In case you have not been outside lately, we have some exciting news for you if you are planning on celebrating a birthday in NYC - summer is here! Although this past winter was relatively mild in the Big Apple, nonetheless we are excited to greet summer and to begin one of our favorite pastimes - partying on our favorite rooftops.
One of the most beautiful things about Manhattan is the skyline at night, however it can be very difficult to enjoy this beautiful sight if you are stuck on the first or second floor of an establishment. There is something less than satisfying about looking upwards through a vast array of buildings in hopes of catching sight of the moon or some clouds, which is why one of our favorite things to do in the summer is to celebrate high above the worries of every day life in the city.
However, before you head off to enjoy your favorite rooftop spot, we encourage to think of a few things - especially if you are planning a birthday party where your guests will all be expecting to spend an evening drinking and carousing to their hearts content with their favorite person - you!
For starters, it is always important to consider the capacity and size of the venue. After all, rooftop spots are hot in the summer, and you can be certain that a large crowd is going to be coming out to celebrate the majesty of beautiful weather and cool clothes. Therefore, it is imperative that you consider both the timing of arrival and size of your crowd before picking a venue. In the summer, we highly recommend advance reservations and bottle service in order to ensure both that you have a space to serve as a "home base" and also to ensure that there is a nice guest list that helps to ensure that your birthday party guests can all actually get into the venue.
Next, you have to consider the dreaded "R" word. Yes folks, we are talking about RAIN! Although beautiful weather can make a rooftop night memorable and incredible, terrible weather can do just the opposite. The last thing you want to do is to be crowded into a small space designed for half the number, and this is likely to happen if your venue doesn't have adequate space available in the event of rain. We always advise doing a weather check, again ensuring you have a nice space regardless of the weather, and sometimes we even advise having a nice backup venue - just in case. Nothing ruins a party more than soaking wet clothes, ruined hair and make-up, and friends that are angry and upset who "just want to go home."
Last, but certainly not least, we always recommend using a party planner such as your truly (My NYC Birthday) to ensure that the entire night goes off without a hitch. After all, it is your birthday, and if you want to celebrate on a rooftop overlooking Manhattan, then that is exactly what you should be able to do while maintaining your sanity. A quality birthday party planner can ensure that you have a good time, no stress, and no hassle - which is the perfect birthday present to yourself.
So remember - Birthday NYC + Summer = Rooftop - and so long as you follow our advice, you will have a fantastic evening and be the envy of all of your winter birthday friends.
Thursday, May 31, 2012
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
We Do More Than Just Birthdays
Although we are best known for our commitment to making each and every birthday in NYC absolutely amazing, many people do not realize that we are also a full service events company that is capable of putting together any type of corporate, alumni, community, or school event, ranging from fifty people to five thousand. Now, don't get me wrong, helping people with New York birthday planning is definitely our first love, but there is still something very satisfying about putting together an event for hundreds of people.
This weekend in New York City, we are planning and sponsoring an event for international law students who are pursuing advanced legal degrees at institutions all across the United States. Beginning on Friday, these students will be in NYC to network, interview, and job search with a wide variety of international employers. This event is a very intense two-day affair, and this "job fair" is very competitive. Due to the sheer number of opportunities for accessing employers, it is likely that the number of students coming into the city this weekend will exceed one thousand.
As you can imagine, these students are not all work and no play, and on Sunday evening (yes, just a few days prior to the job fair) we were approached regarding setting up an event on Saturday evening for all of these students. This was definitely something we were interested in doing, and we really wanted to help out, but based on the numbers and the short timeframe, it was a tall task.
First and foremost, we had to find a venue that could host such a large number, and that was willing to do so on a Saturday. This might not seem like that difficult of a task, but when you realize that most New York venues make almost all of their money on Friday and Saturday nights, you then understand that reservations, the normal weekend crowd, and any other events are already taking up space at the venue, and they often do not have the room to randomly add between five hundred and one thousand people to their already packed venue.
Lucky for us, we have lots of experience in working with a variety of venues, and are also very familiar with floor plans and options for spaces, so we were able to come up with a nice plan that involved rearranging a space and creating room for an extra five hundred people. It required some sketching, several meetings, and some long phone conversations, but we got it done.
Next, we had to plan for the addition of such a large number of people to the normal crowd of Saturday night partygoers. Planning isn't just a matter of space in the venue, but also includes such considerations as the number of servers, bartenders, security, other staffing, door people, and entry-control. The whole point is to ensure that people have a good time, and no one enjoys sitting around all night, hoping desperately that their other friends can get in, or worse, standing around outside waiting to get in. People also tend to enjoy actually being able to get a drink once they are inside, so as you can imagine, these types of staffing issues are both significant and important.
After taking care of all of those things, then we had to ensure that all of the people coming into the city for the job fair actually knew about the event. This is one area where social media has really helped ease coordination challenges, and by working with people from each school we were able to get the invitations out, ensure that everyone knew about the event, and also to monitor the number of attendees to ensure that our planning for the event was on target.
Currently, we have almost five hundred confirmed attendees, and the number seems to be growing by the hour, leading us to deal with new challenges. Some people might find that daunting, but we actually love the incredible amount of work that goes into an event like this. Not only is it extremely satisfying when the actual event comes together and goes off without a hitch, but more importantly, there is nothing better than seeing the joy on people's faces when they attend a well-planned and well-executed event. Since this happiness is the whole reason we got started in the event planning business, it makes it easy to work hard dealing with new challenges because we know why we do what we do, and we care about seeing those happy faces during a great event.
