We were lucky to catch up with Jeremy Parnell recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Jeremy , really happy you were able to join us today and we’re looking forward to sharing your story and insights with our readers. Let’s start with the heart of it all – purpose. How did you find your purpose?
We got our start by doing a car show for my cousin’s 2-year-old son who has been diagnosed with neuroblastoma. I knew I wanted to help them, but I couldn’t help them financially. I have been part of the car community in the Upstate of South Carolina for over 10 years and I have seen what the car community can do when they come together. I spoke with the admins of the car club that I was part of and we decided to try to do a car show and we raised $2,700 that night.
We were asked to do another show after that for someone we knew and then the admin team of the car club decided to do 3 charity car shows a year. These shows require a lot of work, but I really enjoy seeing the look of whoever we help with these shows. After about a year and a half of doing these charity shows, myself and a friend made the decision to try to turn this into a business.
We have been in business for almost 3 years now. We have hosted over 60 events plus planning and officiating weddings since the end of 2021. We have done many charity events and of course events for the business to make money. The part I am most proud of is that since we started with that first show in September of 2020, we have donated over $57,000 to people in need and various great causes around the Upstate of South Carolina.
Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
Fully Involved Events Upstate is an event and wedding planning business. We got our start doing charity car shows in September 2020 for our car club. We turned this into a business in December of 2021. We have hosted over 60 events since the end of 2021. We have hosted car shows, small business vendors events, a charity softball tournament, food truck competitions, school supply drives, toy drives, a fishing tournament, a fishing marathon, truck or treat car shows, Jeep Jamborees, Christmas events, a benefit concert and 2 recent supply drives for Western North Carolina after Hurricane Helene. We have also planned weddings and officiated quite a few weddings over the last few years.
My favorite past of our business is taking an idea and turning into an amazing event. It can be our idea, a customer’s idea, or a wedding. It is awesome taking the idea or vision in someone’s head and making it even better than they imagined. We have been blessed to work with some amazing people over the last few years, and we have been able to host and produce some amazing events.
We offer several different services. We offer event planning, wedding planning, and wedding officiant services. We just recently added a DJ services division, Southern End Entertainment. We have 2 amazing experienced DJ’s who love what they do and are constantly working to get better at their craft. We are exploring new services that we would like to add over the next few years.
We are going to do a realignment on January 1st. My wife will be taking over as co-owner of Fully Involved Events Upstate. My business partner is stepping down from co-owner and will be taking over the DJ division.
The thing that we are most proud of is that we have been part of over 30 events for charity and as of November of 2024, we have been able to donate over $57,000 to those in need and various charity causes.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
I think the quality that has been most impactful so far has been not giving up. It hasn’t been an easy journey and there have been lots of ups and downs. Even when things have gone wrong or we have had slow times, I just keep going.
The skill that has been most impactful for me so far has been listening. I have asked questions of all kinds of people and learned how to make events better. I ask our vendors how I can make vendor events better. I talk to car show participants of how we can make things better. I ask Jeep owners how to make our Jeep event better. I have talked to multiple people on how to grow our social media.
The second skill that I think has helped me alot has been the willingness to learn. You don’t know what you don’t know. I am always trying to learn how to be a better event planner. I pull from many different sources to learn more and try to always be improving on my craft.
Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?
The number one challenge I am facing right now is finding locations to host events. We are still very small and I can’t afford my own venue. We have to find venues to work with and it is difficult to find venues where we can host events that make financial sense for us. Some places are so high that we wouldn’t be able to make any money hosting events at those venues. If we aren’t able to make a profit, then it does not make sense for use to do that event.
I am constantly reaching out to venues and looking at different areas to try to host events. We have hosted events in Spartanburg, Greenville, Cherokee and Laurens counties so far and we are looking at expanding to other counties too.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.fullyinvolvedevents.com
- Instagram: fieupstatesc
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/fieupstate
- Other: TikTok: fully.involved.events
so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
