WPIC Planner of The Month:

Amira Harris owns Posh Productions – a wedding and event production company in Calgary, Alberta.  Amira became a member of the WPIC Alumni in 2007 after learning that there were no other organizations offering programs like the WPIC Course. After being certified for 4 years, Amira still looks for ways to improve through continuing education by attending seminars, conferences, and by purchasing literature to keep current on trends.

Before wedding planning Amira had worked in a variety of positions for different companies from Oil & Gas, Brokerage Houses to Telecommunications.  Amira quit her corporate world career and set out to pursue her love for wedding and event planning.  From day one Posh Productions has been a full time venture.  Amira’s background in finance, customer service and project management has provided her with a wealth of knowledge and experience to apply to Posh Productions every day.

When first starting out, Amira tried everything to promote her business.  Print and online advertising along with networking was the way she got the word out.  Amira tries to help out newcomers to the industry by offering them guidance, tips, lessons learned or opportunities to work with Posh Productions because she remembers what it was like just starting out.

Being such a large industry, there are many professionals for one to look up to.  Amira loves that she has such a great family of support within the WPIC Alumni Association.

In a few months, Posh Productions will be going into its 5th year of business.  Over those years Amira has learned so much about how to run a successful business.  In those 5 years, Amira has put together a “Posh Team” that she wouldn’t be able to live without.  Her entire staff is WPIC Certified and she is always employing new WPIC Planners who are looking for expereience because she remembers how it felt to be just starting out.

Over the years, Amira has worked with so many couples to create their dream wedding!  Each wedding is so unique and personalized to the couple and she has many favourites.  Some of the best details that stick out in Amira’s mind are:

• A Traditional Indonesian Wedding Ceremony: A couple got married in Fiji and wanted to have a reception for guests who couldn’t make it.  They had another ceremony/reception and incorporated the same vows and attire from their destination wedding in Fiji
• A groom wanted to do his speech to the bride in her native language and learned to do his speech in Portuguese.  The bride and her family were touched and so surprised!
• A bride and groom surprised their guests by singing 3 songs at the reception.  She sang and he played guitar.

In August 2010, Posh Productions launched its travel division.  This was a major business decision that Amira decided to take on since she was planning so many destination weddings and using a third party to arrange all the travel needs.  Instead of relying on an agent, Amira decided it would be a great fit in the business and would make the entire planning process seamless for her couples.

In 2011 and early 2012 you can bet you will be seeing a lot of great things coming from Posh Productions.  They will continue to provide an exceptional level of service to their clients.  Amira expects a significant growth in planning and booking destination weddings as the trend continues to grow.  Another division of Posh Productions will be launching this fall, a new and improved website and a few other surprises Amira is hiding and waiting to reveal!