884 Marley Majcher:

Melinda Wittstock:

Coming up on Wings of Inspired Business:

Marley Majcher:

We’re a firm that you go to when, when you say, listen, I want good food, and yes, I want good entertainment, but I want people to walk away, whatever kind of event it is, even if it’s a wedding, and say, oh, my gosh, that was amazing. And they don’t even know why it was amazing, and they don’t even really know. They can’t pinpoint it, it’s just a vibe. And they’re like, this was the greatest event ever. And for us, that comes in, in a lot of layered things and a lot of secret sauce stuff through different experiences or unexpected food or unexpected food at different times.

Melinda Wittstock:

Marley Majcher is known as the Party Goddess, and today she shares her unique mix of creative magic making with hyper detailed logistical organization to build a fast-growing party business. What is it like creating a party for Snoop Dogg, a major corporation or a non-profit? The devil is in the detail and this episode is your inside sneak peek with lessons for all types of businesses.

Melinda Wittstock:

Hi, I’m Melinda Wittstock and welcome to Wings of Inspired Business, where we share the inspiring entrepreneurial journeys, epiphanies, and practical advice from successful female founders, so you have everything you need at your fingertips to build the business and life of your dreams. I’m all about paying it forward a five-time serial entrepreneur, so this podcast is all about catalyzing an ecosystem where women entrepreneurs mentor, promote, buy from, and invest in each other. Because together we’re stronger, and we all soar higher when we fly together.

Melinda Wittstock:

This episode drops 2 days before American’s celebrate our Independence from an autocratic monarchy where a King or Queen is literally above the law … and one day after the Supreme Court of the United States just awarded the President almost complete immunity from prosecution for illegal acts while in power. It literally means any President could take bribes, lead an insurrection, assassinate a political rival, really anything, under the cover of their “official duties” and they would be immune from prosecution. This country was founded on the rule of law, and on the basic principle that no one, not even the president, is above the law.

Melinda Wittstock:

I’m talking about this today because I am scared, enraged, and also motivated because our voices must be heard. Democracy is at stake, and with it our rights to basic freedoms. This is the same Supreme Court that took away our rights as women to our own bodies, the Court that threatens to end marriage equality, even the right to contraception. This is the Court that ruled last week that no public official can be charged with bribery if the bribe is received after the act… apparently that’s a gratuity. This is a Supreme Court that also ruled that the scientists and experts that keep our food, water, air, drugs and airplanes safe no longer have the power to interpret regulations.

Melinda Wittstock:

Business and innovation cannot thrive without the “free” part of free enterprise that made this country great. Entrepreneurs can only succeed when there is a level playing field, when the same laws apply to everyone. So, if you have a vote in this country, it’s time now to register to vote, get all your friends and family to vote, educate yourself about what is truly at stake, and vote this November 5^th like your life of your dreams depended on it. Because it does.

Melinda Wittstock:

Today we meet an inspiring entrepreneur who is known both as The Party Goddess and the Profit Goddess, always driven by a passion for fun and creativity as she has built her businesses along the way. Marley Majcher set a unique personal rule of business early on: As a Georgetown University business student, she refused any interviews that required her to wear a gray or navy suit, simply because she knew she’d never enjoy a role that suppressed her joy or creative spirit. Marley will be here in a moment, and first:

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Melinda Wittstock:

What does it take to create magical and memorable experiences? Marley Majcher is an expert in creating events for major Hollywood stars, large corporations, nonprofits and family gatherings, and today she shares her unique approach balancing creative chaos with precision detail to deliver the exact outcomes her clients are looking for, even transforming mishaps into delight, all while ensuring security, safety, confidentiality, and privacy.

Melinda Wittstock:

From understated elegance to rock star fabulous, Majcher is known for creating the most talked about parties of the year for a client list ranging from top-tier businesses to A-list celebrities such as Snoop Dogg, Sofia Vergara and Britney Spears. Marley is also The Profit Goddess!, a business coach for small business owners and entrepreneurs and the author of But Are You Making Any Money?, a witty and lauded business guide praised by Forbes as “a great how-to book for any entrepreneur.”

Melinda Wittstock:

Marley shares her inside secrets, plus how she creatively transformed her business to survive the COVID-19 crisis, pivoting to virtual events and influencer opportunities. We talk operational systems, how to pre-qualify prospective clients, embrace AI and other technologies, plus why it’s vital for entrepreneurs to diversify financially.

Melinda Wittstock:

Let’s put on our wings with the inspiring Marley Majcher and be sure to download the podcast app Podopolo so we can keep the conversation going after the episode.

[INTERVIEW]

Melinda Wittstock:

Marley, welcome to Wings.

Marley Majcher:

Thank you for having me. I’m excited to be here.

Melinda Wittstock:

I am excited to have you, too, because what better thing to talk about than parties? Parties bring so much joy to our lives. And we missed a few years of them.

Marley Majcher:

Yes, absolutely. I missed them, too, whether it was planning them or just not attending them.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah. And so, what was the spark that made you take your entrepreneurial career in the ‘having fun’ direction?

Marley Majcher:

Well, there was really no choice for me. I mean, when I got my business degree from Georgetown, and one of my own personal rules was that I would not do. For after school, where I had to wear a gray or navy suit to the interview, because that would mean that I’d have to wear that to work. So, my whole thing was I have to sort of be having fun all the time, and I didn’t feel like I could be doing that in a gray or a navy suit. So that that should set the stage.

