Emarie Chervinskas, owner of a new event planning business – A Savvy Event – started working with food, events and people at a young age, because her parents own 10 restaurants and a catering business in northern California. She started helping with catering at age eight, and at 15 became the hostess at the Putah Creek Café, a diner-style restaurant her parents own in her hometown of Winters.
While an undergrad at UC Davis, she planned and catered dinner parties in her spare time, and for four summers ran the Cal Aggie Camp for low-income and foster kids near Grass Valley, managing a staff of 40 students.
After graduation, Chervinskas worked for a food and beverage marketing agency in London, then moved to the Cayman Islands to work as an event planner, first at the Westin Hotel, then for a company called Celebrations. She planned many weddings, which ranged from two people eloping to ceremonies attended by 200 that required her to arrange travel, hotel rooms and activities for the guests after the wedding.
In 2005, Chervinskas and others who worked for Celebrations appeared on a reality TV show, “Weddings Away,” that was broadcast on the Travel Channel.
Last December, she decided to start her own event-planning business. Chervinskas says she loves weddings because “they’re celebrations where everyone’s excited and happy.” She works with clients with limited budgets and those with no limits. “Everybody deserves a nice wedding, no matter how much they can spend,” she said.
Chervinskas knows she wouldn’t be happy at a 9-to-5 job and in fact doesn’t think of her work as a job. She has relationships with local hotels, as well as private venues in the area. Currently, she’s planning weddings in Sonoma, Colorado, Grand Cayman and Lake Tahoe.
A Savvy Event
306B Fifth St. W., Sonoma; 707.364.7403
ido@savvyevent.com;
www.asavvyevent.com
Call for appointment.
