Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Marykate Cavanagh. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Marykate, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Let’s start with a story that highlights an important way in which your brand diverges from the industry standard.

I strive to give couples an incredible experience, and I can say that 99.9% of vendors I work with do as well. But what I find in today’s wedding industry as I’ve newly entered the fold as a wedding planner is, at times, a lack of awareness that this is THE day for this couple. Sure, it’s one of manyyy weddings you as the vendor might be working this month, but for them, this is the one. They say comfort breeds complacency, and when we get into a routine of doing the same thing over and over again, sometimes we can lose the spark of what makes it special. Like a teacher who’s burnt out from their 30-year career and has forgotten why they were so passionate about teaching to begin with.

I strive to bring to my couples one-on-one planning so that they feel supported every step of the way, not just another client on the roster. Taking the time to send a small onboarding gift classic snail mail to get them excited, or giving them new and creative suggestions on ways to rethink the traditional wedding day flow. I am their confidante, logistics mastermind, wedding bestie, and overall cheerleader.

I also strive to make their wedding not only fit within their budget, but actively seek ways to help them save. We are surrounded by a slew of Pinterest and Instagram weddings that tell us what a wedding should look like, and honestly for many, that level is out of reach. You can still have a stunning wedding and not have a million dollar budget. I do this through custom design with my clients. Whether it’s that gorgeous wedding mirror sign they saw on Pinterest, or classically elegant menu cards and matching signage that’s a small fortune on Etsy. I can take their inspiration and bring it to life through my own design services and include those elements in their planning package to not only save them money but ensure a cohesive overall design aesthetic on the day of. Budgeting might not be glamorous, but I can’t tell you how money couples come to me so incredibly grateful that I don’t make them feel like their budget “isn’t enough” and their wedding is impossible. It inspires me every day to know that I’ve helped bring someone’s dream to life and they can be financially responsible at the same time.

As an industry I think we can overall do a better job of still being successful small business owners who thrive and still support couples in making their dream wedding come true.

Marykate, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

It’s funny, I think if you went around and asked every person in the event or wedding industry what they wanted to be when they grew up, I don’t think an event planner would have been the first thing that came to mind. For me it certainly didn’t. If it wasn’t for a coworker who saw the spark and potential in me and asked me to join the events department, I’m not sure what I’d be doing today. But that moment set the stage for a 10-year career in corporate event planning. I had the opportunity to dip my toe into everything from fundraising events, large scale online conferences, sporting events, to boutique industry experiential events. The core element to them all was creating an incredible experience, whether that was working to inspire through storytelling at a non profit gala, assisting with transportation logistics at Superbowl LV, or creating a once in a lifetime experience at a corporate event in the heart of Napa Valley. To me, it’s always been about the guest experience and ensuring they walked away with the feeling that they had been a part of something special.

When I broke into the wedding industry I was helping to plan weddings while still maintaining my full time corporate career. It wasn’t until I experienced how different the wedding industry was from the corporate space, combined with the planning of my own wedding, that I realized things weren’t adding up. From talking with 10 different florists who all quoted me differently, or having to scour the internet to find decor that wouldn’t break the bank, I was astonished at not only how much things cost but the difference between what I knew to be true from my time in the event industry and what the wedding world was telling me. Vendors took months to respond to questions, others didn’t understand what a counter signed contract was, I corrected multiple mistakes in my event floor plan, and banquet order. The lack of communication and attention to detail was disheartening. I wanted to be different – and I wanted to provide an experience to couples who were not only trying to plan one of the single most important days of their life, but didn’t have the event industry leg up that at least I had when I started my planning journey.

And so, Events by Marykate was officially born in 2023, and I quite my full time corporate event career in 2024 to dedicate 100% of my time to building my small business as a wedding planner and giving my clients the time, expertise, and attention to detail that I wish I had had during my own wedding. Reliability, authenticity, and kindness are the foundation of everything my business stands for, guiding me as I fulfill the mission to create event experiences that are truly magical, meaningful, and memorable.

We’d love to hear the story of how you turned a side-hustle into a something much bigger.

Yes, as mentioned in my story earlier I spent 10 years in the corporate event space and helped plan weddings on the side during that time. It wasn’t until I had officially launched my own business and things started to pick up that I realized this could be a full time career to me. I was mentally and emotionally drained from trying to juggle a full time corporate career where I was spending way more than 40 hours a week on someone else’s biz, trying to plan my own wedding, maintain a relationship with my family and ya know still have a life!? It was becoming impossible, and after I experienced some health issues, I realized I needed to make a change.

Is quitting your full time career and a steady paycheck one of the most fear inducing decisions? Yes. Is it also simultaneously once of the most incredible feelings of freedom you’ll ever experience? Also, yes! When your gut tells you to go for it, you do. So many businesses fail after the first 5 years and I think a large part of that holds to this idea that being your own boss is so much easier than working for the big man. But the reality is you have to be self-disciplined, organized, and truly passionate about what you do. At the very least, if you are extremely passionate about the mission and vision of your business, you can and you WILL be successful. The only person standing in your way of growth is you.

From just one year of business I’ve made mistakes but I’ve also already made a profit, something that typically doesn’t happen for the first few years, and I’ve met some incredible people along the way.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

This ties into the first part above where I spoke to what sparked me actually quitting my job and starting my wedding planning business. I was working a corporate event job that was all consuming, long commute, long work hours and no true feeling of downtime. In fact, the last 3 years of my career had slowly started to consume me. My whole life was work – so much so I still cringe when I hear the slack app notification sound. That sound was usually associated with a passive aggressive message from a coworker or a request for a new project even though bandwidth was already non existent. I personally went through health issues as the stress and lack of even physically moving from my office chair for consecutive years started to truly take its toll. I had physical therapy and surgery. I emptied my bank account from medical expenses. My relationship with my then fiancé suffered, my relationships with my family suffered, friendship was almost nonexistent.

I realized one day through a casual conversation with my then CEO of the company that I worked for that what had inspired him to start his business and take the risk…was nothing. It was just an overwhelming belief in himself, what he was capable of, and failure really wasn’t on option. I made the jump, and I’ve never looked back. 2024 has truly become one of the most transformative years of my life and I can’t wait to see what 2025 has in store for me and my business.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.eventsbymarykate.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eventsbymarykate/

Image Credits

I own all images