Become a Wedding Planner

Learn the essential skills in wedding planning and start your new and vibrant career as a wedding planner. 

How can this course help you?

• Set up your own business as a Wedding Planner
• Expand the services you can offer in an existing business (eg. as a celebrant, wedding photographer, caterer, event planner)
• Improve your prospects for employment (or promotion) in businesses that provide wedding services; bridal wear shops, reception centres, event management companies, resorts, etc.

Some wedding planners may already have worked within the wedding industry in some way as a florist, photographer, in a wedding shop and so on, and decided to expand into a larger area of wedding planning. Working in those areas is not essential before becoming a wedding planner, but they are useful.

A wedding is typically a very stressful time for most people and that fact brings with it certain special considerations for the wedding planner. There are lots of opportunities for wedding planners with great planning and project management skills, who are also great communicators. Once you have the fundamental skills from us, you can do the rest with your vibrant personality.

Imagine how rewarding a career you can have to make the day of two people who are in love work like clockwork with amazing precision?

Course Duration

• 100 hours
• This course is self paced -study where and when you want

Course Structure:

There are 9 lessons in this course:

1. Introduction: Covers the nature, scope, opportunities and options available when planning a wedding. Looks at different types of weddings, understanding ceremonies (different religions, celebrants etc), receptions and working with wedding photographers, reception centres, churches etc.
2. Planning: Choosing locations, services, products to use from reception centres, rings, the church or venue, catering and flowers. Also covers themed weddings, destination weddings and off-beat weddings.
3. Managing People: Handling different personalities and the role of different members of the party.
4. Managing Locations: Reception, Church, Photo Shoot Location, Pre Wedding Hen/Stag Parties etc.
5. Managing the Programme: Arrivals, Departures, Ceremonies, Speeches, Entertainment, Eating, Drinking, Dancing etc.
6. Other Issues: Photography, Video, Flowers, Clothing, The Beautician, Invitations, Stationery, Gifts etc.
7. Managing the Client: Interviewing a Client, Facilitating a Plan, Budgeting, Establishing a Contract; Management Techniques, Flow Charts, Check Lists, Schedules.
8. Managing the Wedding Day: Planning for Contingencies.
9. Operating a Wedding Business: Naming your business, dreaming up the plan, designing a web page. Advertising, PR, Costing Structures, Finance, Contracts, Insurance, Starting a Business, Cancellation Policies, Industry Associations, Building Relationships with Service Providers.

What skills does a wedding planner need?

• Enjoying working with people
• Excellent communication skills
• Enjoying planning big parties?
• A good negotiator
• Good at networking
• A good facilitator
• Good at money management
• A good listener
• Friendly and outgoing
• Can you calm frazzled nerves
• Do you know about flowers, colours, cutlery? (or can you find out about them).
• Flexibility with your time
• Able to work at weekends and evenings
• Disciplined enough to work in your own home and organise yourself
• Can you do more than one thing at once
• Do you know about wedding traditions
• Can you keep ahead of wedding trends – keeping up to date with bridal magazines etc
• Well organised
• Great project management skills
• A good fashion sense
• Can you help create that dream wedding

Why Choose to Study with ACS?

ACS has been running distance education courses since 1979; and has built a unique range of resources and services that you simply cannot get from other schools. We have learnt over the years that every student needs to be treated as an individual if they are to develop a unique set of attributes that sets them apart as an employee or business owner.

Education simply does not work as well when you take short cuts -which is why our modules are each around 100 hrs (longer than many other schools). 

Study more, learn more, be more successful. 

Service -we don't restrict the amount of support from tutors -we don't use automated answering services -we have real teaching staff at the end of the phone, or on line, every day, during work hours BOTH in Australia, and in the UK, who will give you whatever time is needed to help you complete your studies

Quality of Tutors -just look at the tutor profiles. All tutors hold degree equivalent qualifications or better, and have at least 5 years of industry experience -many colleges and even universities don't set the mark as high for their teaching staff

Range of Services -We will provide support services that you simply don't get at other colleges; including careers advice, assistance with developing a C.V, opportunity to publish your work, opportunities for marketing a graduates business through our internet presence, and more.

Sustainability -Other colleges come and go; even government institutions, because they depend heavily on government funding to survive. We have been around for over 30 years, are very solid and independent of the influence of government policy changes. We guard our independence, and take pride in providing the best education we can.

PHOTOGRAPHING WEDDINGS CAN BE A BIG JOB

A wedding is something very special. In some cultures they last for days; and even in western culture, there can be occasions before and after the wedding that need to be planned for (eg. a bucks or hens party, the honeymoon).

Even if the wedding is all centered around one day; there will probably be several phases in different locations, starting with the bride and groom getting ready, traveling to the ceremony, the official ceremony, traveling to the reception (perhaps via another venue for photographs), then the reception.

This can easily add up to four or five different locations that a wedding planner needs to arrange for; and a wedding photographer needs to plan the photography of.

Consider what photos might be planned at each location.

Following are examples of some pre- wedding ceremony shots:

• The wedding dress lying on a bed or over a chair
  
• The last stages of dressing eg. zipping or buttoning up the wedding dress
• Bride with her mother fastening the bride's necklace or adjusting a head piece 
• The bride's garter
• The bride's veil
• A shot of the bride's shoes exposed from under the dress  
• The bride looking into a mirror
• The bride looking out of a window
• The bride and bridesmaids applying lipstick
• The bride pinning a corsage on her mother or father 
• The bride hugging her mother or father
• The bride getting into the wedding car
• The bride’s parents leaving for the ceremony
• The groom putting on his tie 
• The groom looking into mirror
• The groom pinning a corsage on hie mother or father
• The groom hugging his mother or father 

Being prepared is critical for every aspect of a wedding; from the food to the photography, and the venue layout to the clothing.

Weddings are the most important event in most lives; and as such, most people consider them worthy of any effort (or cost). Becoming a wedding planner can be rewarding in so many ways; not only financially, but at the end of the day, giving you the satisfaction of being such an important part of the most important day in so many people's lives.

Read our Article- How can a wedding planner help plan a wedding?