Annette Babich Has Made a Name for Herself

Annette Babich started her career in corporate America as an auditor.

“I can’t believe this is my career path,” she thought at the time.

Then when she was getting married, someone told her she should plan weddings, that she was good at it.

“It was a light bulb moment, as Oprah always says,” Babich said. 

She started researching the idea, and then began working with other event planners. It didn’t take that long before she got serious about it and quit her job.

Annette Babich, the business, has been doing well for close to 20 years now, and Babich, the Dix Hills mom of three sons, is enjoying every moment of it.

“I’m not married anymore but my career is intact,” she said.

She said she never did any marketing, that her business has all been based on referrals. About 85% of her events are weddings, she said. She also does product launches, corporate parties and the L.I. Music Hall of Fame.

“It was a matter of putting myself out there,”she said, “and meeting the right people.” 

When she first started, she met an event planner who was the “go-to” person back then, and Babich started working with her. When the woman’s husband died, she decided to move to Florida and retire.  She asked Babich to take over for her, “And that really got me going,” she said.

Then she met another event planner at a wedding, and “she really made my career,” Babich explained. The woman was planning a wedding for the Piping Rock soda president in New York City and she invited Babich to help her. 

“The wedding was absolutely amazing. Beautiful. Over the top,” Babich said.  “She was an older woman and she started phasing herself out of the business. She wanted me to do a wedding for then-New Jersey governor Tom Kean’s daughter. That’s what put me on the map,” she said.

When Babich helps someone plan a wedding, she designs a “wedding story,” as she called it. “I meet with the client—usually the bride and her parents—and I get to know them, what they like, imagine, envision. I design the wedding story: What will happen? What will it look like? The ceremony, the cocktail hour, the reception…What will the dress look like? What’s important to them? The flowers? The music? The food? The dress? The alcohol? I will customize what’s important to them. I find out what makes them tick and that’s what makes the party. I bring them into the fantasy.”

Then Babich will book the venue (often at the client’s home or in their private club), the photographer—everything they need to make it happen.

“It’s pretty involved,” Babich explained. “We’re starting from scratch each time.”

She usually likes to have six to nine months to plan the event.  “A year is too long for me,” she added.

“I often hear people complaining about their job, but I love my job,” Babich said. “I’m very lucky that I stumbled onto a career that I feel passionate about.”

“Life is an event,” she concluded. “That’s how I see it. Nothing happens unless you create it. It’s all about the event.”