And if you're fearful that you won't know how to do that, that's why certification is so important is because we actually teach you exactly how to achieve this goal.

SPEAKER_00 1:34:54

I'm so glad you mentioned that Lord because that was at the tip of my tongue was well don't forget when you leave you can't take those things with you anyway.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:01

Right.

SPEAKER_00 1:35:01

You can't a lot of people think they can but they cannot so keep that in mind whenever you're trying to figure out what journey you want to start with your wedding planning career. The next question we received was how do I compete with planners charging way less than me?

SPEAKER_01 1:35:15

Wow okay you're not supposed to really be you're not competing with them anyway. I don't believe in competing on price I believe in competing on quality of service. So that's why so many of our members once they went through our certification they told their competitors about the certification because they don't want to have to compete on price it really should come down to we this is the general price that all of us charge. These are the services that most of us all offer but it should come down to who meshes really well with us. Are you my ideal client? Am I your ideal wedding planner or coordinator? You know this is my approach how does that approach align with how you would like your approach to be we all have uniqueness but our uniqueness does not typically lie in the services that we offer I mean it does just slightly but most of our uniqueness comes from our approach and who we are and how we show up, what our values are and things of that nature. So anybody who's charging far less than me, then I would recommend that they receive the same certification program that I took so that they can now get on the same page. And if they don't you're not competing with them really at all because what you can do is remember you have certification. So if you're certified and someone's charging way less and they're not certified then what you can say is to every single couple is I'm a certified or I'm a master certified wedding planner. And let me tell you why that's going to matter for your wedding. And so if you're educating your couple as to why you're so awesome, this is this is going to help you.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:57

Exactly and that's exactly what I did Lori with my market whenever I first started there was only a handful of wedding planners in our market and every new one that popped in I immediately introduced myself and said welcome to this crazy industry. I'm so excited for you and introduced them straight to certification because I wanted us to all be on the same playing field. And I mentioned to them too the thing is I don't want to book every Saturday you're not going to want to book every Saturday. So the phenomenal thing about this community is when you become certified I can recommend the clients I can't take, I can recommend them to you and vice versa. And you can end up booking all of your bookings through my recommendations. But with that I would love for you to get certified to make sure that we're on the same level when it comes to our pricing and also what we know and how we operate.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:41

And because you're not going to want to recommend your clients to someone who does not necessarily know the best practices and in the way to plan weddings if you're not going to recommend someone who who plans weddings backwards, right? You're not gonna you're not gonna be inspired to do that. So putting us all on the same level allows us to send business to our wedding planner besties that are out there. Yeah exactly exactly so Lori what do you say to vendors who tell couples that they do not need a wedding planner you can always ask the vendor so how would you like me to phrase that they don't need you no I'm kidding you don't want to say those things but you can say that all day long guys can you imagine okay great so I'm just gonna tell my couples to get their iPad and a speaker and we don't need a DJ how about that exactly so it doesn't make any sense but you know a lot of times what happens is it's all about education to your vendors. And so just like we're educating our clients on why certain things don't work it's also just as important to educate your wedding professionals as to why we do work and why we're such a necessity and we're just as much of a necessity as they are and letting them know we are the repeat customer. So when you are an amazing wedding professional and you're someone who is wonderful to work with and you're someone who really sees and understands our value as wedding planners or coordinators, there is a huge chance you're gonna make it on my approved vendors list. And what happens when you're on my approved vendors list is you're going to get recommendations and referrals consistently and it's it helps to explain it in a way of couples come to you and they're only going to need your services once. But me, I'm coming in and I am that repeat client I'm that repeat couple if you will that is going to constantly be saying I need you again need you again so if we can work together and find a way to see each other's value that is going to be huge. Now I have to also say here that maybe the reason why that vendor is saying this is because they had a terrible experience with an uncredentialed wedding planner.

