Not planned anything yet? Looking for hen party planning tips? Don’t panic! All you need is a roadmap to show you which steps you need to take to kickstart your hen party planning journey.
We recommend you follow these five steps BEFORE you contact your guest list or book anything! They will help you establish what the bride wants, who’s doing what, how much it will cost, and set a date. Remember your hen party guests want to have as much information as possible when they hear from you.
It may seem like a lot of work but it should save you time and effort in the long run! And you are less likely to have guests drop out later in the game. So here goes, five steps you can follow to kickstart your hen party planning today…
First things first, you need to get in touch with the bride to be. After all, you want to make sure you plan the hen party the bride to be actually wants. Contacting the bride and asking her some simple questions will make your life a lot easier. Asking the right questions will take the guessing out of the planning. And it should make decision-making easy as pie!
TOP TIP: Read our blog post ‘Top 5 Questions To Ask The Bride‘ and ask all the questions today to kickstart your planning!
Having these answers at your fingertips will mean you don’t have to send the bride lots of emails. Trust us, it will help you more than you realize!
(If you are planning this hen party on your own, skip this step and head straight to Step Number Three!)
Before you book anything, establish who is planning the hen party with you. The likelihood is it will be bridesmaids, family members or close friends.
Next up, ask the bride whether she wants one specific person to be in charge of planning the hen party. This’ll mean you will know whether you need to run any decisions past anyone. If there isn’t anyone to answer to, delegate tasks to each other and make joint decisions. Either way, it’s a good idea to reach out to your fellow hen party planners and establish who can help with what.
TOP TIP: Play to your strengths! E.g. if someone is particularly good at cooking, it would make sense for that person to be in charge of food.
Below is an example of how you could split out tasks between five people:
Establishing a budget early on is one of the most important steps you need to take. If you asked the bride the ‘5 Questions‘ in Step One, you will have an idea of what the hen party budget is likely to be.
Before you move on, do some quick sums! Get some approximate costs and work out how much the hen party is likely to cost. Make sure the budget is realistic and matches up with what the bride wants from her hen party. You don’t want to tell your guests it will cost £50 per person and then realize you can’t afford anything!
You may need to go back to the bride and let her know that her budget is unrealistic. She can then decide whether she wants to increase the budget or change her hen party expectations.
TOP TIP: Don’t forget to include the cost of the bride in your calculations if you are paying for her. If your guests don’t mind, split the cost between all the guests to make it more manageable!
Once you have a realistic per head cost, you can move onto the next step.
If you followed step one, you should know which dates the bride to be is available. Next up, find out whether everyone planning the hen party can make these dates. You may need to include bridesmaids, family members and close friends in this step.
(Extra Step: Once you’ve found a date, you may need to check it with other bridesmaids and family. I.e. anyone close to the bride who isn’t helping plan the hen party.)
Now it’s time to contact your guest list! It may seem like you’ve done an awful lot of work to get to this point. But trust us by putting in the legwork early on, it’ll save you a lot of potential future stress. It means that by the time you hit send on the first email, you will be able to give clear and concise information. Here’s what your first email should cover:
TOP TIP: If they’re the only dates available, ask the bride to decide which date she prefers! Don’t feel like you have to make that decision because it can be a toughie.
By the time you send the first email, you’ll be able to give your guests a clear and concise rundown of the hen party. Hurrah! And what’s more, you’ll be clear on what you need to plan. By now, you should have a clear idea of:
Not too shabby…By waiting to send this email until after you have figured this out, your guests can make an easy decision. It will most likely mean you’ll get fewer emails and questions from guests too. Bonus! What’s more, it’s less likely guests will drop out later in the process! We’d say it’s well worth the effort.
We hope you found these hen party planning tips useful! Comment below and let us know which step you found most useful! 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5?
We know hen party planning can be tough! There is a lot to think about and it can be easy to get overwhelmed. That’s where we come in. We want to make life easy for you. If there is anything else you’d like us to blog about, let us know below in the comments.
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