A children’s party planner who arranges celebrations for the affluent, throwing extravagant Aladdin and jungle-themed get-togethers for up to £10,000, said the idea only came to her when her former boss asked what she was going to do next, while her “wow factor” parties are inspired by her parents’ one-bedroom flat in India where they would often have over 80 guests. Mrinalini Raman, 40, launched her business in 2018 after quitting her monotonous job in advertising.
When her boss asked what she was going to do instead, she panicked and said she was going into party planning, and eventually she grew to love the idea. Mrinalini’s parties often feature acrobats and handmade party bags, and she asserts all aspects have to be “Instagrammable” in this day and age – she has even had to sign non-disclosure agreements for her celebrity clients so she cannot reveal who she has provided a party for, or their themes.
Mrinalini, who lives in Hertfordshire, decided straight away that her parties were going to have the “wow factor” and justifies the high price tag because every element of decoration is personalised – she thinks that her clients often want to “supersede the next” and they “want everyone to see how good their party is”. Mrinalini says her lavish attitude to parties is partly influenced by her upbringing – in her parents’ one-bedroom flat in India, they would often have over 80 guests.
“I don’t want to throw tacky parties – I charge more because I don’t want to compromise my work and the wow factor is very important to me,” Mrinalini said. "I wouldn’t do cheap parties – I’d rather not get clients – that’s just who I am.
“If I had that kind of money, I would do the same as them.” Mrinalini’s career began in advertising, but when her oldest son was born in 2011, she discovered a new passion – party planning.
For her son’s first birthday in December 2012, she threw an over-the-top jungle-themed party, explaining: “I bought lots of decorations off Amazon, I printed out stuff, I got up on the morning of the party at half four to cut leaves off a tree in my garden and was making bunting out of them to look like a jungle.” Mrinalini continued throwing creative get-togethers for her loved ones and began to dislike her advertising job in London with long hours alongside being a mum – so she decided to quit her job.
She said: “One day, I quit my job, and my boss asked me what I wanted to do instead, so I lied through my teeth. I told her I would become a party planner – it was the first thing that sprung to mind.
“She bought me an entrepreneurship book as a leaving present, and I eventually decided to just give it a go.” Mrinalini spent the year after quitting her job making friends with school mums, until she took the plunge and launched her business, Party Genie, in 2018.
Since creating the business, Mrinalini has thrown gatherings with budgets ranging from £5,000 to £10,000 with a strong theme, such as dinosaurs, princesses and Aladdin. Mrinalini explained how she justifies the price tag, saying: “So balloons are very expensive, cakes are expensive – those are the two biggest things.
“For example, we get custom-made balloons and backdrops. I did a baby shower for a client at a five-star hotel and a gender reveal with a professional acrobat who shot an arrow with her foot in a balloon to reveal the gender.”
Mrinalini’s most memorable party to date is an Aladdin theme from 2019 – despite being in a community hall, Mrinalini transformed the room into Aladdin’s cave. She explained: “She (the birthday girl) dressed up as Jasmine, and we had a beautiful turquoise cake with beautiful cake stands.
“We hired an entertainer to be Jasmine; the whole room was turquoise and purple.” The most popular theme for Mrinalini’s parties is a jungle one – for these, she hires “larger than life” stuffed animals as props, bespoke backdrops and balloons.
She said: “I’ve also organised parties for the children of celebrities, where I’ve had to sign NDAs – so I can’t even tell anyone the theme for those. The point of hiring me is the personalisation – we often do personalised goody bags.
“I hate the tacky plastic stuff – we usually make handmade gift wrapping party bags for party favours.” From the offset, Mrinalini knew she wanted to put on high-end events with a lot of people, and she thinks her Indian upbringing influenced this.
She explained: “In India, we used to have parties at home, and we used to call everybody we knew – my mum used to call her friends and invite them and their kids. My dad used to call his colleagues – we used to have about 40 kids and 40 adults in our one-bedroom flat.
“We would have people sitting on the balcony and on the stairs. Now, it’s all about the wow factor for me.”
Mrinalini explained what the wow factor means for her, saying: “It’s something they haven’t seen before, and it has to be Instagrammable. I have had a lot of mums see the party and start crying – it happened at the first party I threw.
“I just looked at the dad, and he said don’t worry, they’re happy!” But planning parties is not always an easy job, and Mrinalini has had some very picky clients with high expectations.
She explained: “Clients can be particular about things and massively into parties. Everybody wants to supersede the next – they want their friends to go back to them and say how amazing their party was.”
Despite Mrinalini’s business being a success, over the past year she has noticed that more of her clients have been asking for a reduced price due to the cost-of-living crisis. She said: “With the cost of living, this year has been really hard, and I have clients struggling.
“So I lower my price because I understand, but to me, with my work, there always has to be a wow factor and my parties still have to be high end.”