SPEAKER_00 1:40:03

Well literally in my brain that was what I was going to say is that I feel like when I run into this with vendors it's because they've worked weddings with a wedding planner who is not a certified wedding planner. And it's I usually get to the root of so why do you think that your couples don't need a wedding planner and they say gosh well I've worked this wedding planner who got me so behind on my timeline. They were not fun to work with blah blah blah I've worked with this wedding planner before and I'm like well guess what I am not like that wedding planner I am a certified I'm a master certified wedding planner. Right I value education but I also value our relationship I value allowing you to be able to do your job. Yeah on the team just know your focus is just going to be on what you do and know that I'm fun to work with you know I let them know all these things because I'm indifferent. Yes man, the switch in their brains I've had vendors who say well great I'm no longer working a wedding unless a wedding planner certified I know I've had the exact same experience and I'm like this is great.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:00

Yeah because once they see what it's like to work with a true professional someone who who cares about every single hired wedding professional every single couple every single piece of the wedding party every single guest we care so much about the venue the venue's policies the entire staff when someone sees someone come in because we're the conductor of the orchestra if you will right when someone comes in as a conductor who's never even read a piece of music in their life you're going to feel the difference on that wedding day but you you have a conductor who is a master in this piece right and in music and has practiced and has takes continuing education and really honed their skills you can feel the difference and then those wedding professionals are never going to want to work with anybody else but you.

SPEAKER_00 1:41:53

Yep. And it's it's a beautiful it becomes like almost a beautiful mess when you have these great relationships with these vendors because they recommend you for almost every wedding and if you cannot take every wedding that happened with me with the venues in my market my smaller market where I was like I promise you um you're gonna want me on property all the time it's gonna be such a difference and it did become such a difference where I was having to turn away so much business and they were like wait a minute we want you here like I can't be here every weekend. I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:20

That's why we need to have those wedding planner besties right that's why we need to have other certified or bouncer certified wedding planners that we can refer business to so that they can pick up that slack that we can't and and it's so it's not about oh well I just must have better I better get a bigger team so that I can just not ever turn away people it's like no hold on how about this how about we spread the wealth amongst other wedding planners and coordinators that's what it should be more about they're gonna send business to me I'm gonna be sending business to them and it's gonna be this gorgeous collaboration of like minded wedding planners and coordinators who care about the industry as a whole.

SPEAKER_00 1:42:58

And Lauren that kind of segues into our next question which is how do I deal with the guilt of turning down weddings?

SPEAKER_01 1:43:06

Well I don't think you should have guilt I think it's okay to say gosh I'm so sorry I'm booked and it not be automatically well I better hire someone because here's the other thing there's so much that you have to think about when you're hiring people it's not just as easy as I'm going to call someone up and say hey do you want to um help me plan some of these weddings it's not like that because there are IRS laws and there are state laws and you have to classify your workers properly and if you're not classifying your workers properly you can pay a lot of back taxes you can uh get into massive trouble you can even go to jail. Oh not everyone looks good in orange guy so please keep that in mind. It's not everybody's color Chrissy so I think it's important that that you don't fall into that trap and be okay if either you're already booked for that date then you're not gonna feel guilty. Feel honored that you have someone that you can recommend to them or your other the other reason why someone would have to turn down a wedding is maybe they're not your ideal client. But just because they're not my ideal client doesn't mean that they're not going to be someone else's ideal client. And I have to make sure that we're not thinking so highly of ourselves that well if I don't like these people then nobody else will like them. No even horrible people have friends. Have you noticed that I mean they're engaged for crying out loud like if they're a horrible person someone loves them. Someone has devoted the rest of their life to this person. So there are just some people that mesh well and some people who don't so recommend them to some of your favorite planners and coordinators it might work out beautifully it's up to each coordinator or each wedding planner to decide if this is the right client for them. It's not up to us to determine it for them. So please make sure that you're taking yourself out of that equation. But I don't think we should feel guilt for trying down weddings because they're not all for us.

SPEAKER_00 1:45:02

Exactly and you cannot be booked every single Saturday there does you do deserve to have some time off and keep that in mind also I feel like people feel a lot of guilt of like oh but they really want me and then next thing you know you're overbooked yourself and next thing you know you've burnt out and then you're crying every single day. Every single day and then next thing you know maybe your doors have closed like it it can it can get to that point you don't know how to say no or turn clients away.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:28

I agree with you completely.

SPEAKER_00 1:45:29

Well Lori our next question is is it unprofessional to only do wedding day coordination?

