Melinda Toyne is known for throwing parties that people talk about for months. Her annual Mardi Gras party last year drew 100 people to Art 316, the artists’ enclave at 316 S.W. Fifth St. that houses In Any Event, her event-planning business, and before the last beer keg was drained, guests were already asking how she’d top it in 2006. She’s mulling that now. Toyne’s reputation for organizing unforgettable soirees both as freewheeling as the private Mardi Gras extravaganza and as purposeful and results-driven as a one-hour walk to raise money for the Johnston school system’s TeamMates Mentoring Program suggests she’ll deliver.

It was that flair that brought Toyne together with Jeff Brunig, a partner in Full Court Press, the corporation that opened Buzzard Billy’s; The Royal Mile and its upstairs bar, the Red Monk; Hessen Haus; and the High Life Lounge, a collection of restaurants and bars that are helping to redefine downtown Des Moines. She was with friends at the Red Monk one evening a couple of years ago planning a mixer on The Royal Mile’s patio to market her business. Before the evening was over, Brunig, was picking her brain about how to best position Oktoberfest, a major event he and his partners planning for Hessen Haus and the rest of the Court Avenue District.

Toyne’s company was brand-new at the time. So was Hessen Haus’ Oktoberfest event. “We decided we could work with each other pretty well,” Brunig said. “We were both just getting started and a successful event would put both our names on it.”

The inaugural 2004 festival drew 12,000, surpassing projections by 5,000 people, and successfully launched both Oktoberfest as a major downtown fall event and Toyne’s business. Brunig said he and his partners put on a small Oktoberfest celebration in 2003 with another Court Avenue restaurant, but without the help of a professional event planner, the party drew a meager crowd. Toyne was able to play on the media relationships she had built in a decade working for one of Des Moines’ largest advertising agencies, Strategic America, in arranging for interviews and buying advertising.

Like the six men who make up Full Court Press, Toyne views herself as a stakeholder in downtown development. Brunig said she’s at her best when she’s working with clients who want to serve “a greater good.”

“A lot of people have thrown their hat out and said they wanted to make downtown great, and start this club or company or promotion of downtown and Des Moines as a whole, but that’s about as far as it gets,” he said. “It’s all smoke, a big to-do. She does things with substance. She doesn’t go out and say, ‘Here I am.’ She pulls people together.”

When Brunig and his partners opened the High Life Lounge on Groundhog’s Day 2005, they again asked Toyne to help them put an exclamation point on the festivities. Television and radio stations showed up to report “Polk County Paul’s” forecast for winter before about 100 blue-collar workers coming off a night shift at 6 a.m. Playing off the movie “Groundhog’s Day,” the High Life will host a “second annual grand opening” this Feb. 2.

“I thrive on the creativity of those clients,” Toyne said.

The admiration is mutual. Brunig said Toyne, who will take on a larger role in future Oktoberfest planning and work to build corporate support for the event, pushes to strengthen events to the point that she is “annoying, but in a good way.”

“We might be sloughing off, trying to take it easy and not staying on point, but she’s so excited and gets you so worked up, you finally just say, ‘Yes, we’ll do it’ or ‘Yes, we’ll have that meeting,’” Brunig said.

For all the conviviality apparent at the events Toyne is involved in, the planning behind them is more complex than most people realize, she said.

“I get two or three e-mails a week from people who say ‘I think that would be so fun; I want your job,’” she said. “It is fun and rewarding, but it also is really hard work with lots of manual labor. It’s not really sipping champagne and sitting back and watching people enjoy the party. It’s down and dirty.”

That may not come as a surprise to businesses that have hired her to execute their events after doing them in-house. Often, Toyne said, the workers charged with planning events tell her they are “relieved because nobody understands how much time it takes.”

“Staff time is never assessed as a hard cost,” she said, “but if a staff is dedicating weeks to planning an event or function, you need to consider outsourcing.”