Vendors who give the industry a bad name

The wedding business is Nairobi is big business. It keeps growing and everyday there is room for new business to open and flourish. I have an interest in this industry since 2005 and slowly I've seen brides who stand out as unique in their wedding in their demands to quality service and telling a story different from others. Before many vendors and brides and grooms relied heavily on bridal magazines and exhibitions to source for vendors that anyone getting into the business had to invest heavily on these two forms of advertising to get word out there of their existence.


How things have abruptly changed with time. Social media has made it easy to access new vendors at the market and practically everyone is spoiled for choice. In the past there were bad business practices that took a really long time to come to the public attention. This is different today, thanks to social media. There are Facebook pages like buyer beware that brings to your attention bad business practices, who to avoid working with and people who have been conned can easily speak on this platform and other Facebook pages that cater for the wedding industry needs.


Someone had suggested in one of this pages of the need to avoid cheap vendors hence the problem of working with rogue vendors will not arise. I beg to differ with this. The way different vendors charge always means a lot of factors have gone into their final costs, which can differ from one to the other and once one is comfortable with their profit margin, well the variance in price and quality of work received comes in. Due diligence is required in vetting who the vendors are that work for you. You get what you pay for in terms of quality and service at most times but no one pays to be conned of their hard earned cash.


There are many marketers who can promise you alot of what their company can offer but if this isnt stated clearly in a contract, it becomes your word against theirs. This isnt any different with those marketing in the wedding industry. There are local organization, event mangament bodies that have been formed. This vet the vendors who are their members and getting a vendor from them always means finding a reputable one. Working with referral from friends and family who have had experience with such vendors has helped a future bride and groom avoid a rogue vendor.


I love it when new vendors in the industry are given a chance to prove their worth. You maybe impressed by what new talent brings to the industry. But more so do your homework right. Not everyone can afford the same type of wedding but you can find a good vendor for whatever budget you have.

Wedding guest entertainment

Been meaning to get back to writing. I prefer talking to it but once in a while, I remember to update this blog. Today happens to be one of those days. Exactly, a month ago, I attended a wedding as a guest. Every time I do that I get to see what pleases or annoys guests from their point of view. This can be from delayed food service, cold food, not enough sitting, location of the restrooms, inadequate parking. The list never seems to end. I do like the ones who give compliments where it is due as I feel that they appreciate good service.

Back to the wedding that I attended. It was for a family friend and everything went well as scheduled. There was a band and mcee hired that gave me ideas for this article. What would one consider good entertainment for guest. A lot of the times in local settings, the photoshoot happens after the ceremony as guests are having lunch at the reception. It is at this times that a lot of the wedding entertainment is enjoyed. How does one decided what is good entertainment for guests? Most weddings around play similar songs that many dance to. What can easily be enjoyed across varied age groups.  It can be something quite popular or at least it has to be to get guests out of their seats and on the dancing floor. Even though the bride and groom eventually join the dance, its usually for a shot time when you factor in the time their photoshoot takes and the traffic to join the reception depending on the day of the week.

The wedding I attended, the mcee had us dancing at particular times kneeling. While I enjoyed the music and the dance and his style of commanding the crowd, my knees weren't as forgiving once I got home that day.

Wedding flowers: fresh, dried, artificial.

Sometimes, I forget how time flies very fast. Its already February and March is just slightly more than two weeks away. I started this article on wedding flowers in December and still had two more articles to do. On average in most local weddings, fresh flowers are preferred. Though I must say, I admire brides who dare to be different in wedding flowers.
 I have always loved fresh flowers and if it was up to me only work with them. In the past, I have worked either with fresh, dried or artificial alone. With so much changing tastes in wedding clients needs, I'm more than open to experiment. Today, I'll look at those 3 categories and working them on our arrangements.

                               Fresh flowers.