Marley Majcher:

I mean, it’s kind of strange to go to Georgetown and then end up in the restaurant business and then having a catering company and having an event planning company, for sure. I was kind of bored and not sure what I wanted to do before my junior year in college. I decided to go to Paris and spend the summer there, going to cooking school and having a French tutor. And I came back and needed a topic for one of my speech classes and decided I would do it on French cooking. And I interviewed this chef, and when I interviewed him, he was 19 years older than I was. And I just took one look at him and decided I needed to marry him, which was going to be difficult considering, well, many things that he basically worked in the basement of this very fancy restaurant. So, the likelihood of me running into him was about zero.

Marley Majcher:

And he was 20 years older, and I had just met him, and how was I going to make the connection? But I convinced him to hire me. And so, my whole junior year, I worked in this kitchen. I’d go to school until 2:30, and then I’d go to work from 3:30 to 11:30. And then before, you know, nothing ever happened, of course. And then my senior year, I was like, okay, I’m going to go back to cooking school. I’m going to go to Normandy this time. And I went to Normandy and then plotted how I was going to quit for my senior year and ruin his life, because I was the best employee he was certainly most reliable. And when I went back to school until my quit, then he was like, oh, would you like to have dinner? And, you know, we got engaged the month after graduation.

Marley Majcher:

From there it was, what do you do when you have a husband who’s a chef? You get into the restaurant business. And so, so then we moved back to California, and we’re in the, you know, bought, bought a preexisting restaurant and did that whole thing. And that is really where it all started and, and how it just kind of continued. So, it was very random, to say the least.

Melinda Wittstock:

Ah, well, I can only imagine what was going on for you when COVID hit. I mean, what?

Marley Majcher:

I mean, it seems, I’d rather not remember, but yes, okay.

Melinda Wittstock:

It seems like such a long time ago now.

Marley Majcher:

It’s weird.

Melinda Wittstock:

And I think we all want to kind of collectively forget it. But no, I had so many, you know, colleagues of mine, particularly women entrepreneurs who made a lot of money from their events, or they had an event side of their business and just like, everything upside down. So, what did you do?

Marley Majcher:

Well, at first, I did what everybody else did. I think. I think people initially were kind of in one of two camps, right? You thought, oh, this isn’t going to last very long, so I’m not going to worry. And then there’s the other camp that was sort of, oh, my gosh, like, my whole business is devastated. At the time, my mom had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, so for me, I was very distracted already. And I had multiple businesses, thank God, multiple revenue streams, at least. I thought, okay, well, you know, COVID showed up and I thought, well, no worries. I can just work on this project at my dad’s office because I was overseeing that company anyway.

Marley Majcher:

And I thought, I’ll just go in. And I was supposed to go in for four days to fix this database issue that really wasn’t a database issue. And I ended up, you know, whatever it is now, four years later, still kind of overseeing all that. But for me, I got lucky. I was distracted. My family stuff was upside down. My dad was happy that I was at the office, and I thought, okay, well, I’ll just, you know, do this for a little bit and then it’ll be over. And fortunately, I was still able to get a paycheck because he’s in the medical field.

Marley Majcher:

The one thing that was thriving was medicine. And I just kept thinking, okay, I’m just going to make the best of it. I’m going to make the best of it. And then, of course, it kept extending. And then we were really starting to see, wow, this is not, this is not good, because we didn’t know how long the restrictions were going to last as far as booking venues. And people were naturally skittish about their cash, about, we started hearing all these horror stories of things being canceled and venues closing and stuff, and people not getting their money back, et cetera, et cetera. So, I thought I better really dig deep on this other side with the medical stuff. But at the same time, I thought, but I’ve got to keep the party got is kind of, you know, in the news, and how do you do that? So one of the things we did was in my publicist, and I pivoted and sort of made sure that she was pitching me and keeping me out there as what to do, in this case, how to have virtual parties, how to, and while throwing virtual parties certainly was not, you know, going to keep me afloat, because obviously the margins were much lower than what I was used to, it would keep my business afloat.

Marley Majcher:

And we did some influencer opportunities where a company came to us and said, hey, listen, we’re going to lose market share. Can you show us how to eat this product and still be safe while doing it, blah, blah, blah. I thought, yeah, anything I can do like that, that’s going to involve photo shoots and images and things that can keep me in social media, and then we’ll see where it goes. And then obviously, it just kept cutting deeper and deeper. And it was a, for me, it was a very good lesson because I, you know, you go, we’ve, if you, if you’re old enough, you’ve been through a few financial ups and downs with the economy. And I remember 2008 where, you know, we also almost got creamed. And I thought, wow, the good news is I’m in much better position than I was in 2008. I have learned some lessons.

Marley Majcher:

Now I have some more lessons to learn because this component still isn’t where I would want it to be, which, you know, you don’t realize until your pants are down. And you’re like, gosh, I still have some holes in my system. And we just kept trying to see where is, what can we give the market at the moment that will keep us in people’s minds so that when this eventually ends, because even if it feels like it’s going to go on forever, it’s going to end somehow at some point, we hope, then what can I do to just stay in front of people so that I’m the call they make. And if I can hold on by my fingernails while a million other companies are going to go out, that has its advantages, too. It’s not fun to watch, but it has its advantages. So that’s what we did, and it paid off. And then the other nice thing is you do spend a lot of time with yourself realizing, okay, what is it that I want to do? Because by the time the pandemic hit, I mean, I’d been doing event in the restaurant business and doing events for, I don’t know, 20 something years by that point.

