After a six-year leave, Tabatha Wilson has made her way back to us. A lot has changed here at Seven-Degrees in the past few years, but the love we feel for Tabatha is still just as great. While Tabatha has resumed her old position as Production Manager, her responsibilities have changed and she has brought along new experiences. For the month that she has been back, she has already started sharing her experiences with the staff and molding them into even better coordinators. She loves spending time with her niece and nephew, her fur babies, and going hiking with her boyfriend Chris.
During her time away, she started her own floral business, worked on the sales side of the wedding industry, and got some extensive traveling under her belt. Each experience has contributed even more to her excitement and knowledge in event planning.
What have you been up to for the past few years?
I started by taking some time off and doing some extensive traveling. Once I was done with that I started my own floral business, and did some wedding sales and then for a while went into Mac Cosmetics; I was working in their training facility so kind of like event planning, but training events.
Do you feel like you refined some of your skills while you were away?
Yes. I saw how other venues do things. I saw the sales side and did sales for 2-3 years. And then owning your own business you see all of the elements.
Is it the same job you had before?
It’s a little different. Before, I was at the events and this time we are focusing on strengthening the team we have and offering support in all the elements of producing the events. I’m that second set of eyes that can catch and recommend things. It gives me more time to develop vendor relationships and that’s one of my focuses—to get great vendors in here so the client can really benefit from that. I’m also responsible for being on top of design ideas, the new trends, and going to all the networking events. I’ve gone to a couple already and it’s fun because I’ve been out of the industry for a minute but people remember me and they love Seven-Degrees. It’s been a really nice warm welcome from everybody!
What’s your favorite thing about being back so far?
The team. We have just been talking about the old times and the funny moments we have had because a lot of crazy things happen at events. It has been really nice to connect back with Dora and Tim and we keep joking that the band is back together.
What do you do for fun now that you are back?
Travel is still one of my biggest passions. I like to take one big trip each year so I spend time researching new travel spots. Where we live, we are so lucky, there are so many great little hiking places. I have a great group of friends and we like to have little get-togethers. I like to be creative and do things different and that goes into my personal life as well.
Where did you go traveling?
I started in Thailand. Then I took a solo trip to Italy for three weeks and that was life changing. I took the plunge and took the trip by myself. I had taken a lot of art history classes in college, so really being able to submerge myself in the museums and galleries and not have to worry about how long I spent in each space was great. Throughout these last couple years I did Guatemala, Bali, and Africa, so yeah. Lots of places!
Did those travels play in with what you do now?
It definitely gives you perspective. Travel to me is getting out of your comfort zone. Things are not going to go according to plan and so you just have to roll with it. It actually really helps with your event planning because it makes you problem solve, you have to think quick on your toes.
What did you love about your floral design business?
I just loved being creative. Taking something that might be ordinary to someone else and putting my twist on it. I love the natural beauty of flowers and taking those and mixing the colors and the textures and pushing that envelope and showing someone something different. And the thing about flowers is they are unpredictable. You can order say, red roses. And you don’t know exactly what shade of red they might be, you don’t know what size they are, so it’s always working with this unpredictable medium and then you have to take that and meld it into something beautiful to present to somebody. It’s all Mother nature; she decides what color it’s going to be. It’s very unpredictable.
How did you find floral design?
Working here the first time around and working with Dora we just started doing flowers on our own here. Being in such a creative environment there were a few times where we were like “well we could do that…” and rather than getting someone else and trying to explain to them the idea that we had we were like “let’s just do it.” and so we kind of started in-house florals here in that fashion. I just kind of learned by trial and error. You definitely learn some tricks along the road.
We are so thrilled to have Tabatha back with us. Our clients love her, and last week she was able to celebrate a ten year wedding anniversary with a couple she had coordinated for when she first worked with us. When Tabatha plans an event, she loves to find ways to make it different and creative. But above all, Tabatha works hard to make each event memorable. Connect with Tabatha to create the event your friends and family will never forget.
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