This are my speciality. I love fresh flowers and would work with them any day. With flower food for them, either bought or whatever your home combination for yours are you keep them fresh longer before starting work with them. I admit, they are alot of work but they fun to work with. I love the smell of fresh flowers to a wedding reception or venue. Even though they are delicate to transport, how they transform an event can never be understated. Roses, carnations and calla lilies are readily available at low prices in Nairobi. That makes it easy to have a variety of arrangements of fresh flowers at affordable costs.

                                  Dried Flowers.

Another area worth considering is this. There are brides who chose to keep some of their floral arrangement after the wedding and this is a great way to do it. This can be her bouquet, and even some centre pieces. Once in awhile, you might find a bride who chooses to work with dry flowers for all their arrangements. It can be pricey but transporting them is much easier than fresh flowers which are usually a bit fragile and can break easy. None the less, dried flowers make for good arrangements too and can be cheaper on the bride if the vendor is willing to hire them for the wedding.

                                    Artificial Flowers.

There is plenty of this in the market. Whether you work with silk, feather, or any other artificial flowers available. The thing I like about them is they come readily available in almost all colors imaginable which is usually a limitation on fresh flowers. When I work with flower ball or pomanders, the artificial ones are lighter than fresh flowers. Even when it comes to flower wall, the artificial one is usually lighter than the fresh flower one. Though both are labour intensive, I still prefer the fresh flower one myself.

 Incorporating all of them into one wedding is fun though not everyone feels that way. Either way, there is no shortage of flowers to use locally.

Wedding Flowers

When it comes to fresh flowers for weddings locally, we are not without varieties. From different types of roses, tulips, gerberas,lillies, gladiolis, varieties of ferns, snap dragons, carnations, and the list goes on and on.                  

The constant changing weather patterns of rains, sun and cold affect finding certain varieties of fresh flowers in particular season. One thing is sure though, irrespective of the changes, there is always fresh flowers available to use in weddings. Flowers play an important part in wedding décor and whether used little or much, flowers can still make a difference to your event. There is one habit that stands out amongst many local brides and that's to pay wedding vendors at the last minute. This can work against you if specific flowers are needed for your wedding. It helps to ask the florist early enough about the availability of your preferred flowers during your intended month of the wedding.A rule of the thumb is: its never too early to start planning your wedding flowers. What determines the appropriate flowers to use for your wedding would be the budget you are working with, the floral designs you want to achieve, your bouquets, centre pieces and basically the overall theme for the wedding. This article is a first series of 3 that I will be considering on wedding flowers.

Bridal shower

I was to do this article on monday but that was not to be. I was called up by a prospective client who turned out to be a con artist. Good thing i caught onto their scheme before its too late.  A future article will deal with fraudsters and how to handle them.

image from web

 Today i would like to consider bridal showers. Recently on a page i follow on Facebook there was the question of who should host it and an increasing demand on bridal shower planners in Nairobi has made me write this article.  Someone mention the sister of the bride, another the bestmaid while still someone else felt that its the mother of the bride. 
Irrespective  of who does it, its a wedding tradition  that many keep at it.

 Image from web

 A commom feature of the bridal showers in Nairobi is alot of advise being given to the bride on the life ahead of her and alot of gift showered on her. The ladies gathered also sometimes get to play games together.  The event can be themed and usually the bride isnt aware it's organised for her until the material day when she is surprised into it. There are brides whose shower is all inclusive of gifts for the whole  house while some also get to have a bridal kitchen party where they get all the appliances and kitchenware that they will need for their kitchen once married. Last year i remember  being invited into a bridal shower that the organiser split the ladies into groups. Every group had been assigned a different part of the house: living room, kitchen, bedroom  and bathroom.  I was assigned to the names under the kitchen list and we had to pick an item to buy and bring to the shower from the list as a gift to the bride. Her idea was to ensure that no one bought the same gifts also that we could only get what the bride needed for her house and not what she already had. I  didn't attend due to reasons beyond me but would have wished to see how the event turned out. Besides that list, she provided us with one that had food items we would consume for the ocassion. That way it would be less burdensome to the host.

