If you’re an event planner, then it helps to be organized.
It also doesn’t hurt to know everybody in town, as Heather Sewell Day, owner of The Red Cake event planning company, seems to.
Caterer? String quartet? Two hundred folding chairs? Fog machine? Day, a Baton Rouge native who launched her company in 2001 after years of planning other people’s events for years, knows who to call.
“It’s good for me being from here and knowing a lot of the vendors now,” she says. “I know a lot of the facility directors. That makes your job a lot easier. I think that’s why a lot of people come to an event planner, because they don’t know all these people. They don’t even know where to start. They’re overwhelmed.”
Day didn’t always know everybody.
What changed that was the time she spent volunteering, which doubled as networking. That was like free advertising. Joining Forum 35 was a pivotal event, introducing her to a vast pool of potential clients.
“I always wanted to feel like I was giving something back and I was doing something for the world, so I started doing that through volunteering, and I got addicted to it,” she says. “I just started seeing the power that one person could have.”
Day’s father, Tony, died of an aortal aneurism in 2003, about the same time she became involved with Forum 35. Later the same year, she helped Aneurism Outreach put on a big fundraiser called Louisiana Saturday Night.
Most recently, The Red Cake staged a “drag brunch” at Juban’s for the HIV/AIDS Alliance for Region Two. This fall, she’s putting together a rock-’n’-roll-themed art walk at the Shaw Center for the Arts, featuring sushi and a Beatles cover band. Day is a big believer in tailoring to the personality or occasion.
“We first ask the questions. ‘Tell me about your organization. Tell me about yourself. How did you meet? What are the things that make you you? What are you into? I want to know all those things about you,’” she says.
The Red Cake handles all kinds of events, including decorating restaurants for the holidays and staging people’s homes for open houses, though Day really likes to plan weddings—some of them “destination” weddings, and many of them outdoors.
Day also likes doing fundraisers, though she finds herself doing more and more event promotion as well—not something she particularly enjoys, though otherwise an event might not happen. Maybe a nonprofit wants to have a fundraiser but has no marketing staff to set up radio spots and TV interviews. The Red Cake will handle it.
“I don’t love that part,” she says. “The part that I love is the actual setup and coming up with the ideas. That’s my favorite part.”
Starting the company didn’t require a big financial commitment on Day’s part since all she needed was business cards, a phone, an e-mail address and, eventually, a Web site. The Red Cake’s business cards were done by local artist Kathryn Hunter of Blackbird Letterpress, and Day makes a point of using local artists and small businesses on the theory that doing so builds community.
“I want to showcase all of these people and their talent in what I do,” Day says. “I want those places to thrive. That’s what’s going to make people want to stay here after they graduate and 30-somethings locate here.”
Her office was the Perks Coffee & Tea location on Perkins Road until she began sharing a space with Bloom Inc., Casey Johnson’s Government Street florist shop. Beneath the Bloom sign out front is Red Cake’s hand-painted shingle.
Day and Johnson go back to their days together at Gap, where Day was a retail manager.
“I know he’s a fabulous florist so I wanted to use him, and started using him for all my weddings and events, and he was giving me business as well,” she says. “It’s been working well. It’s an appointment-only kind of thing, but when I do have my appointments he usually has some, too, and I always introduce them to Casey and vice versa. Usually we get both jobs.”
Kim Hood, who was working as HAART’s in-house counsel during the June 14 fundraiser at Juban’s, says the sold-out event was wildly successful and Day “couldn’t have been any better to work with.”
“It was going to be an event like none other in Baton Rouge,” Hood says. “We needed someone to share that vision and someone who believed Baton Rouge was ready for that kind of event. She absolutely fit the bill.”
Hood says Day is uniquely fearless when it comes to trying new things, works hard and is always available to the client. Hood says HAART is keeping Day’s number, though next time they’ll need a bigger venue.
“Before, it was, ‘If we do it again,’” Hood says. “Now it’s, ‘When we do it again.’ We used every square inch of Juban’s. It was standing room only. We had to turn people away. We’ll definitely use her again next time.”
Kate Suchanek wasn’t looking for someone to handle her entire wedding, which took place at the LSU Hilltop Arboretum in 2007. She just wanted a caterer. Day recommended one, but she also had so many interesting suggestions Suchanek hadn’t thought of that “it was a pretty easy decision for us to hire her,” she says.
Suchanek wanted something that would complement and not overpower the arboretum’s natural setting. Day nailed it with a “simple, elegant touch,” Suchanek says, from the wildflowers in mason jars lining the footbridge to the magnolias in miniature terra-cotta pots as party favors.
“She did an amazing job,” she says. “She was very thorough, saved us money at every turn, picked up all the loose ends. I didn’t have to worry about a thing. It was really important to her that you didn’t have to worry about anything—and least of all her.”
Though Suchanek’s wedding was relatively low-key, she’s confident Day could go “over the top” if asked to. She recommends The Red Cake to anyone who will listen.
“I was just so impressed,” Suchanek says. “It was exactly what I wanted, but I never would have been able to put it together myself.”
