Debi Lilly
Owner,
A Perfect Event
The holiday season is the perfect time to celebrate with friends and family. Debi Lilly offers a no-fail strategy for hosting with minimal effort and maximum fun.
Design a fresh theme.
A champagne and sweets party is a festive idea. Set up a champagne bar with Prosecco, a rose champagne, and a regular champagne for tasting. You don’t often have a chance to sit and drink champagne the way you would wine so it’s a unique idea. Plus it’s easy and self-serve. For sweets, try the hot trend right now—a mini dessert bar. Have petite cupcakes or take five different glass bowls and fill each one with a different bite-size cookie. Create labels on your computer and stick them on each jar. Provide little white lunch bags for people to take cookies home with them.
Embrace tradition.
Most people today skip formal invitations in lieu of impersonal e-vites. But it’s so special to receive a traditional invitation in the mail and it makes a great keepsake of the event. Purchase invitations from a store two to three weeks before the event. Or make your own—pick winter colors like white, silver, red, or gold, use simple cards, then tie a satin or silk ribbon around them in a pretty knot. Hand-write the details for that extra personal touch, and pop them in the mail.
Keep it simple.
Decorating can be as easy as a few thoughtful details. Pull a big white platter from your pantry and arrange a dozen white pillar candles of all different sizes. Scatter pinecones from your yard around the candles. Buy a few holiday ornaments in coordinating colors and scatter them around the house, along with some votive candles on the windowsills, tables, and the mantel. Finish it off with red and white roses and spread the petals all around.
Make it warm and welcoming.
Light one or two scented candles so that as soon as your guests walk in the door they’ll be drawn into your house by the aroma. And be absolutely dressed and ready to go one full hour before your party starts. No matter where you live, people will arrive early, and there’s nothing as unwelcoming as a hostess answering the door in her bathrobe without any makeup.
Allow plenty of time.
Have everything ready the day before except for the things that can’t be, like food. Rely on catering or buy dishes that are ready to pop in the oven and heat so that you’re not making everything from scratch. It’s very evident to guests as they walk in that your energy is zapped if you’ve spent the last twenty-four hours frantically preparing.
Relax and enjoy!
As the hostess, you should be able to spend time with your guests. They came to see you, not watch you slaving away in the kitchen. Keep everything on a buffet, have dishes that are served at room temperature, set up a bar where people can serve themselves and let the celebration begin!
Debi’s Strategies for Success:
Enthusiasm sells.
“It’s so refreshing for people to encounter and work with someone who is genuinely enthusiastic. I think we all know what happens when we work with someone who doesn’t inspire us or who doesn’t bring an energy level to a project or conversation. After hearing positive feedback about my enthusiasm from both clients and vendors I’ve always tried to focus on that. It gets people excited around you and life’s short so why not!? Especially for me it doesn’t make sense to be mean or yell when you’re in the business of planning a happy, celebratory occasion.”
Put things in perspective.
“It may sound odd but when I don’t know how to balance everything or what to put first, I often think about what I want it to say on my tombstone. What is the most important thing to me? Do I want it to say entrepreneur? Not really—it doesn’t seem to me like the key to life at the end of the road. I would want it to say mother and wife, not businesswoman. It was a big hurdle that took me a while to figure out. But I have to say this trick works for me every time.”
Strive for the absolute best.
“I’ve learned so much from working with Oprah. One thing that I find very unique to her and her team is that they constantly push, push, push for new, better, and improved. They put together this wonderful plan where all the details are over the top, and then because of their passion and talent, they still push it to the next level. It’s in Oprah’s personality to take something that you already think is so perfect and then make it one step better. I find that so inspirational.”
Focus on what’s next.
“It’s easy to get stuck in the trees – to be so busy with all of your day-to-day clients and projects that you don’t have time to plan for your future. But, it’s important to carve out some time to make sure you’re always focused on the overall picture and the business goals you are working towards. Last year, we doubled our revenues, but this year has been difficult and we’ve seen a decline. It’s strictly due to the economy, but I’m realizing that I should’ve kept my eye on the bigger goal instead of being so caught up in the daily grind—because no one else is going to do that for you.”
Celebrate Your Achievements
December 2009
When Oprah Winfrey wanted to throw her televised 50th birthday extravaganza, the first person she turned to was Debi Lilly. For the past eleven years, Oprah has relied on this Chicago-based event-planner who is known for her attention to detail and her passion for parties. Debi will never forget the first time the talk-show host’s team called about putting together a baby shower. “I was jumping up and down. It was the kind of moment people just live for. And it was even more special since that was the turning point that gave me the courage to quit working my day job at a consulting firm and take my business on full-time.”
Although she has been running the show at A Perfect Event for 18 years, Debi’s been planning parties since she was knee-high. “My mom was a huge hostess with the mostess,” Debi recalls. “She had a large garden with all types of flowers and a china cabinet with every kind of pattern. I’d dip into her things, set the table with all her fancy accoutrements, cut flowers for little arrangements, and write out invitations in my childish handwriting. It’s definitely in my blood.” As a teen, her friends could count on her to plan a party for every occasion under the sun—a housewarming if one of them moved or a Bon Voyage if one of them went on vacation. Out of college, they entrusted her to plan their weddings, which got the rumor mills in town spinning. When she landed Oprah, Lilly gained the confidence and notoriety that propelled her from an intimate home-based office into a premier event design company complete with a 3-story commercial building, a 15-person staff, and a roster of big name clients.
But it wasn’t just celebrity clients that fueled her success. This mom of two had the drive and the personality it takes to handle the high-stress that comes along with her industry. “I always have the goal in my sights and when something happens like a tent collapses or it starts to rain, or a bus breaks down, you have to be a quick thinker, a problem solver, and someone who can keep your clients and guests calm. I thrive on that challenge of trying to make everything work.”
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