Welcome to our “Day in the Life” series! We feature wedding and event planners from around the world with many different levels of experience. If you would like to be featured, download our questionnaire here and email your responses and photos to info@plannerslounge.com. We are excited to feature Chantal Holik a wedding planner from Croatia.

Name: Chantal Holik

Business Name & Location: Croatia

Years Working in the Event Industry: 5 Years

Years Owning Your Event Planning Business: 2 Years

Website: https://www.serendipity-weddings.com/

Business Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/serendipity.weddings.croatia/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/serendipityweddingscroatia/

What is your typical day like?

I usually start my work day at 9am, with the mandatory cup of coffee in hand served in my favorite polkadot mug. First, I would check my emails and prioritize urgent ones to answer straight away and snoozing the others for a later time in the day. Of course, new enquiries from couples are a top priority and need to be answered as soon as possible. I go through my to do list for the day and see if I have any meetings booked, so I can organize my time around them. My work day is a mix of emails, RSVP lists, moodboards, budget tables, vendor offers, planning proposals and of course, marketing and social media. As I work from home most of the time, I would sneak in a chore or two if I have the time and I always make sure to take a break of work, which is best used to take my dog Choco for a walk and get me some fresh air. I would usually wrap up work around 5pm, after which I have some online classes to attend (my motto is “never stop learning”) and in the evenings I like to relax with a good book or watch a tv show with my fiancé Tin, who is also a co-owner of our wedding planning business.

How did you get started in the industry?

I have a degree in hotel management and most of my experience comes from work in hotels, both in my home country Croatia and in Ireland, where I lived for a couple of years. Once I found myself working in the event department of a hotel, where I had the chance to plan weddings, I knew there was no going back and that this was the right job for me. After gaining experience as a hotel wedding planner in several hotels in Ireland and Croatia, Tin and I decided it is time to open our own wedding planning agency. To make sure we provide the best possible service, I enrolled In the wedding planning academy in Croatia and got my official certification as a wedding planner. I continue to work on my skills by attending webinars and other online and live educations whenever I can.

What inspires you?

I love to seek inspiration in the fine art wedding blogs such as Magnolia Rouge and Carats & Cake. Of course, Pinterest is always and amazing source of inspiration and every time I get a new idea on a wedding design, I rush to open a new board on Pinterest and to start pinning pictures that go with it. I also follow so many inspirational colleagues from the wedding industry around the world (planners, designers) that I honestly feel inspired each time I open Instagram!

What are your favorite online resources for your business?

One of my favorite tools to use for wedding planning is a brand-new start-up from the UK, that just recently launched at the Bridelux event in Paris, called That’s The One. Their software makes RSVP management and wedding guest accommodation seem like a piece of cake and is honestly a true asset to all of our couples. Their new features will include table plans as well, which I am really looking forward to.

WedUploader is a new thing I also discovered recently, where you can make albums for each of your weddings and create a unique code which the couple can share with their guests, so they can upload from their phones all of the pictures they took on the wedding day. It is connected to Google Drive, so basically the day after the wedding you already have a bunch of photos to look through, which is a nice thing as the professional photos will not be delivered for a couple of months.

To make our admin tasks as easy and painless as possible for our couples, I love to use Calendly for all of my meeting scheduling and eSignatures for signing contracts. With Calendly I just send a link to them and they can book themselves in at any available timeslot. In eSignatures, we have the contract template already imported, so we only put the names of the couple and the date and the system sends it over for them to sign electronically, making it quick and easy.

Aside from wedding and event planning, how do you spend your time?

I don’t really have much time for hobbies, so when I am not working I mostly focus on spending some quality time with my family, go for a movie or a play with my fiancé, try to catch up with some friends. As we travel a lot for weddings, when we have some time off, we usually prefer to spend it at home, relaxing.

Chantal, thank you so much for taking the time to share your story and a day in your life. If you are a wedding or an event planner and would like to be featured, download our questionnaire today and email it to us along with a photo. If you aren’t sure about being featured, take a few minutes to read how it can help your business.