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Party Decoration Sets the Tone for Your Event:Party Decoration: An Interview with Florist and Party Decorator, Richard KiscoWhat kind of services can a company providing party decoration and and flowers for parties and special events give you, what should you know and what should you expect?This past Fall, I interviewed Richard Kisco of Le Fleur/The Princeton Flower Shop to find out. Using his company as an example, we look at what such a company can do for your special event-and give you some planning and decorating tips, also. Here is our interview.EMZ: OK, I thought the best way to get started is to tell us about party decoration and what your shop offers. RK: What we are is a, we have three separate divisions within our company in which we are able to serve our clients. One is, we have a full retail flower shop. Number two, we have a division which is Special Events, which includes weddings, Bar Mitzvahs and corporate events. And we have a wholesale party and prop rental company in which you can rent props, drops or other items to make your event special. We use those in our own special events and corporate work, but we also do rent them out to vendors, event planners, hotels, restaurants, country clubs, and individuals. EMZ: Oh, very interesting.OK, tell me more about your Special Event division. RK: In our Special Event Division, we specialize in weddings, mostly social events, we will do weddings, parties, Bar Mitzvahs, soirees, themes parties and we do do corporate work, black tie work and work for national fundraisers. We do that in the tri-state area. (PA, NJ, and DE). EMZ: OK, and what do you do for these events? Where does party decoration fit in? RK: What we will do is help develop, with the client, a particular theme or concept that they would like to have. From that we will then do a proposal in which we will be able to offer certain ideas, meaning whether we go into customized linen and overlays, whether we provide candles, candlesticks, and candelabrum, fresh floral arrangements or prop centerpieces, chairs or chair covers, theatrical and specialty lighting. We will do plant rentals, themed flats, so we will create the whole event from beginning to end. We do not do food. EMZ: So if you were going to put a name to this, our audience is people with little or no background in party decoration or special events, what would you call what you do? RK: Really what it is giving the ambience to the party. Bringing the magic to how people would like the party to proceed, to put that special touch to the event whether it is a social event, which is a either a wedding, Bar Mitzvah, or Anniversary party. Or if its a corporate event, to get across the idea of an elegant evening, a wonderful fun time. And a lot of times our clients would like to theme it. It doesn’t have to be elaborate and over the top. It can be very simply done and very elegantly done. Other clients like things which are a little bit more dramatic. EMZ: What happens if you're a client that walks in and doesn’t have a clue about party decoration or event planning? RK: What you do is start from point A. You ask them their name, their address, the date of the party, where it’s going to be. You actually walk them through...What do they envision? A very famous line is... “Well, we’ve never done this before.” We know. But I’ve never done your job before. So this is what we do for a living. I’m here to help you. I can understand that. You’re an attorney and you’ve never gotten married before. Well, I can’t get up in court and defend a client. That’s your expertise. So what you’ve done is come to someone who does have expertise and experience. We have portfolios, we have 35 portfolio books we do have a web site, we photograph our work. We have pictures on our wall in the conference room and all of that. To raise the comfort level we’ll give them a list of clients who have worked with us, if they want referral lists. We are probably on every major catering facility in this area’s recommendation list. That’s been what’s really fun about dealing with each individual client. Every party is totally different. The Planning ProcessEMZ: That sounds neat. Can you give me a feel for where you and the whole subject of party decoration comes into the planning process....you get someone who is starting from scratch, they’re planning a wedding, they’re planning a fundraiser, whatever, what will they be doing first, second, third, and what point should they be calling you for your party decoration and other services?RK: Normally what they will do first, and what we have seen in the years I’ve been in the industry, is, first if it is a social event, they will pick a date. Once that date has been confirmed, the next idea or the next area that they would normally go to is a facility. Whether they are going to do it in-house which means a country club, hotel, or a private club. Or they decide they are going to do a tent or an off-premises facility meaning they are going to tent their back yard or they’re going to rent a facility to tent. Or they can rent a facility that is not normally used for events but can be rented. For instance, we’ve done events in parking lots, we’ve done events in parking garages, we’ve done events in warehouses. So there are a lot of interesting areas where you can do an event and totally change the concept of the space. How people will go for a space whether that’s a country club or another facility. Then what they would normally do is deal with food. If they are in an in-house facility they will deal with the head of Food and Beverage and their catering director.If they are on an off-premises facility like an old mansion, or other facility they will bring in a caterer. Most of the times the caterers are recommended. Or they will have a recommendation list in which they will interview one or two. What they will do is meet with the caterer and then pick their menu. Party decoration and other decisions will be made or the information will be gathered up, how many guests are they inviting, the time of the party, what kind of party it is going to be. And the decision of whether we’re doing a stand-up wonderful cocktail party, or we’re doing a seated dinner or a buffet. All of those decisions will be made by the client, but normally it’s done within a process. After that 90% of the clientele look for bands or music or entertainment. Party decoration tends to come down lower on the totem pole. Before us would probably be invitations, and after that would be the the decor, the floral, fresh flowers, centerpieces, what ever needs they still have. If its a wedding, it might be thinking about the ceremony area and what would be done there, what would done for cocktails and then for dinner. If it’s a Bar Mitzvah it would be temple flowers and what we would do for Kiddush. Or an Oneg on a Friday night, or what we would do for the party on Saturday. Whether it’s a luncheon, an evening event, whether it’s smart casual or black-tie. And if any of the children or the thirteen year-old decided to pick a particular theme. Or the family has just decided to make it a wonderful party. Corporate, then, would do, most of the time our work would come either directly through the corporation or we might be doing it in their corporate facility and they just want the facility to change whether they are doing team building, or they’re having a convention or they’re having an annual meeting. Most of the corporates are handled through their public relations department or meeting planning department. If it’s a black-tie fundraiser, normally that committee has an organization of volunteers in which somebody would chair the event or there are two chairs. They would have a committee. We would probably sit down with the decorating part of that committee to develop an idea, concept, a theme. We already know the place, who is the caterer... They can give us an estimation of how many guests. From there, they would say to us, this is what we are looking for, we’re doing an invitation, we’re looking to have, say, a very Roman feeling. Once they say that, we can take that and develop that. Then we go next to color, linen choices, columns, columnades, palms, plants, parthenons, pediments, Roman heads, statuary. So you develop it. More about the process and planning of Party Decoration
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