By Carson Moore
If you’ve lived in Beaufort for any length of time, there’s a good chance you’ve seen the Amazing Event Rentals crew in their giant pink trucks driving around town, heading to or from an event. With the Fourth of July in full swing, the pink truck sightings should increase dramatically as the crews travel to set up tents, bouncy houses, slides and parties all over the Beaufort, Bluffton and Savannah area.
Owned and operated by Tony Burris and his brother, Andy, Amazing Event Rentals is the definition of a local, family run business.
“My family moved here before I was born,” Tony Burris said, smiling, “My father was stationed on Parris Island, left to go back home, then felt the draw to come back, as a lot of people do.”
Growing up in Beaufort certainly seems to have been an advantage for Tony Burris and his company. Initially known as Atlantic Event Rentals, the company represented the brothers’ first foray into business. Soon after that, Jumpin’ Jaxx was added to the fold, and the Burris brothers decided to branch out. While Tony maintained Jumpin’ Jaxx, his brother decided to sell Atlantic Events and widen his search for new business ventures. A few years later, Andy decided to purchase Classic Party Rentals in Bluffton, and called in his brother and their close friend Richard VanBortel to help merge the existing companies into one local hub — Amazing Events. “The biggest struggle was honestly the sheer size of taking three companies and making one out of it,” laughed Tony Burris, “It’s been a lot of learning how to deal with that much flow, when things are going every which way.”
The two brothers, along with VanBortel, set to work getting their name out to the public, and making sure they provided the highest quality service to every customer in the area closest to their heart. “We work with people that we see every day,” Burris said, “We try to service them like we’d service our neighbors because they are!” This mind-set is what Burris believes sets Amazing Events apart from their competitors, and it shows in their business practices.
Amazing Events offers everything a customer could imagine, as far as party planning goes. Their tents range in size from small 10’ by 10’ shade tents to huge 40’ by 180’ marquees capable of holding hundreds of people. They also offer assistance with decorations; renting out china, linens, silverware and even light fixtures.
In addition to this service, Burris also uses Computer-aided Design (CAD) software to preview events for customers. “I’ve done everything from a small tent on there to show how seating would work, up to the giant tents,” explained Burris, “It can also give us a 3D rendering of it as well, where you can go through and pick the colors of your linens and things as well, to see how it would look.”
It’s not only the Burris brothers that do the work, however. “Our girls up front are very creative,” says Burris, and he’s not wrong. The office hums with activity, and the girls, including Tony’s wife Vicki, call out ideas to each other excitedly, using pictures of pervious events as references, or simply trying to explain their ideas through words.
Most often, the girls and the rest of the crew are busy planning and setting up for weddings — the company’s most popular request. Each wedding, once planned, typically takes a day for setup, and then another day to break down everything and get it all packed away. Events like these typically require a couple months notice for the company, although it ranges depending on the event occurring. “The Tybee Run, for example, is the last week of January, and we’ve already pretty much scheduled it,” said Burris, “But we have people that call us the same day, and if we’re available, we’ll bring stuff out.”
For Amazing Events, availability does not seem to be a problem. On any weekend, they can do anywhere from seven to eight events up to about 30. During the summer, Burris said, there are fewer weddings, which tend to dominate the spring and fall periods, while Jumpin’ Jaxx business dominates the summertime with giant inflatable water slides, bounce houses and even an inflatable laser tag arena.
“The two businesses [Jumpin’ Jaxx and Amazing Events] run together sometimes, but once you get into about October they collide, and it gets very busy for us,” Burris explained.
Despite their busy schedules, every member of the Amazing Event Rentals crew strives to make every event special and unique for the people they’re working with.
“I take everything very personally,” says Tony Burris, “Even though it may be another weekend for us, we realize that it’s the most important day in a lot of people’s lives up to this point. We try to think about that every day when we do what we do, and we try to make every event amazing.”
The best way to contact Amazing Event Rentals is to email at amazingeventrentals@gmail.com. They can also be reached at 843-379-5503.
