Wedding Industry- The Wedding Confidential: Industry Secretes continued

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The Wedding Confidential: Industry Secretes from ABC’s 20/20 reported that event vendors are known to charge more for their service as soon as they hear the word “wedding”. But what does this word mean to a vendor? Is there a certain level of effort that raises the prices for weddings? Also, did this report hurt a vendors business?

As I researched different for vendors who watched The Wedding Confidential and wrote how this affected them, I came the conclusion that the vendors had a negative response because they were offended and it is misleading to engaged couples.  For example from a blogger TaylorMade says that, ”industry secrets? What secretes?... The media has made me, and the rest of my colleagues in the wedding industry look heartless, slimy con artists who use lies and hype to trick brides and from into giving us money that we do not deserve.” It is clear that this report from ABC made its way to the media and created a crack between vendors and engaged couples by portraying vendors as those whom trick engaged couples to give more so vendors can get more bang for their buck.

As a bride to be, I am cautious when meeting with different vendors not only because I need to connect with them for ideas, details, etc. But also because we all know weddings are not cheap. This report from ABC is deceptive to couples about the wedding industry. Also TaylorMade commented, “Most couples do not fully realize that there is a difference between planning a wedding and a party. A wedding is not a standard party. There is more stress, an increase of time investment, more details, and more liability, which lies in a higher expense.” Planning for a wedding creates many more elements and time to a vendors work, than a party would require. As a bride I can agree, a wedding is not the typical party to plan for.

Another example is from a blogger Susan Southerland. Susan Southerland is a business owner whose company helps engaged couples plan their weddings in various price ranges. She ponders “the episode got a lot attention from inside the wedding industry, mostly because of its one-sided, negative depiction for wedding professionals…20/20 made it look as though all of us in the industry are out to empty the pockets of every last bride and groom until there is nothing left but lint.” Watching the report, it is understandable of why vendors are angry. Denise and Alan Fields from the episode had a negative perspective for the wedding industry, as well as those small businesses that create the industry.

Wedding Industry- The Secrets They Don't Want You To Know

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The wedding industry is a multibillion dollar industry. It expands with the economy from all different vendors, such as caters, photographers, bakers, florist, and so on. Take for instance these statics from ABC’S 20/20, “The average wedding costs around $27,000 according to theknot.com. In Los Angeles, it is $37,000, and $65,000 in New York City. It is no wonder the wedding industry is a $30 billion behemoth.” Ellen Terrell wrote a reference on wedding industry research that explains more of what this industry is.

                “It is an industry that is made up of multiple smaller enterprises like caters, wedding consultants, dresses, various beauty supplier (hair, makeup), photographers, favors/bridesmaids gifts, music, honey moon related etc. While the industry as a whole represents a lot of money, each of the component parts is much smaller… Many of the smaller components like caters, DJs, and photographers, wedding favors, invitations, etc. also do other events without necessarily breaking their business down into wedding versus non-wedding.”

However, I believe that a few vendors do break their business down into wedding versus non-wedding based off ABC’s 20/20, In Wedding Confidential: Industry Secrets, this is reported that event vendors are known to charge more for their service as soon as they hear the word “wedding”. My question is Why? It because vendors know that brides or grooms are willing to spend a little more cash to get what they want rather than what they can afford or need.  Do vendors think couples are venerable so they up the cost?

This is the video of The Wedding Confidential: Industry Secretes. In this video shows an experiment where a person is making phone calls about hiring a DJ vendor, making it seem like they are having a wedding. Another person will call the same vendor about the same dates and times, but instead of a wedding, it is for a birthday party. As a result from the video, there was a $700 difference, %46 percent from a wedding to a birthday party. I am astonished! As the video goes on, they will show you other examples of this phenomena. 

To Be Continued...

Cake Time- Continued

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Last week I discussed different elements of a wedding cake and what to keep in mind when choosing a cake. However, I wanted to go into more detail of how to keep saving! Wedding cakes are expensive but there are always ways to save. There are two alternatives I researched and wanted to inform those married couples to be these options. For one, except having an entire wedding cake, enjoy cupcakes. Two, most people know how to bake a cake themselves, why not make your own wedding cake.

Recently in America we have seen a trend in cupcakes, for example the show Cupcake Wars or George Town Cupcakes. Cupcakes are very practical now days, it is no wonder they are becoming more popular and in this case, replacing wedding cakes.  “Surprisingly, cupcakes have grown in popularity from 13% in 2010 to 17% a year later in 2011” (Fraiman).  Having cupcakes at a wedding has its advantages; a couple can have more of a variety and less waste. Cupcakes can be in various flavors due to their size. It is easier to make a couple dozen chocolate, vanilla, or red velvet cupcakes than to have layers of a wedding cake all different. In addition, it is also easier to organize the cupcakes by flavor, than to wait for each tier of a wedding cake to be cut and divided. Also cupcakes allow a couple to have a cake structure that is more convenient to hand out to guest. At the end of the day it leaves less waste than the traditional wedding cake. Each guest would start out with at least one cupcake then have another accordingly. For example, at my wedding I would love to have cupcakes because not many people do eat cake. It would be easier to handout to each guest and if they wanted more they can go pick another cupcake.

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I am getting my cupcakes from this place called Sweet Reasons. Like Sweet Reasons other bakers may have the same idea of having gift bags for the guest to put their cupcake in to take home with them. Therefore, each guest has a favor, and also I would not be left with 100 cupcakes!  Now that I have mentioned how convenient cupcakes can be to a wedding than the traditional wedding cake, I also researched prices. According to Marina Shifrin, “the average cost of a cake can be around $1,125- $1,800. The average cost of cupcakes can be around $375- $525+”. This is a huge money saver for those on a tight budget for their wedding!

Another way to save money on a wedding cake is for a couple to bake the cake themselves.  Perfect Wedding Day.com gives a link to a video tutorial with instructions on “how to make a wedding cake.”  Also I wanted to share another link of step by step instructions on how to create a wedding cake from about.com-weddings.  Like mentioned before, there are always ways to save some money, especially when it comes down to planning a wedding.