Saturday is just a few days away, and we will keep on working to make this event incredible. As the number keep growing, so does our excitement! It is going to be a great evening.
This weekend in New York City, we are planning and sponsoring an event for international law students who are pursuing advanced legal degrees at institutions all across the United States. Beginning on Friday, these students will be in NYC to network, interview, and job search with a wide variety of international employers. This event is a very intense two-day affair, and this "job fair" is very competitive. Due to the sheer number of opportunities for accessing employers, it is likely that the number of students coming into the city this weekend will exceed one thousand.
As you can imagine, these students are not all work and no play, and on Sunday evening (yes, just a few days prior to the job fair) we were approached regarding setting up an event on Saturday evening for all of these students. This was definitely something we were interested in doing, and we really wanted to help out, but based on the numbers and the short timeframe, it was a tall task.
First and foremost, we had to find a venue that could host such a large number, and that was willing to do so on a Saturday. This might not seem like that difficult of a task, but when you realize that most New York venues make almost all of their money on Friday and Saturday nights, you then understand that reservations, the normal weekend crowd, and any other events are already taking up space at the venue, and they often do not have the room to randomly add between five hundred and one thousand people to their already packed venue.
Lucky for us, we have lots of experience in working with a variety of venues, and are also very familiar with floor plans and options for spaces, so we were able to come up with a nice plan that involved rearranging a space and creating room for an extra five hundred people. It required some sketching, several meetings, and some long phone conversations, but we got it done.
Next, we had to plan for the addition of such a large number of people to the normal crowd of Saturday night partygoers. Planning isn't just a matter of space in the venue, but also includes such considerations as the number of servers, bartenders, security, other staffing, door people, and entry-control. The whole point is to ensure that people have a good time, and no one enjoys sitting around all night, hoping desperately that their other friends can get in, or worse, standing around outside waiting to get in. People also tend to enjoy actually being able to get a drink once they are inside, so as you can imagine, these types of staffing issues are both significant and important.
After taking care of all of those things, then we had to ensure that all of the people coming into the city for the job fair actually knew about the event. This is one area where social media has really helped ease coordination challenges, and by working with people from each school we were able to get the invitations out, ensure that everyone knew about the event, and also to monitor the number of attendees to ensure that our planning for the event was on target.
Currently, we have almost five hundred confirmed attendees, and the number seems to be growing by the hour, leading us to deal with new challenges. Some people might find that daunting, but we actually love the incredible amount of work that goes into an event like this. Not only is it extremely satisfying when the actual event comes together and goes off without a hitch, but more importantly, there is nothing better than seeing the joy on people's faces when they attend a well-planned and well-executed event. Since this happiness is the whole reason we got started in the event planning business, it makes it easy to work hard dealing with new challenges because we know why we do what we do, and we care about seeing those happy faces during a great event.
Saturday is just a few days away, and we will keep on working to make this event incredible. As the number keep growing, so does our excitement! It is going to be a great evening.
Monday, January 2, 2012
Happy New Year!
Happy New Year! We hope that you all rang in 2012 in style and wish you all the best for the year ahead!
In terms of us, we have a lot of exciting plans and changes upcoming that guarantee that we make celebrating your birthday in NYC easier, better, and more exciting than ever! We will continue with our commitment to ensuring that your celebrating is absolutely amazing, our services will of course continue to be absolutely free, and we will continue to work to maintain our ranking as the number one birthday party planning service in the Big Apple.
One of the first big changes that we have upcoming is the addition of ten new venues to our website in the month of January. Adding new venues is a big deal for us, because it takes a long time for us to really review the entire experience of a night at any particular place, and because our standards are quite high in terms of what we want to provide for your birthday experience. We are very excited to be offering these exciting new venues to our fans and loyal customers, and have high expectations that the addition of these new venues is going to make our service better than ever.
Speaking of our website, we are excited to be launching My NYC Birthday version 2.0 in the month of January as well. Although our original site provided all our customers with everything that they needed for the optimal NYC birthday experience and was extremely user friendly, we wanted to give it a facelift from our retro 90's original site and truly modernize it for 2012. Look for a redesigned user interface, menu changes, an on-site blog, a new photos section, and much, much more. We have put a lot of time and effort into planning out the redesign, and we think that it will great for all of our fans.
Also in terms of birthday parties, 2012 is looking like the year that we celebrate planning our 1000th birthday in New York City! We are not sure when that will happen, but expect a big party with a free open bar to celebrate (we have always been big fans of the words "free open bar"). We appreciate all of the support from fans, friends, customers, and local businesses, and are very excited about reaching this milestone. It is amazing to watch a dream become a reality, and we could not have done it without each and every single one of you.
All of this and more in 2012, and we are so very excited to make this an incredible year for those that we care the most about - you! When you celebrate your birthday in New York City, remember that My NYC Birthday is number one for a reason. We are passionate about what we do, and are goal as always it to make your birthday absolutely amazing! All you have to do is blow out the candles, and we will take care of all the rest!
Thanks for making 2011 a great year for us, and we are looking forward to another great year. Best wishes to you and yours in 2012!
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