Planning a small intimate wedding in Las Vegas is super-duper easy thanks to the photography based all-inclusive packages offered at Electric Sugar Elopements.
The venue, photos, florals and an officiant are all included. And while those are the most important elements, you should also consider adding other vendors to make your wedding day totally rock.
Services you may wish to add include hair and makeup, live music, transportation, videography, or even reception services. And unless you’re in the events biz, have planned a wedding before, or have experts in all these categories on speed dial. you may have no clue how to go about getting any of these lined up.
This blog will teach you how to score true pros so that you and your true love can have the micro wedding you’ve always wanted.
General Tips
If you spend as much time in the Las Vegas Weddings & Elopements Facebook Group as I do, you’ll start to see a lot of the same questions over and over. Once couples lock down their wedding venue and photography package, they start looking for help on the rest of the pieces.
If you choose to join the group, and pose your question(s), you’ll get potentially dozens of recommendations and people raising their hands wanting to help. It’s a great community and I love being a part of such a diverse and helpful group.
After scrolling through responses for a while it starts to get repetitive. So, if it feels like you’ve seen enough, you probably have. Now, you can reach out to a couple of your favorite vendors in each of your needed categories and work your way through them from there.
,At the upper levels, it’s a small world in the Las Vegas wedding industry and I know many of the great professionals who are members of the site and take time out of their busy days to help inquisitive couples find answers. They’re great people and you’ll learn a lot by perusing the group posts because I know they are actively in there responding all the time.
The other great way to score stupendous service folk for your special day is by seeking recommendations from the members of your wedding team that you’ve already hired. Each of us has a short list of other professionals who we love working with and can’t wait to suggest. Being familiar with the other people on the team makes things so much easier and your photographer, for example, will already know the working styles, habits, capabilities and preferences of the other pros. When I get to work a wedding with vendors I already know, it’s much easier for all of us to make your experience amazing.
Hair & Makeup
One of the most sought-after professionals in the Facebook group is a good hair and makeup person. Seek out someone who has lots of experience doing the type of hair and makeup style you want. Go to their websites and their Instagram pages to see their work. A good artist will post their recent work, and not just photos of styled shoots. You’re hoping to see real life examples of real brides that they’ve done up.
Then it’s time to ask questions. If you are worried about specific beauty concerns, ask how they address those things. This may include hooded eyes, super thin eyebrows, sparse eyebrows or lashes, thin lips …. whatever it is you’re concerned about. Ask.
The same goes for your hair stylist. If you have thin or fine hair, curly hair, straight hair, etcetera, then be sure to ask how they work with it. Their answers should make you feel comfortable they’ll do you right on your wedding day.
In case you’re wondering, I always recommend my good friend Amelia and her team at Amelia C. & Co.
Live Musicians
Nothing captures the mood and magic of your special day like the right song played at the right time by a live musician. Guitarists, harpists, violinists and others elevate your wedding to a place that a Bluetooth speaker just can’t.
When searching for a live musician you should consider a couple of factors. How long will they play for you, and how long have they been a professional musician? There’s obviously a sweet spot for every couple when it comes to budgeting for this, but it’s rare that a young professional with minimal experience (who will charge you a cheaper fee) can keep up with a seasoned pro. You can tell the difference by the way they present themselves online, and over the phone when you are talking to them. If they don’t sound serious when you call to ask them questions, then why would you expect them to treat your wedding ceremony or reception with the respect it deserves? If they don’t have a robust website with lots of samples of their work, then what can you expect from them on your wedding day?
Musicians are kind of like photographers in that lots of amateurs think they can do it to drum up some extra cash between gigs. But dedicated professional musicians are always better and worth the extra money. One of my favorites is Josh at Six String Weddings.
Transportation
Whether you’re hoping for a sweet set of vintage wheels, or a slick new limo you’ll probably want to shop around for the right ride for your wedding day.
You could just wing it and take a ride share, and I think many couples do that. But if you want to arrive in style, a run-of-the-mill Toyota Highlander or Kia Sorento you’ll probably get randomly paired with on a ride-share app is not the answer.
Professional transportation alleviates a lot of stress when it comes to finding the location, getting there and being able to relax on the drive to and from your ceremony. All the drivers know the locations well and this alone provides couples and their wedding parties with so much peace of mind!
