Some weddings stay in your memory because everything went perfectly. Others stay because something almost went wrong — and didn’t. Simona and Tautvydas flew to the Dominican Republic from Lithuania to get married on November 11th, 2023. They had planned for months. They had a vision. They had everything ready.
What they didn’t have, when they landed, was their luggage.
Inside that luggage: the wedding dress. The suit. The rings. Everything that makes a wedding feel like theirs.
I got the message that evening. “The bags didn’t arrive.”
I want to be honest about this part. When you’ve been planning a wedding for a year — across time zones, across languages, across an ocean — and something like this happens, there’s a moment where your stomach drops. Not because of the logistics. Because of what it means for the couple.
So I did what I always do. I stopped panicking and started calling.
That night I didn’t really sleep. I was on the phone with the airline. With the airport. With contacts I’ve built up over 5 years of working in the Dominican Republic. I was writing emails in Spanish and English. This is the part of wedding planning that nobody sees on Instagram. There’s no aesthetic photo of a planner at 2 AM on hold with baggage services.
By midnight we found the missing luggage at Punta Cana airport. By 1 am it was on its way to Las Terrenas. By the time the ceremony started, Simona was in her dress, Tautvydas was in his suit, and the rings were exactly where they needed to be.
In her own words:
“I can’t say that Anni helped us plan our wedding — she did it for us. I had no idea that planning a wedding across the whole world could be so smooth and worry-less. Anni went above and beyond, not only planning the wedding celebration itself, but also arranging covid tests and literally saving our wedding when the luggage with our wedding attire didn’t arrive with us, staying up into the middle of the night and communicating with everyone possible to ensure its arrival. All in all, planning this wedding was as easy as planning any family trip, and that’s all thanks to Anni.”
— Simona & Tautvydas, Lithuania
I’m not telling this story to make myself look good. I’m telling it because most couples — especially European couples planning a wedding in the Caribbean — only think about what should happen.
They don’t think about what to do when it doesn’t.
A wedding planner isn’t there for the perfect days. The perfect days run themselves. A wedding planner is there for the moment the luggage doesn’t arrive. The moment the florist calls in sick. The moment the rain starts thirty minutes before the ceremony.
That’s the moment you stop thinking about whether a planner was worth it.
Simona and Tautvydas are back home. Every now and then I get a message from them — a photo, a memory, a “can you believe it’s already been so lomg ago?”
That’s the part of this job I love most. The wedding day ends. The relationship doesn’t.
If you’re planning a destination wedding in the Dominican Republic and want clarity before committing to a resort package (Click here) , working with a local planner early can change the entire experience.
You don’t need more options.
You need the right structure.
Contact us for more information: hello@anniroth.com
See other interesting Blogposts:
The Quiet Panic Moment. It almost never happens at the beginning. At the beginning, couples are excited. Confident. Motivated. They’ve got Pinterest boards. Google Docs. A shared Notes app called “Wedding Stuff.”
They think:
“We’re organized.”
“We’ll figure it out.”
“Do we really need a planner?”
And then… there’s a moment. ….
“Don’t worry — we have a wedding coordinator.”
And in that moment, it feels like one big thing is checked off the list. But here’s the part that usually comes later — often after weeks of emails, restrictions, and rising costs: a resort wedding coordinator and a wedding planner are not the same thing. And then ….
When is the best time to get married in the Dominican Republic? A local planner’s honest guide to weather, seasons, and what the brochures don’t tell you.
Real numbers from a local planner: what a destination wedding in the Dominican Republic actually costs, what the categories are, and what nobody tells you upfront.
What actually happens behind the scenes on a destination wedding day in the Dominican Republic — from 5 AM setup to midnight breakdown. A planner’s honest account.
People often ask me how a Swiss girl ended up planning weddings on a Caribbean beach.
The short answer is: I followed a film, a feeling, and a man — in that order.
The longer answer is what this post is about.
Every year I watch the flowers change before anything else does. Before the dresses, before the color palettes, the florals tell me where weddings are heading. And in 2026, they’re heading somewhere I love: away from the soft, symmetrical bouquet and toward something bolder.
This year, the flowers aren’t decoration. They’re architecture.
“Where should we actually get married?” It’s the first real question almost every couple asks me. Not the date. Not the budget. The place. After ten years of planning weddings on the North Coast of the Dominican Republic, I have opinions. Strong ones.