Marley Majcher:

Listening to one of your other podcasts where somebody said, like, is this all there is? Like, is this all there is? Is this what I want to do in a perfect world? Do I want my world to go back to being exactly the same as it was and just, you know, doing more or bigger parties or this is the opportunity for reset? What do I want to do?

Melinda Wittstock:

Right, right. I mean, so the pandemic was kind of very interesting because it did focus a lot of people’s minds on what’s actually important.

Marley Majcher:

Oh, yes.

Melinda Wittstock:

You know, what do you actually want your life to be? And I found that people that approached it that way came out of it really well. Okay. Like, so many new businesses created so many new opportunities, people finding their true passion, their true purpose. Right?

Marley Majcher:

Absolutely. And also, to me, if you told me that the whole world just about would be comfortable working virtually and setting up Zoom interviews, and I mean, that alone, getting, whether it was 60-year-olds or 70-year-old finance people who never were on Zoom on a regular basis, certainly couldn’t set it up themselves without a lot of help. Help. If you told me that that was going to shift the landscape of business so much, I mean, that was, or that is to me, a huge positive, because now what happens is that’s a big opportunity to reduce costs as a business owner. Right? Like, take a business like mine where so much of it was about, you know, the client calls and says, hey, listen, I want to do an event. And you, you know, especially if you’re not prequalifying them well enough, you’re running off and you’re doing a site check and you’re doing all these measurements, and you’re putting all this time in, and guess what? You couldn’t do that. So, everybody had to get very creative. It was like, hey, listen, why don’t you take some photos of your backyard, send me some videos, walk me through the event, blah, blah, blah, all those things.

Marley Majcher:

Well, that became perfectly acceptable. If I said that to people before, they’d be like, are you lazy? Or like, why don’t you just do it? Well, now, it was the way to have it done. And I think the smart entrepreneurs, at the end of the day, learned those skills, kind of created some systems around them, and then integrated them into their day-to-day business activities, which is what we did 100%.

Melinda Wittstock:

And with things like AI now, I mean, I mean, that’s the other major disruption coming in behind this.

Marley Majcher:

Yes.

Melinda Wittstock:

AI can make people pretty freaked out if they’re in the people business because, like, are the people all going to be replaced? And on the other hand, it allows for those underlying efficiencies, if done correctly, that allow for deeper, more creative human experience because all the background work is being handled. It allows you to focus on the thing that’s actually the true value.

Marley Majcher:

And now AI is posing its own set of problems. Of course, with so many entrepreneurs, I feel like it’s like the early days of Zoom where people don’t know how to use it, and so they’re kind of fumbling around and maybe getting misinformation. Right. And not knowing how they have to verify it so much. And, but it, the, if you can step back and not just be frustrated with, hey, it didn’t churn out my marketing plan. Like, I read an article that, that said it would if I just asked it this question. And if you can just keep looking at it as something that you’ve got to sharpen the saw and keep getting better at and that it will change your world if you do, I mean, literally change your world and cut your expenses drastically and help you find, you know, tap new customers, all those things.

Marley Majcher:

I mean, it’s, to me, it’s like the greatest thing that’s ever happened to business, except, you know, there are huge downsides.

Melinda Wittstock:

It’s kind of demystifying it and learning where best to apply it, you know, in your business. So, like, I think that there’s some interesting trends, you know, I think when I, you know, not an expert at all in my party business, apart from enjoying them.

Marley Majcher:

Yes, I get that.

Melinda Wittstock:

I think there’s just such a yearning, though, for authenticity, authentic, genuine human connection, because we have sort of a social media environment that is actually making people feel disconnected rather than connected.

Marley Majcher:

Oh, well, I think we’re seeing that proven. I mean, I have kids, and for me, talking to anybody else that has kids, they say the same things. I mean, the kids lost this depending on their age. They lost this huge chunk of learning how to interact with other people, and they, you know, depending on how old they are, they didn’t have necessarily that much time to figure it out in the first place to learn the skills. And then what happened is you could do everything. You weren’t doing things face to face. And we all know that there’s so much more than just the words we text, the meaning. There’s so much more, even than just being on the phone.

Marley Majcher:

Yeah, you can hear the inflection and all that, but when you’re face to face and you can see somebody’s facial expressions, and it’s just reading things on a completely different level. And to me, it just showed how much we learn just being in the company of other people and those forced interactions, whether it’s just, hey, I’m getting gas, or I’m going to buy my books for school for the fall quarter. But also, it’s really what I think started bringing the industry back because people, you know, people said, well, listen, you know what happened after the pandemic? And I said, for us, after the pandemic, it was this pent-up demand, and it was like the floodgates opened. I mean, it was like, I mean, it was like everybody under the sun was just like, let me out. I want to have a party. Like, I want to see my friends. What can I do? And we took advantage of 100%.

Melinda Wittstock:

So, tell me about the types of events and parties that you do. What do you specialize in?

Marley Majcher:

We’re special. We definitely handle, social and corporate, and we, and we definitely handle weddings. But the secret sauce for us is we are, we’re never going to be somebody that competes on price. We’re a firm that you go to when, when you say, listen, I want good food, and, yes, I want good entertainment, but I want people to walk away, whatever kind of event it is, even if it’s a wedding, and say, oh, my gosh, that was amazing. And they don’t even know why it was amazing, and they don’t even really know.

