by Susie Weiss

The obvious duties of a wedding consultant are to assist you with your wedding plans and coordinate the events of the wedding day. But there are many more roles that the consultant plays during the months prior to your wedding.

Manager
Your wedding consultant will manage the funds you've allocated for your wedding by means of a detailed budget on paper. She will see to it that deposits are made in a timely manner to insure bookings of your service providers and she will create a payment schedule to keep you on track with subsequent payments. She can help manage your time, offering choices from which you will select that can create the wedding you desire with a minimum of unnecessary time spent doing so. On the day of the wedding she will manage the various service providers so that the events of the day are seamless.

Negotiator
While your wedding consultant will likely not bargain with your service providers (to respect the published fees of each service provider), your wedding consultant will offer advice as to package choice, things to include or not include within the various packages and can offer cost-cutting suggestions without the appearance of creating a budget wedding.

Confidant
Your wedding consultant will keep the information you share with her in confidence. Very often family dynamics regarding budgeting (who is paying for what), divorces and blended families can cause a strain on the bride. Your wedding consultant will be there for you, if only to listen

Partner
A talented wedding consultant provides a positive partnering with all your service providers so that the team effort is always in place, egos are left at the door and the ultimate goal of a stress-free wedding day is achieved for the bride and groom, their families, the bridal party and the wedding guests.

Counselor
No wedding comes without the occasional (or frequent!) etiquette question. Your wedding consultant will be able to provide you with the correct information so that everything you do regarding your wedding is socially correct or within the parameters of good common sense.

Dresser
An experienced wedding consultant will arrive on your wedding day complete with all the items necessary to take care of any of the little emergencies that may come up. Some obvious items are needle and thread, super glue, headache remedies, hair spray and steamer; some examples of not-so-obvious ones are straws (to keep lipstick fresh), jumper cables, mole skin (to keep rough, inside edges of gowns from irritating the skin) and an extra bow tie. Your wedding consultant should also be trained in CPR and have available other first aid items in the event of a physical mishap.

Friend
Even though you have entered into a contract with your wedding consultant, a friendship is often born due to the many hours of time the two spend together. This friendship helps to insure the care necessary to perform in everyones best interest.

Scheduler
Your wedding consultant will create a detailed schedule of the wedding day activities to include a list of all service providers involved and contact numbers; an overall wedding day schedule; a photography schedule which is designed primarily to insure that pre and post-wedding photography is on time and includes all those that need to be a part of it and a transportation schedule outlining pick-up and drop-off locations and information about what parties are included in the hired transportation.

Magician
No, your wedding consultant will not saw anyone in half at your wedding! However, she can pull rabbits out of a hat if last-minute substitutions need to be made (wedding service providers are human and occasionally illness, family emergencies and scheduling issues can create a situation where a last-minute substitution needs to be made). She can also juggle lots of balls and do a balancing act so that all needs are taken care of without the appearance of stress or overwork.

A talented wedding consultant should be able to fill all of the above listed roles and many others probably not listed here! So when interviewing prospective wedding consultants to hire for your wedding plans, pose several "what if" questions to her and gauge the response. If the responses come easily, she's the one for you!