COVID, Weddings and second Wave Postponements
I want to preface this with the smug relief of a vendor whose clients on the whole have been incredible. So supportive, understanding and practical. Absolute legends! But we’re a small community and boy have I heard some stories so I felt compelled to write this.
The first COVID wave brought a slew of postponements that wedding vendors managed in the way that best suited their businesses. There were a few different strategies adopted at the time.
Mine was to avoid booking postponements into prime times on Saturdays. This allowed me to secure my postponing couples a date in the future without charge- whilst taking on new work to sustain an income. It also supported the fact that Saturdays into 2021 were already heavily booked.
As a full time vendor this was the best option for me to accommodate old and new couples and ensure I had a business left at the end of the fallout.
We’re now in the crushing midst of the second landslide. It’s been literally raining postponements and vendors are really starting to struggle. And realise that they need to make plans now for the survival of their business into the future.
First wave, we did what we could, were generous with our calendars and hopeful about the resumption of weddings. With the unrelenting progression of this virus nightmare, many vendors have had to reassess their postponement plan going forward. For some, this has meant the introduction of a transfer fee.
Exceedingly unpopular. How could they? Right?
I want to dissect the idea of vendors transferring postponing couples into prime Saturdays and how this affects them, their business and potentially you as a client, who has invested money as a booking fee.
SCENARIO
Say a photographer has booked a couple in Sept 2019 at $4500. Enter COVID and the couple wants to move from their 10/10/20 date into a Saturday in October 2021.
If they transfer them across without a fee- they immediately halve their income. They receive the balance of the $4500 from this original couple eventually but they also miss out on booking a new client into the October 2021 date.
Most vendors increase their fees annually and by Oct 2021 (two years after the original booking was taken) the photographer’s fee is $5300.
Effectively, by filling a peak future date with a postponement they are losing $5300.
Multiply this by 40-50 weddings a year and consider the outcome.
One way I’ve sidestepped adding fees is to continue offering postponements to days other than Saturdays in peak season without charge.
The stakes keep on growing and some couples are now postponing for the third time.
It’s been a really tough time for them. Awful, of course. But also for vendors.
Ideally, the outcome is that you have your wedding and that your vendors’ businesses survive to share it with you. If their business fails- ergo your monies paid to date go with it.
Vendors cannot continue to shoulder the entire financial load of this fallout. Angry clients demanding they get what they want/ threatening bad reviews and harassing vendors aren’t helping anyone.
This situation is not the couple’s fault. But it is not the vendors fault either. They could not have predicted this. And them wearing the entire cost is not fair either. Nor is it sustainable.
This has absolutely sucked for the wedding industry and there’ll be businesses that don’t make it through.
We need to work together here. There’s a reasonable expectation of flexibility.
Ideally, I only wanted to do 75 weddings next season but I’ve already been catapulted waaaaay past that. (waaaaay past it). It’s not ideal but I accept that this is a uniquely shit situation so I’ll adapt as best I can to ensure everyone gets the best of me.
A global pandemic kinda means that all bets are off.
Please be kind to my friends.