Making your dream wedding a reality

Q. What advice do you have for a customer looking to hire a provider like you?

A. Do your research. There are a ton of businesses out there claiming to be able to provide you with the wedding of your dreams, but very few have the experience to show they can and more importantly, even less will take the time to personally assure you of this. Ask yourself this, your wedding is one of the most important days of your life, are you going to trust the DJ company who can't even take the time to personally respond to your initial e-mails and instead run canned responses? This is a sure sign that they only want your money. And the opposite of this are the responses that are 2 sentences long and send you to another site so they don't have to answer your questions.

Take the time to find the right DJ, they will make or break your wedding, and it's a decision that should never be rushed.

Q. If you were a customer, what do you wish you knew about your trade? Any inside secrets to share?

A. Who gets sent to my wedding? I remember when I was searching out DJ's myself I couldn't get anyone to tell me who was going to DJ my wedding. Even a list of John, Tom and Joe would have been great, but they had no idea because they were employee's who would/could quit at any time. The businesses where the owners work are the ones you want, because it's our name on the line every night. If we screw up, we have to deal with it, we can't just find a new job.

Q. What questions should a consumer ask to hire the right service professional?

A. What do they wear to my wedding? Who is going to show up? How old is their equipment? If money weren't an object would they buy new gear? Do they have backup equipment on site? How many weddings does your DJ personally do each year (not the company, your DJ)? Can you meet them face to face?

These questions will give you a great start on finding out what that companies motives are. If they can't meet you, this is a sign. And remember, most DJ's are doing this on the side, so having a store to meet in isn't always a give away for a legit company, especially when you realize that the reason they have a store front is to do something completely unrelated to DJ'ing your wedding.

Q. What important information should buyers have thought through before seeking you out?

A. What is your budget? Know this before you start anything because while most of us would love a huge wedding, no one wants to pay for it for the next 30 years.

Talk to your vendors for recommendations. We work with each other every weekend, DJ's in particular can tell you what reception halls have the best catering staff, what photographers take the best pictures versus being a basic option. And most importantly, what catering company has good food versus edible. HUGE difference there.

Q. Why does your work stand out from others who do what you do?

A. We take pride in our services and treat your wedding as if it were our own. We don't like gaps or pauses, it makes us paranoid that the guests are sort of lost. We also have names that people always mis-pronounce, so we take the time to go over with every wedding party member how to pronounce their name right before we bring you in. This is huge to us because odds are everyone there knows your name, it'll be obvious if we screw it up. By contrast we've heard other DJ companies announce bridal party names and mess them them up, and then laugh about it on the mic, this is not professional at all, and this is not us. We want your party to be everything you envisioned, and we take the time before hand to do our party to make sure it happens.

Q. Do you have a favorite story from your work?

A. In 2009 we picked up a wedding off a referral from a past bride. The bride who just hired us was having problems finding people to light her reception hall with uplights. We were more then happy to fill this void, when she showed to the reception she was blown away with the way everything looked and commented that we were the only vendor that night who looked like they were trying to make a good impression rather then just get her money.

A second story was in January 2011, when we asked the bride and groom if they wanted to add another hour to the party (because it was still going strong) she responded with "I don't care, as long as I'm with Charles, I'm happy". That's why we got into this business, and that's why we want to work with you. We love sharing a wedding day with people who are just starting their lives together, there is nothing better.