You would be amazed at how many wedding parties pass through our doors. Quite honestly, up until now, we were equally amazed at how we managed before our decision to deploy our new web-based planning and collaboration software created by the fine folks at 37signals.com. For us, it is not uncommon within our salon and spa locations to have three or four wedding parties receiving services on a Saturday. This especially happens during peak wedding season.
Until now, the majority of the planning and coordination process for weddings took place over email. What a headache! To eliminate redundancy and confusion on our end and the bride’s, it’s our practice to coordinate all communication through one team member for our entire company. Now, picture all of the phone calls and emails flying back and forth when scheduling multiple services for several different people. When brides contact us for services, we understand that they are allowing us to be a part of the most important day in their life. That’s a lot of responsibility. What worked for us five years ago, just wasn’t working for us now. We knew that we needed to look at how we facilitated our work flow that allowed more organization and better collaboration between Maximum FX and our clients. That’s when we found Basecamp. A web-based collaboration tool that allows us to manage projects, and collaborate with our team and clients the modern way.
Here’s a sneak peek at the Project Dashboard that summarizes all of the recent activity on this bride’s wedding planning.
Here you can see where the bride uploaded photos to the Basecamp project ahead of her scheduled visit. This allows her stylist to review the images to get an idea of various looks that she enjoys. With iPads available in the salon, this makes for a very powerful bridal consultation.
Basecamp allows us to contain all communication, calendars with events, files, images, to-do lists and more between Maximum FX and our client within each project that is created in the software. The software is web-based so we can grant access to our clients for specific wedding projects that we create. It’s just an easier way to work. It eliminates stress, improves communication, and positions us to provide a better salon experience for our brides.
Here you can see where phone notes are stored under the wedding project created for Cynthia Woods. Both the bride and the MFX wedding coordinator can log in at any time to review notes that were made by either party.
So there you have it! Just one more innovation brought to you by Maximum FX and the guys over at 37signals.com. Stay tuned for more blog posts on how we continue to use Basecamp for internal projects, making collaboration productive and enjoyable for our team members every day. If you are getting married, or you know of a friend, family member or co-worker who’s planning a wedding. Send them our way. We promise to take good care of them!
August 14th, 2012 at 8:38 pm
Awesome! Wish I would have had this tool back in my wedding coordinating days! LOTS of emails so true!
August 15th, 2012 at 8:18 am
It definitely makes life easier Juanita! Clients love it too!