Marley Majcher:

They can’t pinpoint it, but it’s just a vibe. And they’re like, this was the greatest event ever. And for us, that comes in, in a lot of layered things and a lot of secret sauce stuff that we put together, whether it’s through the entertainment or it’s through the invitation, or it’s through different experiences that are happening during the event or unexpected food or unexpected food at different times that we really leverage. So, for us, it has to have that component or at this point, I’m not going to do it because I don’t need it to pay my mortgage.

Melinda Wittstock:

Give me an idea of some of your best parties. Walk me through some of the highlights, some of your favorites.

Marley Majcher:

Some of my favorites are when people walk in and they, they think, oh, I’m going to a Halloween party. And then they have the regular Halloween party components where they’re like, oh, it looks spooky, and the lighting is like that. Right. But then they go up and they have, you know, there’s a regular bar, and they can order whatever drink they want. And then they also can go to a bar where it’s just all black and there are hands and curtains and they don’t understand, but they walk up, and they order one of the drinks that’s kind of scratched on the wall in front of them. And then the hand, a gloved hand, pops out and hands them their drink. And then, you know, the hand goes back in so they can’t see people behind it.

Marley Majcher:

They can’t see what’s happening. And it’s small things like that. That is not rocket science, right? It is not rocket science to have a flat set kind of wall that’s black, that’s a chalkboard where it says, you know, whatever, specialty cocktail, and have somebody with a glove, you know, coming through a small window with a curtain. But people, it just amazes me. Every time we do something, it’s the…

Melinda Wittstock:

Detail, the intrigue, the surprise.

Marley Majcher:

So just be unexpected and creative.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah.

Marley Majcher:

And every single time, I mean, and I’m talking like, you know, for the most part, our clients are fairly, whether they’re corporate or social, they’re fairly well traveled and they’ve seen a lot of events and things like that, and it will just amaze me. I’m like, that guy is the CEO of Blah, blah, blah. And he is standing there trying to get the hand behind the curtain to talk to him or something. Like he can’t, you know, it’s kind of like that whole thing with the palace guards’ type of deal. And I just never get over that sometimes. I mean, one time we had the sushi girl, you know, this is many years ago, when it was much more appropriate to do that. But we had, one of the things that I would always hear is that my female clients would complain because the guests, the female guests always wanted to go to these parties, especially if they’re dressed up, especially, you know, women in general, and I’m obviously generalizing, loved that kind of stuff.

Marley Majcher:

They love to get dressed. They love to participate in the whole thing. And they would always say, they listen, they’re dragging their husbands or their significant others there and they’d be like, oh, you know, well, I was like, well, it’s very simple what, depending on what the target audience was, let’s, you know, let’s have the rolled cigar guy sitting there like you, as if you’re going to roll a cigar on demand, like as if you’re sitting in, you know, Cuba or in some good old boys club. And let’s have the sushi girl, you know, in the bathing suit where they are having, you know, the sushi. And the, and the thing about it was there wasn’t a man at that party who would leave. And the why? And the wives and women, they were thrilled because, and all we did was create a little lounge where they could sit and hang out with each other, smoking cigars. The wives were like, fine, I don’t care if you smoke the cigar. You know, that’s the least of my words.

Marley Majcher:

The women are all dancing. Half of them are dancing with each other. It just having the time of their lives. But it was, it was the small thing of, it’s just like entertaining a kid, you know, if you can keep the kids busy at, you know, a Super bowl party, for example, then they’re, then the parents are happy at the party, right? Because you’ve got some kind of activity or you’ve got some kind of little photo thing going, they won’t want to leave. But people really underestimate the components that go into the components that go into an event and the components that can ruin event. And it’s like if one person wants to go home or your child isn’t happy and tagging it, you know, tugging at your pant leg, it’s annoying. You’re like, oh, fine, let’s just go. You can’t enjoy yourself.

Marley Majcher:

But if the host or hostess has thought of that ahead of time, then the party is just so much better, and they leave. They don’t even know why they had such a great time. Because everybody had a great time. You know, nobody’s going home in a cranky mood that they had to go to this event for 4 hours because mom said we had to.

Melinda Wittstock:

Right, right. Well, let’s go through the process of what it takes, because I can only imagine the complexity of understanding your client. What’s the objective of the client? How do I want people to feel? So, from the time that they come to you saying, hey, we need to have this type of event to its full execution. Tell me about the process. Tell me about all the things you have to do well to make it happen.

Marley Majcher:

It’s so from my brain, or probably even, you know, your brain. It’s a very systematic approach and it’s almost like you’re interviewing a new business client, right. Or new business consulting client. You can’t let them feel that way because that’s not why they’re calling. You know, they don’t want to have a business conversation about a party that’s going to take the fun out. But it has the same, the process has the same backbone. Right.

Marley Majcher:

You just have to use different words. So, it is about having that whatever way they come to, whether it’s, you know, a form or a phone call or an email, and you get a feel and then you have to pre-qualify them. That is a number one. Because if you don’t do that, what I’ve found is so many small business owners don’t pre-qualify and think, hey, listen, because the person fits your target audience in every other aspect, but you don’t know if they’re willing to spend x amount, which is what they need to spend to make this, to have this level of service. Right. It’s not necessarily impossible to do things well, but it is nearly impossible to do them well without going through the steps and taking the time to pick up on the subtleties because that’s what’s going to bring the event home. It’s about prequalifying the client and then having that kind of in depth intake session where so many times they show up and sometimes it’s a, you know, a husband and wife, and sometimes it’s, you know, a mom and a daughter and she’s getting married. I mean, and sometimes they’re just big disconnects, right? Maybe the spouse doesn’t want to spend the kind of money and, you know, and the woman says, listen, I want to have this amazing blah, blah, blah.