Image from web

 Deciding who foots the bills, what is done and how to get the bride to the event all require forethought. The  success of the event irrespective  of the amount used or activities planned relies on how well its organized. Just as there are budget weddings  there are also bridal showers that run on a tight budget. The organiser has to be aware that most of the guests on the bridal shower locally are already either bridesmaids to the wedding, a family member or someone with a role to play come the wedding.  If they feel they already are spending so much on the wedding, the idea might not be so welcomed if they spend more than thet are willing to do so. Here  is the scenario : if this person was called up to raise cash for the wedding as a committee member, she also took  the bride home during the customary families meet up before the wedding, is a bridesmaid and has to spend on her outfit, makeup, shoes and accessories for the wedding then they might just be feeling that they are planning their big day and not helping a friend out. If thats the case make the burden less on them.



 During bridal showers the bride gets to spend time with ladies who are close to her or the groom it can be fun and affordable to everyone involved.

Chocolate Brown color themed wedding.

Today I'd like to look back and feature a wedding that I did in November two years ago. She was a lovely bride working with. In fact, her wedding was my first  encounter with choral pink. She was was calm from the months we started planning right up to the end. I met her and the groom in social media, Facebook to be precise (works wonders with certain clients.)

Looking for choral pink amongst suppliers wasn't a walk in the park then. The good thing that I had a sample from the bridesmaids dresses that could assist me in sourcing for the required color. By then few stocked it hence we had to change the decor color all together to burnt orange and chocolate brown. While the bridesmaids wore choral pink, the maid of honor stuck with chocolate brown.

I was skeptical meeting some of their wedding committee members. Nothing was wrong with them or I hadn't heard anything that would cause this but past experience with a few committee members who sat on different weddings has not always been a pleasant experience. More like walking to be interviewed by a panel a second time even after the bride and groom's approval. Sometimes, someone in the committee ends up changing what you have decided with the wedding couple as they are in a way "financing'' that particular wedding. On this particular wedding, that was not the case. Its the best wedding committee I have so far worked with from start to finish.

On the wedding day, the ceremony service was to start early and being a November, the rains too had their early start. This meant changing the original untented location for the ceremony as guests would have been rained on. The best part was that both ceremony and reception were on the same location. Interestingly enough, the rains ended half an hour to program start and we ended up with a sunny weather. The wedding team I worked with was excellent. The vendors all worked well and everything pulled together beautifully.

Frugal Bride

Ive been missing from my blog for 3 months. I considered it a necessary  break. i made time to look at my business from a different angle. My core business has always been wedding  planning and i have had many other support businesses on the side: catering, card business,  decor and sewing. Some are working out and some arent. i needed time to evaluate  what to keep and remove  from my list completely.  The former accountant side of me had to come in play. So within  the next 6 months, I'll have dropped some of my support  services and decided on a new business  strategy.

Now onto today's  article. I prefer to use the word frugal instead of budget bride. I still believe anyone can be on a budget. Even someone  with a million, five million or even five hundred thousand shillings  are all on  type of a budget irrespective of the amount  to spend. i had the opportunity to work with a frugal bride.  She was very economical in her spending and i must admit i can also refer to her as both a budget bride and DIY bride .

She had a budget like most would  but the goal was to lower it to almost  half the amount she had intended  to spend. She knew what she wanted and wouldn't  let last minute pressure change that. For a while the wedding dresses i have seen (not in terms of design), in quality of lace used to make hers was of really good one. She had taste but was very considered of how much she would spend while not compromising anything despite the pressure. Even when it came down to the food for her guests. she took time to select the best and had her caterer make and serve it.  She took the shortest time to plan a successful wedding. I work with all brides that are great and unique but this one left me with great lessons to learn from her.