2019 Wedding Industry Vendor Blender, Northampton MA

I didn’t plan on entering the ugly Christmas sweater contest at last night's holiday vendor blender, but I’m not sure everyone there realized it. Lol! Organized by CJC Events, monthly vendor blenders are a much appreciated industry night out. 

This year we partied at Union Station in Northampton, Massachusetts and congratulated Neil Gadbois, the facility’s new event planner, who just booked 50 weddings for 2020. That’s some serious hustle and if his wedding planning skills are anything like the hosting he did last night, people are going to be happy having events there. 
The blender included a toy drive that appears to have been a success in no small part due to the efforts of TC Disc Jockey owner Tony who brought a push cart filled with toys to the party.

Every vendor blender typical features a topic such as effective social media strategy or how to do boudoir photography, with a local pro giving a presentation. Last night's topic was all good vibes spread by CJC’s owner Lisa Powers. Powers has been doing events in the Pioneer Valley for 20 years and has been holding vendor blenders for … I don’t know how long. 

I was happy to meet some new people last night including Karen and Mark Murdoch; they’re opening Worthington Vineyard and Winery in Somers, Connecticut, where they also hope to host weddings and other events. Wine and weddings go together like love and marriage or a horse and carriage (that’s a MWC ref or a Frank Sinatra ref depending on your generation ;). Also, Karen is a chemical engineer and I bet that influences how she and her husband make wine to an interesting degree. 
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The wedding business in Western Massachusetts is competitive; HaleChannel has worked hard to become an industry standout here among so many skilled people. But it's also supportive and friendly. We network and recommend each other when a job calls and we're booked or a bride is searching for a vendor. I've always felt that if you practice community before competition you will be so much more successful in this industry.
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I don't know if we'd have this strong of a professional community without these CJC quarterly gettogethers. This is a long way of saying thank you to Lisa Powers; keep those blenders coming!