Marley Majcher:

So, what it is about is, A, figuring out who the decision makers are in the process, and B, what is the goal? But that’s obviously difficult to define. It’s easier to define for a corporate event. What’s the goal? Oh, we’re launching a product. We want to get x number of new, you know, sign ups and we want to get x number of posts on social media and that gets shared, et cetera, et cetera. Well, if it’s a social event, it, it also, you have to know the goal. But that’s much more amorphous.

Marley Majcher:

It has to be, are you guys trying to get your good friends together after COVID? And do you want to be dressed up and have this fabulous, like, Marie Antoinette kind of party? Because, by the way, that’s what a lot of people wanted because they had, they’d been in sweats. They were sick of being in sweats. They wanted to dress up and just go to town. Or was it more, the goal is to get our friends together and just relax and veg and enjoy each other’s company and be happy that we’re not in masks anymore. If you take the two, the two potential events, one is going to be structured very, very differently, right. You’re most likely not going to have people dripping in jewels and all dressed up and serve them grilled cheese, maybe, but the casual group who wants to hang out, and you most likely are not going to sit them at a formal roundtable of ten people and serve them six courses. You’re not going to get where you want to go.

Marley Majcher:

It’s not going to facilitate achieving the goal. It’s really, that’s where the most time is spent, is on the goal and then on the hotspots. And I think so many people, when they’re planning events, they don’t consider that enough. Like some people absolutely hate. And it might be something that I consider small, but to them, it drives them insane. Onion certain components in the food, right? And then some people like, I’m starting to get this way, or understand a little bit more, if the music is too loud, it will destroy their experience, period. They won’t stay very long.

Marley Majcher:

They’re annoyed. There’s, you know, they’re. And that’s a real balance, obviously, for an event planner and a host or hostess, because the band or the DJ always wants everything to be very loud. And they typically are the only ones that want everything to be very, very loud, unless you’re throwing a rave or something. But everybody else really wants to be able to talk. There’s that balance. So you have to just ask a lot of pre qualifying questions to figure out what, you know, good or bad, what’s going to, what’s going to rack it, because you can have the goal, you can have everything set up perfectly and you didn’t think to ask the question or, you know, about how parking is on their street and you don’t really force the hand of saying, hey, listen, you guys need a valet. And now they’ve had this amazing event and people are waiting 45 minutes for their cars.

Marley Majcher:

Well, I’ll tell you, I don’t care how great the event was, you’re going to have a lot of really cranky people. So, it’s about taking all those notes in and then coming and then throwing the mud at the wall, right. Coming back with a proposal and saying, okay, listen, here’s kind of what I heard was the point. Here’s my interpretation of how we can best accomplish that. Sometimes it aligns perfectly with what their budget is. Usually, it doesn’t. I always say, do you want me to just pick to a party that’s just going to fit in your budget, or do you want me to list everything you want and then line item it and we cut back if need be, and then it gets into the execution of it. So, once they buy off on the concept, then it is okay, you lay it out.

Marley Majcher:

We’ve got maybe three months to plan the event. Maybe we’ve got six months to plan the event. A lot of times, high profile events, you might have two weeks or a week. Depending on the timeframe, you can’t underestimate how much that affects things. If you have a very short Runway to plan a fairly involved event, that host or decision maker has to be prepared for a bumpy ride, because there are going to be a lot of decisions that have to get made quickly, a lot of payments that have to get in deposits and all that stuff, depending on how you structure it versus you know, event that you have six months to plan, you’re going to, the pace is going to be much smoother and it’s not going to be. It’s about managing the expectations and then about having a good solid contract, too, that everybody understands what’s in the contract so that there aren’t surprises where the host or benefactor is saying, oh, I didn’t realize the whole thing was due two weeks before the event.

Marley Majcher:

You don’t want to be having those conversations two weeks before the event and, and getting into, well, why is the whole thing due if I haven’t had the event yet? You know that kind of thing. And then it’s the managing of the details, because that week before an event for 99% of the time is fairly miserable because the client, let’s say, is having people come in from out of town or people are texting them last minute. They’re. Every client, at least, that I’ve had lately, is fighting for our final RSVPs, which are drastically affecting the count and the table seatings and all that stuff. It’s about kind of holding their hand through that and reassuring them that, hey, listen, it isn’t just your friends, it’s everybody’s friends. This is what’s happening and making that as smooth as possible so the host or hosts can enjoy the event that they’ve put so much time and money into creating. And then it’s also making sure that the postproduction of the event is smooth, because that’s where a lot of times people planning events, where they fail, right?

Marley Majcher:

And then the party is Saturday night and it’s not communicated to them, hey, listen, your tent isn’t going to come down until Tuesday. Or do you want us to be cleaning up at night to get rid of all the trash and everything till two or three in the morning? Maybe you want to just enjoy your guests. Maybe, you know, do you want us to come back on Sunday? That’s going to be an extra charge, that kind of stuff. So, it’s about managing all those, those components and expectations and really understanding what is better for the client. And so that it, the whole packet, like the. Because people don’t just remember at 09:00 on Saturday, they had a good time, right? That they remember the general feeling of the whole experience and so that’s where all the planning and experience, in my opinion, comes in.

