Planning The Perfect Party

Don't leave your party planning until the last minute, get your party off to a great start by getting yourself sorted well in advance.

Planning a party is either the easiest or hardest thing in the world. Much of the time, the best parties and nights out happen when they are unplanned and everything works magically in your favour, but if you're hoping to celebrate a special occasion, you really need to plan ahead if you don't want to find yourself sitting home alone hoping for the doorbell to ring. The best way to ensure you enjoy a great party is to get some excellent basics in place, but to also keep a feeling of spontaneity about the night.

The kind of basics you want to settle on are the rough number of guests you are expecting, this will help you decide what type of party is best suited to your occasion. You'll also want to spend plenty of time thinking about your venue - whether it's your home, the back room of a pub or a special venue - and start thinking about how to fill it.

If you're thinking of a themed party, you might want to think about decorations. But be careful with these, only go for it if you are prepared to go the whole hog - a few half-hearted streamers and handfuls of balloons are guaranteed to give a party a depressing edge in next to no time. Decorations work best if they are either very clearly part of a theme, for example, inflatable palm trees and toy treasure chests for a pirate party, or are colour coded, so you stick to only one or two colours for all of your decorations.

Choosing the dress code in advance is always a good idea too. If you're hoping to have a fancy dress do, you'll need to give people plenty of time to have a think about their costume. If you've left it late to get your invites out, it's a good idea to drop any fancy dress plans, as you're likely to find people will decide not to come if they don't have time to sort an outfit out for themselves. You should also make it clear how formal the party is expected to be, because people can have the same reservations if they think you are planning a black tie event - and they don't have a black tie.

Invites are a crucial part of your party planning. Whether you’re organising something casual with only a few friends or you're hoping to drag along as many people as possible, you won't get any party goers unless you ask them. If it's an intimate affair, a few phones calls and then reminder texts should do the trick. If you're planning a big bash, be sure to send out proper invites and make sure everyone has time to add your party to their social calendar. Online invites are fine, but you're best to email them if possible, as well as creating things like Facebook events. While social networks can be great for reminding people about things, there are many people who don't bother to check them very often. This means a reminder text a week before is also a good idea.

Once you've got your guest list, venue, theme and invites sorted out, all you need to do is visit an online beer shop, place your order and sit back to wait for the fun to begin.