K. Hancock Events

ultiple times through the process - Feeling as though I was being treated as if I should know how weddings work, and also how I know nothing at all, all at the same time - Feeling as though we were supposed to tell Kiara what we liked, then keep our fingers crossed and eyes closed and hope that things turn out on our wedding day to our liking. My decision to write this review is purely based on the fact that I don’t want other brides to go through what I went through. Professionally I am a marketer that has put on many events myself. Going into this wedding planning process I was very forthcoming with the fact that I have put on large events but have never planned a wedding so I will be looking to my planner to lead me and offer input along the way. I hired Kiara as a full Wedding Planner, Designer & Florist. Our flowers turned out beautifully and I think Kiara is a skilled florist. Below I will list some of my red flags (facts). It is possible Kiara does not see these as red flags herself or for her business, but if you have a problem with any of the below, I would recommend looking elsewhere: - Undisclosed working hours: her business hours for wedding planning conflict with her full-time employment (she is a FTE at a different company) - Waiting 2-3 weeks for a response (slack is the primary channel of communication) - Resistant to negotiating or advocating for her client with vendors for fear that it would hurt her relationship/reputation - No budgeting/tracking for her clients (it was made clear that it was on me to track spend and ensure we were in budget). - No final walk-through, minimal inspo photos or samples for setup - Minimal assistance filling out forms/questions from vendors or venue (i.e. things that the wedding planning team should know the answers to) - Consistently having to ask for big deliverables (example: wedding timeline - was sent to me the day it was due to the venue; with a variety of mistakes like cutting our photographer coverage by 50% of what we contractually paid for & incorrect event start times) The theme I’m seeing above, and what I think summarizes my experience well is a sense of secrecy and sloppiness. Kiara seemed to keep everything close to her chest, and other than whispers under her breath or comments mentioned off the cuff, I had no real indication of how things were progressing or what came next. Although I do agree that things can get lost in translation, like comms over slack, Kiara seemed comfortable with her business's status-quo being on slack and was not proactive nor seemed to want phone/zoom calls. About 6 months out, I strongly advocated for a recurring zoom meeting to speed planning- we settled on 30 mins every 2 weeks. Up until the wedding, that was the extent of our in-person meetings, and often it was on me to come up with talking points. There were a myriad of things that did not go as planned on my wedding day/weekend...but that I expected. What I did not expect was to have Kiarra & team to be the cause for some of those. Note: Kiara has not reached out to me after my wedding, nor has she requested feedback through any channel. Although I would be happy to give this feedback and more in detail, I don’t believe any of the above is new information for her.

everything in between. Her presence was calming and her work was top notch. Everyone kept complimenting us on how smoothly everything ran. We can't recommend her enough!

put together the perfect celebration of us and helped us navigate from what we thought would be an intimate wedding that became a bigger event with over 100 guests. Kiara helped find exactly what we needed when we needed it. Always on time for scheduled meetings and clear with timelines, boundaries, and deliverables, I can’t imagine having done this event without her. On the day of, all we needed to worry about was ourselves and our families. The event ran so smoothly and the little touches that were just so use made our day extra special. We also hired her for florals and this was our best choice. The arrangements were enchanting and the flowers she chose were some I’d never have thought of by myself but were gorgeous and unique. In the beginning we had doubts as to if we needed such a hands on coordinator and if we should have saved money for a cheaper planner or done it all ourselves, but as the lists started to grow and the day grew closer, we knew we’d made the right choice and she was worth every penny for us. So much less stress and she helped us pull off an event that will have our friends and families joyfully recounting for years to come. Really couldn’t thank her and her team enough!

. You cannot go wrong in working with Kiara.