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Melinda Wittstock:

And we’re back with Marley Majcher, CEO and Founder of the Party Goddess.

[INTERVIEW CONTINUES]

Melinda Wittstock:

Right, right. That makes a lot of sense. So, what are some of the biggest challenges that you faced along the way? I mean, I can imagine dealing with people, dealing with personalities, especially dealing with some of the people. I mean, you’ve worked with Snoop Dogg, you’ve worked with all these of a list sort of celebrities, a lot of probably opinions, egos, all sorts of stuff. So how do you deal with the people?

Marley Majcher:

Well, yeah, that I feel like, I feel like I always just can learn so much about how to do it better, let’s put it that way. But some of the challenges, obviously, are the people often, and they are slightly different. If you’re doing a big nonprofit event, like when we did the opening of the Hollywood Bowl, or you do the Critics’ Choice Awards, let’s say, and you will have multiple decision makers, often on the same level. If I do in a corporate event and the assistant to, you know, Jennifer Gray or whoever I’m working with, I might be working with that person, and then that person goes to the boss and gets buy in, and that’s that. But let’s say it’s a high-end nonprofit. You’ve got a lot of people with opinions, and for the most part, those opinions are all usually equally weighted. You’re constantly kind of asking yourself, who is my, like, who’s my boss? Who do I listen to? And navigating those waters? Because sometimes there’s a squeaky one who should not have their opinions weighted more than somebody else, but they are the ones that are texting you and calling you and about to put this whole thing over budget, you know, very quickly. So, you have to be a little bit of a negotiator and a little bit, you know, the psychologist.

Marley Majcher:

One person thinks that they should have roses and they should all be this shade, and the other person says, we should do something much more modern. But at the end of the day, they want the event to go off really well. When you’re dealing with celebrities, you have multiple decision makers who often have very, very different agendas or agendas that are competing. So, for example, the celebrity themselves it’s like, hey, I want to have this party.

Marley Majcher:

Maybe they’re not particularly financially savvy. You know, they’re not really managing their money. They just say, I want this and this and this and this and this. And then in comes the manager who’s like, not going to happen. We’re not spending $200,000 and having dolphins come swim in the pool. I don’t care. And then you have, typically, the legal team.

Marley Majcher:

I can think of one celebrity event we did where everything got signed off on. And then the legal team, during the event was like, who in God’s green land allowed these little motor cars here? I mean, they were losing their minds because of the liability. And then the PR team has a totally different agenda a lot of times, right? The PR team is. Is trying to, let’s say, remake the celebrity’s image at that point. Maybe that’s why the celebrity’s having the party. Like the PR team says, hey, listen, we’ve got to change this narrative that’s out there, that you’re a serial killer. But obviously, I’m exaggerating. And the celebrity maybe doesn’t even see that it’s that big a problem.

Marley Majcher:

They’re thinking they’re just having a party. The PR team is thinking, we need to really massage this and really place these photos and magazines and online and stuff carefully. And, you know, as I said, legal is going well, ‘I’m so glad that they look like mother of the year, but that the liability and potential for disaster here is huge’. And then the other thing, too, is I will. I’m trying to keep all that in balance and keep it in balance that I’ve signed often very, very, very stringent confidentiality agreements and keep the paparazzi at bay. But sometimes the PR team is leaking things to the paparazzi. Right? So, they’re leaking it to the paparazzi to get the paparazzi to get these photos to further the narrative that the person is mother of the year.

Marley Majcher:

The other side of the paparazzi hears about it that’s been forwarding, you know, that’s been promoting the other narrative, and then if I’m the company, or our company is the only one that’s handling all aspects of an event, and this happened, and then stuff gets leaked. It’s like, we’ve done everything we can to have the contracts and different names and under pseudonyms and all this stuff, and our employees don’t even know, other than maybe two, who the client is. Et cetera, et cetera. And then all of a sudden, you got pop rots and you got everything else, and you’re like, oh, my God, I’m going to get blamed for this only to find out, oh, yeah, yeah, no, you’re good. We leaked it, and you’re just like, ah. You know, so it becomes not always about just executing a good event. It becomes about hitting the, all the different key points, I guess, that the, that the decision makers want hit.

Marley Majcher:

It’s never easy, and sometimes it’s not even possible.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah. I don’t know how you do what you do. My AI business is easier.

Marley Majcher:

The thing about it is, I think it’s a certain personality type that’s drawn to it that, and there is a certain. I’m not as happy when things aren’t as complex. I guess I do like the challenge, and I guess I am confident in my experience and my abilities to put things over the finish line. That, to me, it’s a challenge. And so, I like to have different balls juggling in the air, within reason. Right? Because we haven’t even addressed the things of, we’ve talked about the publicist and the legal team and the manager and the celebrity themselves. We haven’t even talked about the fact that the fire department, you know, doesn’t give two hoots that this is a celebrity event and is just saying, listen, there are going to be too many people in the venue. And are all the linens and fabric fire retardant? Right.

Melinda Wittstock:

Imagine, like, all the regulations and all the things code, like, all the, all.

Marley Majcher:

The things, the noise requirements and the ballet, you know, the parking requirements and how many cars can be on a street at a time and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Melinda Wittstock:

So many, so many details.

