Today we’d like to introduce you to Lindsey Nickel

Hi Lindsey, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?

I’m a Napa based wedding planner helping stylish, fun-loving couples (and their dogs) plan their wine country weddings. I’ve been planning destination weddings since 2010 so I’ve seen what works and what doesn’t work for a gorgeous, fun and low stress wedding day. My clients have been featured in Brides, The Knot and Style Me Pretty just to name a few.

I got my start as a wedding planner in 2010 when I was living in Jackson Hole, WY. To make a long story short, the economy was really bad and no one was hiring. I started doing events for different non-profits and that morphed into an entire event planning business. I moved to Napa in 2014 and expanded to Napa/ Sonoma weddings. Now I only do weddings in Napa/ Sonoma wine country.

In 2022, I expanded my event planning business to specialize in celebrations of life. At the end of 2021, I cut back on my wedding planning workload so that I could think about what I wanted to do next in my career. I knew I wanted to do something I was really passionate about, but wasn’t quite sure what that was at the time. The idea I kept coming back to in my heart and my head was to help families plan meaningful celebrations of life.

The idea of an event planner for celebrations of life, funerals, and memorials first popped into my mind when my grandparents passed in 2015. I was watching my highly capable aunt plan their memorials and I was thinking, “Why isn’t there a professional to help her plan this? She has enough going on, dealing with the paperwork, closing accounts, and the crematorium.”

When I’m not planning an event I love hiking, fostering dogs and binging Real Housewives (Orange County and Salt Lake are my favorites).

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?

On challenge was the mindset that I would have to say no to booking weddings so that I could make time for the celebration of life clients. It was a little scary to intentionally leave big gaps in my calendar, hoping that a family would contact me. I had to have confidence that I had put the strategic pieces into place to launch my new service and cross my fingers that it all worked out.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?

As a celebration of life event planner, I help grieving families plan meaningful celebrations of life without feeling even more stressed out. Suddenly, things families didn’t think you cared about become important. My role is to provide my clients with options, help them make decisions efficiently, and manage the event planning process start to finish.

Our families start with us at various stages of their event planning. Some have a venue picked out, while some need help finding a venue that will work with their specific needs. Some are starting from scratch with no pre-planning wishes from their loved ones, while others have desired arrangements from those they love. We help families to plan celebrations of life, funerals, and memorials (yes, there are differences, and we can help you navigate them). The one thing that they all have in common is that they want a meaningful event to honor their loved ones and they want a specialized event planner to help them.

What do you specialize in? What are you known for, etc.
I’ve really become known for planning celebrations of life because so few event planners offer this service. It takes more than being just an event planner, you have to also be able to gently yet efficiently work with people who are grieving. To help people plan a celebration of life, you also have to be very comfortable with death and the knowledgable about the dying industry.

What are you most proud of?
The celebration of life event that I’m most proud of is probably the very first one I planned. I didn’t even have a website up for celebrations of life. Instead I had one page on my wedding planning website that basically said “celebration of life event planning coming soon” and that’s how this client found me. It was an event for almost 300 people. After that, I was hooked and knew that was an area of event planning that I felt passionate about and could really help families.

What sets you apart from others?
Being specialized in planning celebrations of sets me apart because so few event planners offer this service. I before launching celebration of life event planning, I spent a lot of time researching the dying industry (I toured funeral homes, I learned about the terminology, I joined Facebook groups for funeral directors, etc.), I interviewed friends who had recently lost family members to see where they would have wanted support in and learned as much as I could about what they were going through during their time of grief. For me, offering celebrations of life is not just adding the newest event type to my list of offerings, it’s something I carefully decided to learn about and expand to.

What sort of changes are you expecting over the next 5-10 years?

I really see the dying industry making huge shifts in the next few years. One of the big shifts I see is that families will opt for a celebration of life over a funeral or memorial. This is already happening. There are also changes in burials, with people shifting to cremation and now new options like green burial / human composting and mushroom burial suits. There are also end of life doulas which can be tremendously helpful for families. I think that the options around burials, memorials and celebrations of life could really have a lot more options in 10 years and that is fascinating to think about.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://lovelydaylegacies.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lovelydayeventsxo/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LovelyDayEventsAndWeddings

Image Credits

Milou and Olin Photography
Jen Philips Photography