My mother told me never to say the 'C' word, yet here I am jumping on the Christmas bandwagon in late October.
Hear me out though... for those of you who take the holiday season super-seriously when it comes to throwing the best, most extravagant, most Waitrose food-laden, John Lewis decorated parties - then I hope our top 10 tips go someway to helping you out.
The thought of planning a Christmas party can be a frightening one; due largely perhaps to the fear of somebody else you know throwing a better one. It’s a big deal!
You’ve got a lot of people to please; friends, work colleagues, your boss and maybe even clients. They all want to have a good time but they most likely have totally different ideas of what constitutes ‘fun’ and, whatever you do, they are likely to be posting photos of it all over Facebook.
It’s possible that you are totally organised and have already planned your Christmas Party but don’t be over confident, there may be something you’ve missed, which is why we’ve put together the following Christmas party planning tips.
So here it is, our huuuge blog post, with our top 10 tips for planning your Christmas shin-dig. Oh, and don't forget to download our party planning excel spreadsheet below. It will help you to manage your budget.
Free Christmas Party Planner
1 - Set the Date
Date and Venue are particularly important in December. Venues book out EARLY, and so do people’s diaries, so it’s best to get this sorted ASAP to ensure you get the Christmas party you want. In fact, if you haven't already booked somewhere, it could be too late... stop reading this and find a venue now!
• Firstly pick some dates that you think will work – Thursdays and Fridays are probably the best days to choose. Try to avoid the temptation to settle for a mid-week party; although the prices may be inviting, no-one really wants to work on a hangover.
• Send an e-mail to the whole team (or your friends list if it's not a work do) with the dates you’ve chosen. It’s almost inevitable that not everyone will be able to make it, so it’s best to go with the date that most people can do. You can’t work around everyone or you’ll be wasting time that could be used to make other important decisions.
• Once you’ve set the date, put it into our Christmas Party Planner so it’s firmly cemented in your head and you have a record of all the information you’ll need later on.
2 - Budget
Knowing your budget will help you to understand the sort of event you can plan, so find out what it is before you start putting down deposits and booking things. And, as with all budgets, prepare to go over... hey, it's Christmas after all.
• Find out your maximum budget as soon as possible – this will allow you to put together a properly segmented budget.
• Leave some contingency, ALWAYS.
• Allocate the budget from the off-set and work out which areas will need more budget and the areas where you can afford to spend less. Use our Christmas Party Planner to keep a track on costs.
• Venues at Christmas charge a lot more for bookings, so you’ll need to take this into account. Be careful not to go over on venue costs so you don’t have to scrimp in other areas.
3 - Choosing a Venue
You might have done this at step 1, and you'd be right to, but with budget in mind, here's what we think you should consider when finalising your venue choice.
• You're probably restricted to a particular area, but regardless; search, search and search some more. We all want to stumble upon that trendy little venue that nobody knows about, but realistically you need somewhere practical and with suitable facilities.
• Visit the venue and while you are there take photos so you can remember what it’s like once you’ve left. Also, introduce yourself to the events team; it’s a good idea to have them on your side as they will be able to help with logistics later on e.g. you can brief venue security that only attendees wearing the wristbands/ lanyards you’ve had designed are allowed into the party.
• If you’re even remotely interested in a venue, ring up and get a quote. Find out if you can provisionally put the venues on hold. It’s good to get on their radar and to give yourself as many options as possible.
• Negotiate! Bargain with them, you don’t get if you don’t ask.
• Once it’s booked put that information into your Christmas party planner.
4 - Invites & Itineraries
A personal bug-bear of mine is not getting all the right information early on and, for
God's sake, don't forget to highlight the dress code! Remember, the more you miss off, the more emails you'll have hitting your inbox and the more time you'll waste telling everyone what the difference is between 'Lounge Suit' and 'Black Tie'.
Give people ALL the details, including:
• Date
• Start and closing times (people need to get home, give them the exact times so they can arrange their evening)
• Theme (nobody wants a theme, let's be honest. But, if you're insistent and want people to waste money on fancy dress... tell them the theme)
• Dress Code (set one and make sure your guests know what it means... Reader's Digest sum dress codes up nicely)
• Venue Address (you'd be surprised how many event invites I've received that miss off very basic information like - 'when the hell is it'?)
• Format Of The Event
• Menu Choices
• RSVP (always with a deadline)
• If you work for a design or ad agency, you'll no doubt spend half of your budget making the invites coolest, ‘kitchs-est’, must have this year and, that's fine, but, miss any of the above, and you'll have to send an email out too. E-mail invites are fine. They're instant and if the date and info is clear, any sensible person would drop this straight into their Outlook Calendar. Job done.
• Use our Christmas Party Planner ‘Guest List’ tab to keep a check on who has RSVP’d – be prepared to chase people that haven’t responded. Sometimes you have to be the bad guy!