Marley Majcher:

I mean, it’s just so many details.

Melinda Wittstock:

I ask every entrepreneur this because there’s always stuff that goes wrong, and our ability as entrepreneurs is to deal with the stuff we can’t control. So, what are some of the things that have gone wrong and how do you manage that?

Marley Majcher:

Well, you, you manage it by, you know, I think there’s some proverb from many thousands of years ago or whatever, something along the lines of, you know, you sweat a lot in peace so that you’re calm in war or something like that. And so, I look at it as I have to always be working out and meditating and doing those things so that when it hits the fan, because usually you don’t expect it to hit the fan when it’s going to hit. I’m, like, mentally prepared and not exhausted and not too strung up on caffeine with no lunch. But see, there’s that front end preparation, but then things are going to go wrong. So, for example, we did this. We had a client, and she was one of my favorite clients to this day. And she wanted to do. It was in southern California, but it was very clear she did not.

Marley Majcher:

It wasn’t a Mexican themed party she wanted. She had traveled a lot and done documentaries and stuff and Latin American, South American. She very much wanted these different countries where she’d done these documentaries represented and, okay, that was great. She was very creative and out there. And so, we did this whole thing where one of the commonalities in all these countries was that they had all these colorful birds. And so that was one of the things we really riffed off of, which is hilarious to have a theme of, you know, kind of Latin American frivolity with a sub theme of brightly colored birds.

Marley Majcher:

So we had live birds, we had stuffed birds all kind of intertwined in this theme. And in the. And, you know, one of the birds got loose and yours truly is up there. All they had was the pool net, you know, and I’m trying to catch the bird with the pool net, and all I’m thinking is, oh, my God, I’m in California and PETA is going to shut me down. You know, this small bird is escaping, whatever, and I don’t know how, but I did catch the bird on the ladder and the whole thing. So that was one thing. But the other thing that I never could have anticipated was we had this big cake, and she wanted the big. Those big, colorful Mexican paper flowers.

Marley Majcher:

Well, ironically, for this event, the fire department was a very big part of this event because of the city in which it was held and very stringent requirements on the draping and all that stuff. And so, we knew they were going to come and set things on fire and test it and look for all of our certificates. And, I mean, I was locked and loaded, you know, I was like, they could light a match to this place. They could put kerosene on here, and this place isn’t going to do anything. Right. Okay, so now we’re towards the end of the, obviously, fire department signs off. Life is great.

Marley Majcher:

Towards the end of the party, the client had a lot to drink. We like the cake. We’re all singing happy birthday. The happy birthday is, you know, getting a little drunker and longer. And she hasn’t blown out the candles. Well, by the time, you know, we’re kind of like, okay, hey, blow out those candles. Then the cake, the flowers on the cake catch fire. Okay, so now I’m holding the cake that is on fire.

Marley Majcher:

I’ve already, you know, ironically, spent half my time preparing for this event for a fire. She thinks this is the greatest thing that’s ever happened in life. The photos are amazing. All those things. But that’s one of those, like, it just goes to show you. My God.

Marley Majcher:

Yeah. I mean, it makes perfect sense eventually that the wind blows and there are paper flowers at the base. But you wouldn’t, you know, really think that would happen. And you certainly can’t fireproof the flowers because it would affect the taste of the cake. So, you get what I’m saying. It’s just sometimes, no matter what, it still goes wrong. Now, in that case, she thought it was the greatest event of her life that that happened. But I could have used it.

Melinda Wittstock:

Oh, my goodness. There’s so much detail that goes into what you do. So, tell me, how many of these do you do a year? I mean, you. You must have quite a few.

Marley Majcher:

Well, in the old days, we used to do just tons. I mean, you know, if it was like a Saturday night and we weren’t busy, it was like, wait, what happened right now? The kind of going back to the whole COVID piece of it, you know, my priorities have shifted a lot, and unfortunately, I’m at a space where I can kind of pick and choose. So, our goal now is really just, like, four to eight events a year that are, you know, ginormous. Now, they might be ginormous with a very short time frame. They might be ginormous in Budget, but for only four people, which we have a client that does stuff like that regularly, but events that have kind of these magical components where we really get to be creative, because I no longer want to do it for just. Oh, yay. I have a $10,000 event, and there’s so much competition for that $10,000 event, and the costs to producing it are going up so much. And the barriers to entry to our industry are almost zero.

Marley Majcher:

So, you constantly are fighting people who are doing it at a lower rate, I’ll bet, without insurance, et cetera. But that’s the goal. And I have other projects now that I’m working on, too, that kind of dovetail with the events, but that’s a good spot for me to be in.

Melinda Wittstock:

You’ve accomplished so much in this space. What’s next for you? Because when you think of businesses and, like, scalability and how big they could get, right, you know, how are you scaling this, and where do you ultimately want to be, you know, five years, ten years from now?

