TELEVISION shows such as MTV's “My Super Sweet 16” depict spoiled 16-year-olds with birthday parties grander than many wedding receptions. In fact, Sweet 16 celebrations can be a sweet business, according to many event planners — but good luck finding many clients.

FAKE PHENOMENON?

Solomon Rosenzweig, president of San Francisco's DaVinci Fusion, says Sweet 16s “are quite overhyped by the media, mainly because the shows featuring them are so inexpensive to produce.” Ira Mitchell-Steiman, creative director of Pembroke Park, Fla.-based ME Productions, goes one step further, saying, “I almost think {the media} is trying to create them.”

Yet, creative manager Sarah Finlayson of Chicago's Blue Plate offers a different opinion. She “definitely agrees that aspects of these parties have a significant presence.” Offering delivery pizza and renting movies for teenage parties “just doesn't cut it anymore.” However, she adds, Blue Plate's work on teen parties shows “only one aspect {of the party is} blown out of proportion — entertainment, food or decor,” Finlayson says, “not all factors, such as {the honoree} being carried in, having A-list entertainment and serving extravagant food, as seen on MTV.”

Regional preferences for Sweet 16 parties also come into play. As Atlanta-based Bold American Catering's director of sales Stacy Zeigler notes, “They don't seem to be a Southern thing.” Finlayson says there's a reason for their popularity in only certain parts of the country. “New York and Los Angeles see a lot of requests for over-the-top parties due to the close proximity to the celebrity world,” she explains. “However, influences are popping up in the Midwest, especially in Chicago's suburbs where many affluent corporate parents reside.” Mitchell-Steiman adds to this by citing an event planner friend in Kansas City, Kan., who “does Sweet 16s all year-round, but very few bar and bat mitzvahs,” the latter a far more significant business in Mitchell-Steiman's Florida.

Perhaps most telling is the fact that all respondents — located in Illinois, Florida, Georgia and California — cite Sweet 16s as a mere 1 percent or less of their business.

16 AND SUPER-SWEET

Yet, Sweet 16 celebrations are nothing new and are sometimes astoundingly elaborate. DaVinci Fusion produced a party, which aired on “My Super Sweet 16,” that “acknowledged the celebrant's love of all things Christian Dior with a ‘Dior diva and Parisian nightclub’ theme,” Rosenzweig says. Decor included walls covered in deeply pleated white chiffon, pink lights embedded into a stage, a 15-foot-tall model of Paris' Arc de Triomphe, a 10-foot-wide pink neon sign honoring birthday girl Nicole, cancan dancers and models in “J'Adore Nicole” T-shirts.

Mitchell-Steiman says the nightclub theme is popular for the Sweet 16s he has produced as well. For one event, ME created a sleek white lounge: “The entire thing was draped in white and carpeted in white,” Mitchell-Steiman says, “and all the tables were white with all-white high-end leather furniture.” He also notes the popularity of medieval themes. One party transformed a ballroom into a castle: “We had a drawbridge with a moat,” he explains. “Knights were everywhere.”

Zeigler's client — also featured on the MTV show — opted for something altogether different: an old sugar mill venue. “It was a little rustic: open wood-beam ceilings, hardwood floors,” Zeigler explains. “She had a Shakespeare theme, so she was brought in by jesters.” Despite the extravagance, Zeigler — who has worked with non-televised Sweet 16s as well — notes, “We made more money on the regular one than the MTV one.”

Blue Plate Catering, 312/421-6666; Bold American Catering, 404/815-1178; DaVinci Fusion, 415/864-1000; ME Productions, 954/458-4000 or 800/544-0033