Since my husband and I started this blog, quite a bit of the inquiries we've gotten from brides-to-be have been about our coordinator, The Best-Case Scenario Events. Last night, I got another email from a soon-to-be bride saying that she read my post about booking with the owner, Camille Vivas, [see Wedding Coordinator - Check!] but she would really like to know how the entire coordination team did at our actual wedding. I gave her a brief overview on Best-Case, but I also promised her I would finally do this post, so here it is! Brace yourself though, because since the coordinator is the only supplier that dealt with every part of the wedding, this is going to be a long one.
Camille (in metallic gray), just looking after things at our reception. (Photo by 4play Band)
As I posted in my first entry about Best-Case, my husband and I had a hard time finding a wedding coordinator. No one we knew whose wedding we liked could recommend their coordinator wholeheartedly. (It was really surprising, actually.) I had a couple of coordinator contacts too, but we had reservations due to personal relationships. In the end, it came down to research and gut feel. We looked up the coordinators of the weddings we liked online, and decided to go with Best-Case. When we met up with Camille, we were really impressed with her professionalism, resourcefulness, and creativity, and we just felt like we clicked with her. Coordinator -- check!
Best-Case packages are mid-priced. They're not in the range that could be considered affordable for most brides, but they're also not in the extravagantly priced range. I think for our entire wedding we chose a lot of suppliers whose services weren't cheap but also weren't super expensive. Trust me when I tell you though, that Best-Case is worth it.
We went for the Day Coordination package. We liked that though it's only on-the-day coordination, Camille starts work one month before the big day. She is also available on email for consultations from the time you booked. During our preparations we communicated mostly by text and email and met three times. We were too busy with work and the preps during the final month that we just didn't have the time. We also had a lot of confidence in Camille and her team at that point and didn't feel like we needed more meetings though she was open to them.
Our first meeting was the booking, where she presented to us what her team is all about, and we gave her a general overview of what we wanted for our wedding. She also gave us a few supplier leads to start with, as well as some logistics ideas. We emailed a ton during all those months of prep, and she gave us loads of helpful advice with whatever we were unsure with.
Our second meeting was a month before the wedding, and that's when we hunkered down and went through every detail, dilemma, and supplier. We turned everything over to her, and from then on she was in charge of supplier contact, keeping track of the balances, scheduling, etc. She also helped us with some last-minute supplier bookings that we somehow didn't get to, like the entourage flowers, host, projector, sounds, and mobile bar, which saved us so much hassle. She was able to negotiate good deals for us, and her taste in suppliers were exactly in tune with ours.
Our third meeting with her was with our host, Atom Ungson. We discussed what we wanted in the program, pinned down the program flow, and figured out really quickly how to work together at our reception. Camille and Atom worked together before, so they were already a good team right off the bat.
The Best-Case Scenario Schedule (Photo by MyPhotato | WeCelebrate)
On the morning of our wedding, The Best-Case Scenario team arrived early. They breezed into our rooms and simply took over. The group was made up of one bridal manager, two all-around assistants, one floor director, and one technical director. Aleq and I somehow just let go of all our stress and worries -- maybe even a little too much because somehow, we just completely forgot to check on things. We were so relaxed and happy on the day of our wedding that we realized afterwards how lucky we were that Best-Case was so on top of everything, because if we had a less-than-capable coordinator, our wedding wouldn't have been as great. However, we also think that it might have also been the opposite -- we simply had a lot of trust in Camille and her team and knew that they would pull it off.
When they got in, coordination just went into full swing. They took care of the suppliers arriving, they made sure everyone (us plus our families plus the suppliers) had lunch, Camille burned our ceremony CDs right there in my hotel room because Aleq and I are such crammers and sent her the songs only the night before. They even took our unfinished escort cards which I was going to have one of my cousin bridesmaids help out with and they painstakingly stuck the cards on a hundred-plus oranges themselves, as well as helped put together everything else. There was a group that picked up all the materials for the church and left immediately to set up. The second group plus Camille left a little while after for the reception.
Best-Case with Jeon Varon from Edwin Uy, helping me get into my dress. (Photo by my friend Sheva)
The bridal manager assigned to assist me in whatever I needed was amazing! She was there beside me for everything, especially when it was just me, my dad and the photographers left at the hotel because everyone else already left for the church. She made sure I didn't forget anything. She helped appease my dad who is a total stickler for time and always wants to be an hour early. She helped me with my enormous dress in the bathroom before leaving (that was bonding right there lol). She had water ready for us during our photoshoot after the ceremony because she knew Aleq and I would be feeling hot. She took our picture for us in the bridal car. She helped me change into my reception dress. She even had my perfume ready for me (and I completely forgot about it) so I could freshen up. I seriously don't know how I could have managed without her that day. I didn't get to be with the rest of the team much, but Aleq said the guy assigned to assist him was also just as amazing.
The bridal manager helping me with my veil outside the church, which was threatening to fly off with the wind. (Photo from our friends Hilda and Joel)
Our wedding had no hitches to the best of our knowledge! The ceremony and reception program all went smoothly. There were no pauses or gaps, or sound/visual technical glitches. Camille also handled everything herself and didn't stress us with problems like seating. She and her team found solutions to anything that popped up. They never really came to us so we could solve a problem ourselves. Camille also trained her staff well. They knew exactly what they were doing. They're just like her -- they're methodical, they're organized, and they just get the job done. Like the bridal manager told us in the bridal car, it's their job to stress out so we could have a worry-free day.
We're really lucky that we found an extremely creative, professional, and detail-oriented coordinating team. We've heard so many nightmarish, traumatic stories of weddings that fell apart because the coordinators weren't very good, late, unorganized, didn't know the program, left too early, didn't care, etc. We're truly grateful to The Best-Case Scenario Events for giving us a wonderful wedding. We relied on their expertise, and they delivered. It was worry-free, indeed.
Very nice wedding your coordinator is very good!
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