SPEAKER_01 1:45:35

So we have to talk terminology I think before we go any further here so day of it there's no such thing as day of coordination or coordinator. And let me explain to you why um day of implies that I don't need any meetings leading up to this. I'm probably not going to be putting together any special itinerary I'm not gonna have any kind of communication prior to or leading up to the wedding day that gives me lists of all the things that are going to be set up. I literally will be going in blind if I am just showing up to the day. If I'm only showing up on the day up then I need to also have some sort of clairvoyant skills or stuff are your mind reading skills up to par is what you're saying here. So there's really no such thing as day up but if you're talking about just coordination okay if you're saying is it unprofessional to only offer coordination services and not offer full service planning the answer is it is absolutely not unprofessional at all. If you only want to offer coordination services which typically start about 60 days prior to a wedding and that's why we don't call it month of because our services don't start 30 days before the wedding it always starts 60 days prior. So if you want to only offer coordination then that's what you should do. But when you also offer only coordination I want you to understand that you still need to understand all of the details and and what it takes to plan a wedding so that your coordination services will go smoothly because there's no way you can coordinate something that you have no idea got you there in the first place. Good point. The next question is how do I stop giving free advice in consultations and it kind of reminds me of the why buy the cow you're giving away the cow you're literally gifting them a cow and and you're left with no milk and no cow like you have nothing left right so uh it is so so vital okay that because it's hard. I I want you guys to understand this is so so hard because you're gonna have clients at an initial consultation asking you questions that you feel obligated to answer.

SPEAKER_00 1:47:48

Yeah yeah kind of because you feel almost on the spot yeah and you need to show them well I know what I'm talking about so I want them to know I know what I'm talking about. But in doing so you end up planning their wedding yeah you're giving you all the secrets.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:00

Here's what you need to do if someone says something like who do you recommend we hire for a DJ or who do you typically work with or whatever however they decide to phrase that question I always say oh my gosh I've got some of the very best entertainment providers and that's actually part of our packages that I cannot wait to share with you that I am actually going to be curating specific professionals based off of your personality your budget your communication style the types of services that you're looking for I will curate options for you that would fit you like a glove. So that's part of the services that I offer so I can't even answer that question yet because I haven't even had you haven't hired me we haven't had our onboarding meeting so I can really get to know you in ways that will help me then curate that specialist so that we can dive into the vendor selection portion of the process. So don't worry we will get there right that's how I would typically go.

SPEAKER_00 1:49:00

But it is it is hard because then if you're like me you get really excited and on in my head too when they're talking to me I'm already planning their wedding. Yeah because I'm like oh I know I want to I want to do this I want to do that or we can do this we can do that. Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:12

But I don't know not until you pay me to where you're like okay no I've got to remember and I used to have to like pet myself up and give myself a my own pep talk of stop giving away the cow knock it off or knock it off. Right. It's because I mean young Lori was like let me tell you everything that I know right it's just like no I gotta pull I got to rein this back in so no it's really about making sure that your mindset is is ready for that initial consultation. You need to be prepared for when they are going to ask you questions. And if it if their questions are going to require answers that come with any type of service package then you can say that's actually part of the services and we can even customize something if you only need that service I'd be happy to just you have you hire me just for that service and all by itself I can do that because we have an a la carte pricing list as well. So that way you are able to kind of steer the conversation back in and you know how to answer those questions without giving it all away.

SPEAKER_00 1:50:19

Eventually they get the hint and then they get the hint like okay I basically I just need to make sure I hire this person.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:25

Exactly. Oh been there done that do that again no I know you won't I remember when you went through that and that was awful you know here's the key don't get yourself in that position in the first place. And what I mean by that position is you need to make sure that you know exactly how many weddings you should take per month so that you have downtime. One of my favorite interviews that you did over the years Chrissy was with our 2020 wedding planner of the year which was Annelyn Calderan and she is from the Philippines and she's oh my goodness kind of amazing wedding planner right just off the charts off the charts and she said something so profound that I was thinking to myself I wish every single wedding planner had that same philosophy. And she all she always said I need to have rest between weddings so that I can bring the very best of me to each one of my clients' events and so she almost called it quarantine she quarantined that's how she worded and I thought I love that so much. Yes it was beautifully said and I you know and I don't think she necessarily meant the word quarantine but at the same time it helped us visualize exactly what she was saying is I I need a weekend in between so that I can readjust. I can get back all of the rest that my body needed I can get my mind back where it needs to be because when we're tired when our body's tired our brains don't function as well as they would if we were at full rest so she literally only takes one every other weekend and she does not waver from this Chrissy.

SPEAKER_00 1:52:19

Which is so smart because when you think about it if you're doing back to back weekends so we Friday night Saturday Sunday you're typically just so physically drained you're in a wedding coma yeah basically and then have a wedding coming up then that Monday you are right back in the office gearing up for that other wedding. Yeah you're not giving yourself two days of rest that sometimes you really actually need in between weddings.

