"I'll wait to book my wedding DJ until about 4 or 5 months before my wedding after I've booked all of the IMPORTANT stuff.  I mean all wedding DJs are basically the same right?"

That is what we hear from almost all of the wedding couples we speak with daily.
The funny thing is that we also hear something completely different from those same couples AFTER  their wedding.

"The DJ we hired was horrible and it totally ruined our wedding."
"The DJ messed up important names or didn't make the announcements we needed."
"The DJ company was all just online forms. We didn't even meet our DJ until our wedding day.
"The DJ didn't play any of the songs we requested or follow the time line we planned."

Most couples determined that “It just wasn’t worth the money we saved to hire the cheaper DJ. If we had it to do over, the DJ would be one of the first vendors we book so we can make sure it's the right wedding DJ for us."

Weddings are unique events and many of the best wedding venues are already booked a year or 2 in advance, sometimes more.  Often, couples select their wedding date based on when their preferred venue is available and not the other way around.

Why is that?  Simple, because when you've decided on the venue for your wedding, there's no changing your mind.  You've found the perfect place to celebrate your most special day so it's just a matter of when is the next available date that works for you?  As soon as you settle on the date, you book that venue and that date because you know that if you don't, someone else will, possibly leaving you to have to settle for your second choice of date or, even worse, your second choice of venue.

It's your wedding day.  Never settle for your second choice.

In our 20 years of experience in the wedding industry, we strongly suggest you confirm 4 vendors as soon as you possibly can;

1) Your venue (Wait too long and your ideal venue may be booked)
2) Your menu (Same with caterers. The best book early)
3) Your memories (Your choice of photographer / videographer is critical for capturing your day)
4) Your music (The DJ or band is pretty much one of the only vendors at your wedding for the entire time so yeah, they're pretty important)
 
Of course, you're probably saying, "Well naturally you'd say music. You're the DJ."  Fair enough.  We do see music as an extremely important part of your wedding day but that's not because we're a DJ company.  It's because of what couples tell us AFTER their wedding.  Comments like those above are all too common from couples who assumed that all DJs are pretty much the same.  We simply ask couples about the best and worst parts of their wedding day.
 
Those that were happy overall generally comment that all of their vendors did a great job and would recommend them to others.
 
But of those that were unhappy, almost 75% of them said it was due to a bad DJ (or live band).  We literally never hear, “The florist ruined my wedding.” Or, “The cake ruined my wedding.”  We’ll sometimes hear that it was another vendor such as the photographer/ videographer, caterer, etc but that only accounts for the other 25%.  And often, the couples went on to say that, while the photos may have been very disappointing after receiving them, it wouldn’t be accurate to say, “The photographer ruined our wedding,” since the day itself went well. 

Since the vast majority of unhappy couples singled out the DJ service as the main reason, we asked those couples when in the wedding planning process did they hire that DJ, the overwhelming majority said that it was about 4 or 5 months before their wedding.  Many of them also told us that their first choice of wedding DJ was already booked or that they had used most of their wedding budget by that point and didn’t have much budget left for their first choice wedding DJ so that was also why they chose who they chose.  It was a combination of who wasn't already booked and what they could afford. Want more proof? The overwhelming majority of couples planning a second wedding, make the DJ one of the first wedding pros they book.
 
So to sum up, the unhappy couples hired whoever was available that was also at a price they could afford.
 
One final question we asked, “Did they hire their venue or their caterer that way?”
 
“No, we hired both of those first because we knew that they can only do one wedding per day and we really liked both the venue & the food so we didn’t want to lose our date.”
 
The majority of the happy couples had reserved their four main vendors (Venue / Menu / Memories / Music) at least 8 months in advance.  We strongly encourage you to learn from previous couple’s experience.
 
If you’re asking, “When should I hire my DJ?” We simply respond by asking, “Is your wedding date confirmed and have you booked your venue & food yet?” If the answer is yes, then it’s time to find your DJ.