Fun-loving woman married to career in event planning

Who would have ever thought that a love of theater would lead to a career in event planning? But that's how life played out for Christy Loftin, who, as director of sales and marketing at Planters Inn and Peninsula Grill, oversees all special events, including weddings, for the posh downtown hotel.

"As a C of C student, I couldn't afford to go to all the performances I wanted to, so I started volunteering for the theater so I could attend," says Loftin, who graduated from the College of Charleston in 1985 with a business degree.

Her volunteer work in theater quickly became focused on set design, which provided a crash course in lighting, color design and working with egos that could tend toward the dramatic, to put it mildly.

She also had a love and a knack for entertaining and hosting parties, a lucky break that revealed the possibilities of combining her passions and talents into a viable career.

While Loftin was working as a Spoleto volunteer, the host of a festival party had a caterer back out at the last minute.

"I told her, 'Buy the groceries and pay me $100, and I can pull this off for you,' " Loftin recalls.

Her father had other career hopes for her, she says.

"He wanted me to be the first female president of IBM," she confides.

Following that advice, she entered sales, but she kept volunteering for catering and bartending gigs, not turning her nose up at anything that would help her learn the business.

She got a step closer to her long-term career goal when she accepted a position in catering sales for Wild Dunes. From there, catering and event sales took her to the Francis Marion, then to Charleston Place, where she successfully begged to plan a party at the Hibernian Hall for a film that was shot in Charleston.

"It was a success, and everyone at Charleston Place recognized that and realized I needed to be on the outside in event planning rather than in just strictly sales," Loftin says.

She did a stint planning special events for McCrady's, where she beefed up her understanding of food service from one of the nation's most respected chefs.

Thirteen years ago, Loftin became a notary public, which in South Carolina qualifies her to officiate at civil wedding ceremonies. Since then, Charleston has emerged as one of the nation's premier "weddingmoon" destinations, which places Loftin in high demand for turnkey wedding services.

She plans and performs an average of 35 weddings a year.

"It's funny how that's worked out just from performing one friend's wedding, upon her request, 13 years ago," she says. "But then again, I never sought out this career. It just found me," she says.