To get hooked up with a great chauffeured experience I highly recommend you work with my fantastic travel concierge, Steve Winders. Steve offers a beautiful fleet of vehicles ranging in size from luxury sedans to luxury coach buses.
Vintage cars are more difficult, have more restrictions and may not actually provide a way to get to and from your ceremony. If you read the fine print, you’ll see that many of them are just props for photos or require that you use the owner as the driver. My biggest tip is to read all the details and ask lots of questions.
The preferred classic car vendor of my sister company, Cactus Collective Weddings, can be contacted using this form. Vehicles available include:
1955 Ford Thunderbird
1961 Cadillac Convertible
1961 Cadillac Series 62 Convertible
1962 Cadillac Sedan DeVille
1966 Cadillac DeVille Convertible
1965 Ford Mustang Convertible
1968 Ford Mustang Convertible
Videography
The standard all-inclusive wedding packages at Electric Sugar Elopements do not include videography, so I also like to talk about videography pros when discussing vendors.
Videography is another art form that is subject to interpretation, so the best thing you can do is to pick one whose previous work you really like. Make sure the samples shown by the videographer you’re considering are from real weddings. Like photographers, videographers need to have more in their portfolio than just styled shoots and staged videos.
If you want to learn more about my guy Joe and his work, check out this blog he and I did recently.
Many camera people just getting started in the business will try to undercut the price of experienced videographers, but I DO NOT recommend you go this route. My number one tip for booking a totally terrific videographer is to get the best one you can afford.
Receptions
In addition to all the coordinating I do for couples here in Las Vegas, I also have a close cousin currently in his engagement era. He recently mentioned that the number of people on the guest list for his small micro wedding is starting to creep up. This happens to a lot of couples, and before you know it, you’ll be needing to add a reception to what you thought would be a You + Me elopement.
Instead of scrapping all your already in place ceremony plans in order to start the search for a new double ceremony/reception venue, you should consider adding reception services from a dedicated reception coordinator.
These local experts know all the best spots and can put together an all-inclusive package that compliments your ceremony package. My girl Teresa at Gather After can hook you up with everything from the venue and menu to entertainment, photography, decor and more.
The relationships that she has cultivated with a select group of elevated lounges and restaurants are clutch for helping pull off the party of your dreams.
In many cases pairing your reception with your ceremony is the easiest way to go about it. But with a little creative planning you can have an outrageous ceremony at somewhere like the Punk Rock Museum and then hop across town to places such as the swanky speakeasy Wax Rabbit or a stylish steakhouse like Barry’s Downtown Prime for your reception. A well-connected reception services coordinator can help make it happen so you can make the memories.
Content Creation
If you’ve been scrolling through TikTok or Instagram in search of wedding inspiration, (and I know you have lol) chances are you’ve seen hundreds of posts that were shot, or edited (or both) by a content creator. But you may not have realized that’s where this sort of stuff is coming from. Look for candid pics and vids native to a vertical format that show more of what goes on during your wedding day than what the traditional photographs capture. If it looks amazing but you’re wondering to yourself “What couple has the capacity to capture all this content on their wedding day?”, then you’ve spotted the work of a wedding content creator.
If you’re new to this, it’s time to get on board. Here’s a quick refresher:
While traditional photogs take pictures with a powerful large-bodied pro-level camera (or cameras) to deliver high quality and timeless images to cherish forever, BTS photogs use a smart phone to create media that can be delivered quickly and uploaded within hours not weeks.
Essentially, it’s a batch of raw photos and videos couples can get their hands on right away so they can speedily share pics and flics of their special day. No more waiting for the traditional photos that have to be processed, edited, uploaded or printed. You’ll still get those of course, but now you can get some shareable goodies before the wedding weekend is even over.
It’s all the rage for couples wanting to share their special day with their online followers. More than any other trend, hiring a content creator for your wedding is THE new wedding trend you don’t want to miss out on.
My biggest tip when it comes to hiring a content creator is to just do it and ask questions later. The types of young creatives that are doing this sort of wedding day work are the go-getter types that have this figured out before the rest of us, and we just have to trust them.
People like my girl Ashlyn at Make My Day Media are perfect for this.
My Team is Ready To Help Hook You Up
If you’re still wondering how to secure a top-notch vendor for your special day, let us help. My team of wedding industry professionals have years of experience and love making your dreams a reality. Vegas is for dreamers afterall, and we can’t wait to connect with like minded couples seeking the most fun way to get married in Sin City.
Get in touch today.