5 - Food and Drink
The quality of food and drink you serve at your event and how you present it is always a talking point. Food hits all the sensors and evokes feeling. So, even those who have one drink too many, will remember how good or bad the food was. Also, remember, in this world of Instagram and Pinterest, pretty much everything you serve up at a party is going get the 70's-filter treatment and find its way onto the social media.
Check points:
• Will you be using your venue to cater food or will you be using a separate company? It can be tempting to get an external company to do the catering, but don't forget the price of your time. In-house caterers could pay dividends.
• What sort of food do you want to serve? Canapés? Buffet? Three Course Meal?
• Test the food! Don’t feed your guests food that you haven’t already tried.
• Dietary Requirements – not everyone eats meat and not everyone can consume dairy, so make sure you’ve taken everybody’s dietary requirements into consideration.
• Greet your guests with a variety of alcoholic and non-alcoholic festive drinks. These could be in the form of cocktails, Champagne or mulled wine, it’s up to you but make sure it fits your theme and it’s good. This drink needs to wow.
• How will the drinks be served? If people are sitting down for a meal you may want bottles of wine at the tables or you may prefer people to get their own drinks from the bar.
• How will you pay for the drinks? This will have to be decided in-line with your budget.
Depending on what your budget allows you can:
1) Pay for what is consumed on the night – tell the bar that anyone wearing your specially designed fabric wristbands gets free drinks all night and sort out the costs once everyone has gone home.
2) Use custom designed Tyvek wristbands or vinyl wristbands that include a limited number of
tear-off tabs, which act as drinks vouchers. This limits every person to a certain number of drinks whether they be alcoholic or non-alcoholic and the tabs are used up they can buy their own drinks.
6 - Theme & Decor
Some people think that Christmas is enough of a theme but whether you’ve gone down the traditional Christmas route or chosen something a little more exotic you’re going to need to make your venue look great.
• Do some research; there is nothing worse than a badly executed theme. You want the theme to be obvious to everybody and for everything to match up.
• Set the mood with lighting; talk to the venue managers and find out whether they have lighting available or if you will have to budget this in.
• Use different decorations that match your theme to really bring the venue to life. Buy drapes for the walls, table decorations if you’re planning a sit down meal and colour matched or patterned table cloths – essentially, anything that’s within your budget that will make your theme more memorable.
• If you’re using wristbands as entry, make sure they’ve been specially designed to fit your theme. You can re-create some really intricate designs, and if you’d like a little bit of help creating a striking look for your event to fit your theme, just give us a shout.
• If you have a very specific theme remember to let people know on your invites so that they can dress accordingly.
7 - Music & Entertainment
Some people will want to throw some shapes, especially after a few glasses of bubbly, so you’ve got to provide suitable music for the evening. Smashing it out from 7pm isn’t always the way to go though. Start off with some background music and gradually build-up the volume as the night goes on, making sure your DJ or band feed off the guests.
DJ's aren't always the answer, consider:
• A Playlist: Created by yourself or a mix of songs chosen by everyone in the office. Stick it on an iPhone, plug it into a Bose docking station and you're good to go.
• Hire a musician or a live band. This is the in-thing to do at the moment and can be a great way to get the party going. Consider the band's repertoire though, how long do they play for and what genre's do they cover? You don't want to be 2 hours of skiffle or, even worse, no music at all. (actually, which is worse?)
• Make sure your venue can cater to your needs. Check things like lay out, acoustics, power and what’s already installed for sound and light.
Having music is almost a given, a party without music is one I don't want to be at. But, what if you want to offer something more? You know your guests better than anyone else, so you will know what will or won't work. I could write a list of ideas, but just use Google!
8 - Transportation
You have two options here. You are either arranging or paying for transportation or you're not. In either scenario, you want to do everything you can to help get your guests to and from the event, whether that's laying on transport or simply identifying nearest Tube stations and local taxi firms. Your guests want to enjoy the evening and not worry about finding a way home.
9 - Communications
You've done all the hard work but it's imperative that you keep in touch with your guests throughout the build up to the party. If it's a small company, a group email every so often will do the trick, but if you work in a huge organisation, you might want to consider working with the graphics department to knock-up an html email - after all, you'll be setting the tone for the quality of the event.
Always send one final communication on the morning of the party. It will be fresh in people's inbox and they'll use it as a last-minute reference without trawling through old e-mail folders. Be sure to remind them:
• That it's today!
• What time it starts
• If they need to bring their tickets or wristbands
• Any other useful logistical stuff
• Dress code (always remind them of this. You're never too far from a Next)
10 - On the Night
Don't fall at the final hurdle. You're not there to enjoy yourself (not at the beginning anyway).
• Get there early or phone the venue to double and triple check EVERYTHING.
• If you have staff helping, brief them. Please for the love of god brief them.
• Greet your guests
Make sure the party is in full swing. Enjoy yourself but remember to be on hand should anything go wrong or be needed. Even if you're an office junior tasked with organising the party, you'll be the one they turn to if something goes wrong.
So there we have it. No two events are the same, but hopefully our top 10 tips for planning Christmas parties has given you some insight into what's needed.
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