We were lucky to catch up with Anne & Kayla Valenzuela recently and have shared our conversation below.

Anne & Kayla, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear your thoughts about family businesses.

A family business is exactly what we are. We’re sister-in-laws! I think it works only if you have the same mentality on how you want the business to be and at the same time, you each have different roles so that you’re not stepping on each other’s toes. Anne is the creative person and has the vision of the client’s theme/ideas. Kayla puts the vision to reality during setup.

Since we’re family, we do know what each other’s own family is going on. We know when an event would work for our families or not. On the rare occasion, we’re also flexible with each other if one of us needs to bring our kids to any meetings.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

What started us having a business together was when Anne got married over 10 years ago. Anne DIY’d many items for her wedding and Kayla helped. From there, the idea formed. We are mainly hired for themed events, such as birthdays, baby showers, and gender reveals, but we are also hired for weddings. We’re big on family and making memories, which is why we want to make the client’s event memorable. That way, when the look back, they will have that nostalgic feeling. See what I did there :) From a first birthday to a full-service wedding, we do it all! We’re here to organize those racing thoughts and ideas in your mind, focus on the things you actually want to incorporate, connect you to vendors/places that have what you’re looking for, and we’re there to put it all together on the day of.

Our packages and services are very customizable. I think that’s what sets us apart from other event planners. You can hire us for only an a-La-carte item or you can book a package and add one or a few things from the a-La-carte items. This helps the client to not be set in packages where it’s not in their budge to hire us to do a bunch of things, and wants a lower package, but still needs help with one or two things not included.

We want clients, potential and current, to know that we’re in this business for you and your vision, not what we want. If we can make something happen for you and your event, we’ll execute it. We’re also very realistic so if it’s something is not in budget or ideal for the weather, we won’t recommend it. At the end of the day, we want you to be happy.m and not stressing over something after the event has already started.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

We are a family-owned business and family oriented. There have been times when we’ve been pregnant and had to work an event. When one of us has been pregnant, we know to slow down with the business. That means changing some duties, booking less events, not booking events back to back, and really just taking a break when it’s close to the due date. There’s also an adjustment period to get back in the swing of things.

What’s been the best source of new clients for you?

One would assume it’s social media, but for us, it’s really word of mouth. Social media is always changing. Algorithms are changing, new platforms are always popping up, new ways of advertising on existing platforms, etc. It’s a lot to grasp as a small and local business like us. Those who support us will recommend us to their friends and family. We don’t even have to ask clients because since they’re happy with our work ethic, they gladly recommend us.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.nostalgicevents.net
• Instagram: nostalgic.events