SPEAKER_01 1:52:44

And you're not allowing yourself extra time to plan future events too. When you have yourself in this back to back mode you are always planning for the weekend coming up and that does not allow you to take on new clients so that you can onboard them properly. It does not allow you to plan for the weddings that you've got six months from now because you are so jam-packed. And that's why it's just so incredibly important that you do get certified because we talk about how to not overbook and talk about how it's really about managing your time better and not taking on too many weddings that you can't handle. And I think we even did a podcast on I think was that one of that our first one I think the first one was about getting ghosted you're right it was the second one and it was I have too many clients so we're at episode 100 and we're let's go back 98 episodes ago which was years ago right and yes that one was all about I took on too much what do I do what I do so go back to that if you want to hear more about that.

SPEAKER_00 1:53:49

Our next question is can I really make a living doing this or does it need to be a side hustle?

SPEAKER_01 1:53:55

Oh girl you can make some serious coin doing this. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:53:57

And I think my favorite question comes from like wedding guests or family members who are like so this is what this is your full time job like yeah this is this is what I do for a living and they're like so what do you do Monday through Friday? What do you do during the week?

SPEAKER_01 1:54:10

And I'm like okay right because a lot of people don't understand that we work all day Monday all day Tuesday all day Wednesday all day Thursday all day Friday Friday night for rehearsals all day Saturday we work Saturday night a lot of times we're in a coma on Sunday and then we're starting it all back over again on Monday morning. So it is this is why we're rated the third most stressful job in the world it's one of the reasons is because there's so much work that has to be done and there's really very little time in between if you're taking those weddings every single weekend. You can take one every other weekend and still make a great amount of money but you know what you need you got to know your numbers okay and that's what I teach in the in the wedding planning certification program alongside of you. It's all about making sure that you know those expenses you know what's coming in you know if you need to raise your pricing a little bit you also know how much money you need to make after all of those expenses so that you can contribute to your your home expenses there is so much that goes into that process. So not knowing your numbers and just planning blindly is not going to be beneficial. And a lot of those new planners that say oh I'll charge$500 per wedding they think that's a lot of money because how many industries can you make$500 in a day it's not as common. So it sounds good on paper but if you break down all that it took to get everything lined up and ready plus all of the physical labor on wedding day and the rehearsal the night before now you've gotten paid a lot less than you thought. Yeah working for like a dollar fifty an hour and that is probably not going to pay your bills. Exactly so it's really important that you do know what goes into it and that's why certification is also so important so that you can make this a living and turn it from a side hustle into what you do full time. But you know what that's going to take and this is what you and I educate all the time it's gonna take for a little while you're gonna have to work two full-time jobs.

SPEAKER_00 1:56:24

Yeah that's why I feel like calling it a side hustle is hard to say I don't really think this is a side hustle because it essentially becomes you working two full-time jobs. Right. Side hustle is uh when I had bounce houses where I would just go and deliver a beautiful white bounce house, drop it off passive income because it didn't require hours and hours and hours and hours of work leading up to it. So uh what is I don't think it's a side hustle at all.

SPEAKER_01 1:56:48

It's in fact you're gonna two two full-time jobs you can't do this job as a side hustle at all. This is not one of those I'll just do this a little bit unless you're willing to just take one wedding per year. Now if you are willing to just take one a year I want you to know it's still going to be incredibly time consuming but it's not going that I think you can call that a side hustle. Yeah it's just one cute little baby one a year. But if you're gonna do it right and you want to do it all the way, you're gonna have to put in all of the effort and still work your full-time job so that you can make this your living. Now if you're lucky enough to where maybe you don't have another full-time job and you're wanting to make this your your full-time gig, then you that's gonna be so much easier because you can just pour all of your your heart and soul right into this company and you're not gonna have to split your time uh you know with something else. So hopefully that's the way it goes for you.

SPEAKER_00 1:57:41

I guess even I one of my um dear friends she's a certified wedding planner but she got her certification because it was a quote side hustle. She she her friends and family were just asking her to help them with their weddings because I knew she was very organized and creative but she didn't even want to take them on without education.