Marley Majcher:

Well, that is a question that I’ve always been somebody. I don’t even know how long it’s been. I mean, I feel like I was a kid when I started having written goals and really believing in written goals, you know, their smart goals, where they’re measurable and all those things. And for a long, long, long time, my goal was to have an event planning company of x amount of hundreds of millions of dollars a year, because it was $1 million more than the highest grossing international event company. And I had all the specifics broken down of how I would do that, plus 10% more. And that’s one way to do it. But at the end of the day, one of my overarching principles is always that your passive income is double your expenses. Well, having an event planning company, even at, you know, $400 million a year, it still would require me, even though, if I get paid very well, it still is a dollars-for-hours situation, which is fundamentally what I don’t think is financial freedom, which is my ultimate goal. When I was 30 years old, and I’m loading catering trucks day and night, and you can do it three nights in a row, and you can have a few hours on Sunday and then bounce back on Monday. I have no interest in doing that anymore. Fortunately, my dad was very influential in me diversifying. And so, I do have a lot of, like, commercial properties and stuff like that that I’ve enjoyed rehabbing, which is, by the way, very similar to event planning because it’s, you know, just making a more permanent gutting something and making a more permanent space instead of a temporary space.

Marley Majcher:

But then after the pandemic, or kind of during the pandemic, I was like, I really want to be a rancher, which is so random. And so, I bought 20 acres of ranch land with, that was just dirt and Santa Nez, and I’ve been building that. And it’s interesting how it all kind of comes full circle, right? Because it’s sort of the, you know, 40 years after Martha Stewart did it, I’m kind of going back and doing my own little twist on it, and I’m working on some patents for sheep’s wool and I’m going to have sheep at the ranch, et cetera, et cetera. So, it’s very random, but in the end it all comes together. But I think at the end of the day, if I have nothing left other than intellectual property, that will absolutely accomplish my goal of passive income being double my expenses, which is saying a lot because I like to spend a lot.

Melinda Wittstock:

Amazing. Well, Marley, I want to make sure everyone knows how to find you and work with you if they’re planning a partner party coming up soon. Who are your ideal clients that you’re working for? Are there any geographic constraints? You know, what’s your ideal? And if anyone is looking to work with you, what’s the best way to find you?

Marley Majcher:

There are no geographical constraints whatsoever. I mean, as long as somewhere where I can get a visa. Quite frankly, the more geographically bizarre, far away, the more I’m interested. The ideal client for us is somebody, I mean, I can get into very detailed, very detailed avatar. But to keep it simple, it’s somebody who is usually well traveled or well versed, kind of in attending events and has seen a lot and wants to do something different. But they are not exactly sure how to accomplish that. They have high amount of disposable income where they can spend it on an event. And it’s not going to mean that their kids have to drop out of private school.

Marley Majcher:

You know what I mean? It’s somebody who’s very comfortable and wants a different event, doesn’t know how to accomplish it, likes. And if somebody who, quite frankly, is willing to make an emotional decision, who’s going to say, because they’re going to get, they can get proposals from all kinds of planners and at the end of the day, even if it’s delivered electronically, it’s still black and white words on a thing with line items and numbers and yes, maybe photos and stuff to sell the concept. At the end of the day, what they are investing in is me. So, it’s somebody who’s going to make an emotional decision and be like, I don’t care. I have to have her because she gets it. And that’s really, those are my most successful, successful clients, whether it’s corporate or social. A lot of times, our corporate clients, not always, but a lot of times our corporate clients are like family, multi-generational companies because they are the decision makers. I love that because then you typically, you’re not going through three rounds of check requests and, you know, waiting for corporate to decide on things.

Marley Majcher:

It’s just kind of like, yes, this is what we want, and it doesn’t matter that it’s, you know, not particularly practical. Those are the people I’m like, yes, you know, they, they just know what they want. They’re not sure how to get there.

Melinda Wittstock:

Right. I mean, that for a busy entrepreneur or anybody, you just want to have the peace of mind that, oh, my God, this has done for, like, if it were me, and I was just like, I just want this done for me. You know what I mean? I don’t want to have to be sweating the details. I want to be able to trust and have peace of mind that it’s just all going to come together.

Marley Majcher:

Right. And that that’s the thing is, because these days, there are so many other components right there. There are the confidentiality components. There are also big security components, you know, so sometimes the client themselves might not be high, particularly high profile, but the attendees are going to be very high profile. So not only do you have security for the event, but you also have security from just photographs being taken and things like that. And so, it’s somebody who just is like, you know, I’m busy. Whether it’s they’re busy working or they’re just busy with their lives and. And don’t have the patience to deal with somebody who’s just going to be, you know, messing around and somebody who just says, okay, I got it, I understand.

Marley Majcher:

I’m going to be back in touch with you when I’ve got questions that only you can answer and you respect their time, and you realize their time is their money and their freedom, and let’s get it done right 100%.

Melinda Wittstock:

So, people can find you everywhere on social media as the party goddess, but you’re also the Profit Goddess as well, with your book, But Are You Making Any Money? What’s the best way for people to get either of these amazing resources?

Marley Majcher:

Well, they the simplest of courses for on social media and Instagram is @ThePartyGoddess or @theprofitgoddess. And if they want to know more about kind of the business aspect, then my book is on Amazon and that would be the easiest. And yeah, those are, those are the simplest ways to find me, and you will definitely find me a mix of, you know, kind of crafted posts and then a mix of just me, no makeup, you know, on a rant about something random happened.

Melinda Wittstock:

All the details will be in the show notes. So, if you’re driving or whatever, don’t drive off the road. All this will be in the show notes. Marley, thank you so much for putting on your wings and flying with us today.

Marley Majcher:

Thank you. I had a great time. I appreciate it.

[INTERVIEW ENDS]

Melinda Wittstock:

Marley Majcher is the CEO and founder of The Party Goddess and author of But Are You Making Any Money?

Melinda Wittstock:

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