SPEAKER_01 1:57:58

She's like I don't want to mess up you know even though I'm not she's like I have no desire to do this full time but I want to make sure I know what I'm doing before I even take all my friends and family's weddings and I was like well done that tells me a lot about that person right I mean that person obviously values themselves values the couples that that they were wanting to help and valued uh you know the industry and their friends I I love that that means so much to me when I hear people and even if it's not my certification that someone chooses please make sure that you are looking into making sure that whatever certification you choose look at their reviews my gosh some of the most expensive ones that are out there have the worst reviews I've ever said I'm like how do they keep getting business but this advertising there can you know I don't pay for advertising advertising can attract a lot of people that that will just believe it because it's expensive well it must be good because of the price that is not always the case especially the certification program. Yeah exactly just take it a step further and look at those reviews yes all right well we've got two more questions and this one is how do I explain to my family that this is a real career so I think that the reason why this person asked this question this way is because a lot of times we are working from a home office and sometimes our family thinks well then so you can like make cookies and you can clean the house and do the laundry and like can you run a few errands? Can you make a couple calls to the bank we're working and so I try to make it very very clear to everybody that I know is if I don't pick up the phone, there's a reason and it's probably because I'm right in the middle of something and I try to let them know how detailed I have to be in order to do this job well. And so what I have to do is block my time zones out on my calendars and Whenever I'm doing a block, I am 100% concentrated on that block. That means I'm not going to be able to answer your text. I'm not going to be able to take your phone calls. I'm not going to be able to run to the bank. I'm not going to be able to switch out that laundry at the exact time that you were thinking I need to be switching it out. I can't just drop everything I'm doing because I just because I'm a wedding planner working from a home office does not mean I don't have client meetings back to back, that I'm not working on a timeline, that I have to really concentrate and review all of these contracts. There's so much that goes into this. It's hard to explain to family members that this is in fact a real career. And so you can go ahead and show them that stat of us being the third most stressful job in the world.

SPEAKER_00 2:00:44

For me, it's so funny because when I first started, my cousin, who's he's basically like a brother to me, he would help me on wedding day with like any heavy lifting. And I remember the first couple weddings he used, so he was like, You don't get paid enough for this. And I'm like, You don't. I was like, This is the easiest part of the day. He's like, All these people and their personalities, everyone coming to you with questions. He was like, This is stressing me out. And I'm not even near you. I'm just setting up these chairs. And I'm like, Yeah, it's it's a lot. And even my sweet uncle who helped my mom, my mom used to be a wedding for us, and she had a really big wedding where we were multiple trucks of stuff, and he had a moving company, so he used his company to help with some of the bigger stuff, and he stayed all day and he he was so blown away by both of us. He was like, I'm just you work so incredibly hard. He was like, I just can't, it's so much more than people realize. He's like, People see the end result, which is the beauty that you guys create. No one sees how much it took for y'all to get here because he helped her that week up too, like cleaning bases, buckets. He during all that process, and he stayed for a room flip and was, you know, saw me in action. He was like, he calls me sissy, and he's like, I'm just so blown away by you, sissy. You just did so good.

SPEAKER_01 2:01:55

And like it's it's there's no way to to adequately express how much work goes into this position, this job, this career path that we're on. And all I wish people felt was my feet and how my feet feel at the end of the day. Like, if you could just be inside of my body for two minutes, you'd be like, Oh, this isn't good. So, yeah, you've got to make sure that your family maybe sees what happens. And I remember, you know, my I brought my husband in early on and let him help me on some wedding days, and he immediately got it, but he still didn't necessarily get it like the during the week stuff.

SPEAKER_00 2:02:38

Yes, that's my husband too. He still he respects me, he understands I'm clearly bringing in an income. Yeah, it's clearly work, but during the week, he'll be like, Hey, can you run by uh I'm like, no, no, no, that's not gonna happen.

SPEAKER_01 2:02:54

But you know what? How about you do that on your way home from work? That'd be awesome. Uh, because I've got a few more phone meetings to deal with. We have we it's so hard to explain it, but just do your best. And sometimes even showing your calendar, that also might help. But I also find that I don't really want to feel like the need to explain every single thing I'm doing to people. Just like I wouldn't call them at work 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and expect them to just leave work to go run a quick errand. I I when I say it like that, like, well, can you do it? Well, no, I can't do it. I'm at work. Well, me too. Me too. My work, though, is just not in that kind of office. It's it's at our home office, but it's the same level of respect and responsibility that I have. So just like you can't just take off, uh, neither can I. When I explain it like that, sometimes it it resonates a little bit more. I don't have to ever explain that really with my husband, but I have had to explain that to friends and family.

SPEAKER_00 2:03:56

Yeah, totally get that. Well, Laura, this is our last question. Oh, what boundaries should I set from day one? Oh, that's a day one. Lori Hartl and I love boundaries.

SPEAKER_01 2:04:09

Boundaries is they're amazing. Boundaries are absolutely amazing. And so I would say from day one, office hours, but I don't want just these boundaries created for clients. I want the wedding planners and coordinators to put these boundaries in for themselves. Your office hours are from nine to five, but you're working from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. That, my friend, is a direct path to burnout. You need to start work at 9 a.m. and end at 5 p.m. and figure out a way to make your business efficient. That's how this has supposed to go. I mean, period the end. There's nothing more to it. You but I find that so many coordinators have these office hours that they send to their clients, but they're not respecting those office hours for themselves, and then they wonder why they're so exhausted and burnt out and don't want to do this job anymore.

SPEAKER_00 2:05:02

Well, that's why. Yeah, you're working 24-7. Yeah, you are not the 7-Eleven. We're not Walgreens.

SPEAKER_01 2:05:08

No, no, I'm not the 24-hour open Walmart. That's not what I am.

SPEAKER_00 2:05:13

Well, those are gone after COVID. They haven't come back yet.

SPEAKER_01 2:05:16

Oh, see.

SPEAKER_00 2:05:17

My sister and I were just talking about that. We were like, why Walmart has never come back to the 24? Even Walmart, you guys, is no longer 24 hours.

SPEAKER_01 2:05:24

So Walmart now has boundaries, is what you're telling me. Okay, so this is nice. It's good to see. We need more examples of boundaries of companies that have these boundaries. So, yeah, I mean, that's that's what I would say. What are your thoughts?

SPEAKER_00 2:05:39

That was my exact same thoughts was having your office hours in place, but doesn't want you to piggyback off of what you mentioned to respect them yourselves. It's so easy for us to be middle of dinner, pick up our phones and return a quick email. That we've got to know how to stop doing that. You've got to be able to have those office hours and know that you are more than just a wedding planner and a business owner. You have other roles in your life, whether you are a spouse, a partner, a friend, a daughter, a brother, whatever your role is, husband or wife, you got to make sure that you're also blocking off time for those roles.

SPEAKER_01 2:06:15

I love that because it you what you want to do too is maybe have a visualization of a costume change. And I feel like when I mention this to some of the wedding planners and coordinators that we have coaching sessions and mentoring sessions with, you've got to think, put whatever design the wedding planner hat. What does that look like? That's the one that you're gonna be wearing during the day, during your office hours. The moment that you are done with that day, let's say it's five o'clock, you're gonna take off the wedding planner hat, okay? Take off the wedding planner clothes, go to the next portion of your home and put on the I'm at home. I'm I am Lori Hartwell, right? Now I'm the the Lori Hartwell that I'm gonna change into my pajamas, right? That's just what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna get on my slippers, I'm gonna do my thing, and I'm going to hang out with my husband. We're gonna cook dinner, we're gonna watch our shows. I am not going to answer one email when I leave this office. That is the way it has to be in order for my sanity to stay intact. And too many wedding planners and coordinators violate their own rules and boundaries.

SPEAKER_00 2:07:25

And too many of them end up being completely burnt out to the point where they no longer love doing what they do. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:07:37

Yeah, those two things are really, really good. You're right. Uh, but make sure you're changing that costume. And I think when we change our costume, uh it's going to help your mindset shift as well. And that's going to be really, really helpful. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 2:07:51

Well, Lori, that's it. That is our hundredth episode. And what a journey this has been. And I'm so grateful to have you here to celebrate this milestone. I'm also grateful to be a part of this podcast and be a part of the CWP Society. So to everyone listening, thank you. Thank you for your questions, for sharing your challenges and victories with us and for being a part of this incredible community that we have built together. Whether you've been here since episode one or you're just discovering us today, you're exactly where you need to be. And you know, as we reflected on some of our favorite episodes, one thing became crystal clear to me. The planners and coordinators who invest in their professional developments are the ones who are thriving. They're the ones who are confidently handling difficult conversations, setting those boundaries without guilt, and building businesses that supports the lives they actually want to live. So if you've been listening to this podcast and thinking, gosh, I want that level of confidence. I want to be part of this community. I want the framework that will take my business to the next level. Certification through the CWP Society is your next step. This isn't just about adding letters after your name, it's about gaining the education, the systems, and the support that will transform how you show up in your business every single day. Head to our website, cwpsociety.com to learn more about certification programs and find out which path is right for you. Trust me, future you will thank you for making this investment. And Lori, cheers to 100 episodes and hopefully 100 more.

SPEAKER_01 2:09:20

Cheers back to you, my friend.