Your Wedding and Covid-19 // tips for brides
Well let’s start off pointing out the obvious — this is a blogpost I never in my life thought I’d be writing!!! Ugh. This situation is simply unreal and every day I feel more and more like I’m spiraling in the twilight zone. I’m sure without question, everyone else feels some variation of the same thing.
How is COVID-19 affecting my business?
Well, besides the fact that I’m losing my mind knowing I won’t be able to shoot during my favorite time of year — spring blossoming season!!! Aside from the sheer sadness I feel knowing my couples aren’t getting their original dream date. And aside from my weddings for the 2020 season being nicely spread out between May-November… There’s also the financial aspect. I’m currently facing the loss of just over $31,000 between the months of May and June. Yup. That’s a swift kick my friends. That’s also a lot to share publicly with you all, but I do so because it’s worth pointing out the insane and awful impact this virus is having on small businesses. Thankfully, if there is such a silver lining — so far, my weddings have been able to postpone to dates I have available, because my brides are AMAZING. So I won’t lose them entirely, my heart won’t completely shatter, and the income will resurface later.
How is COVID-19 affecting my personal life?
There’s the obvious stuff that is likely true for everyone, but I’ll rattle ‘em off anyways — fear of getting the virus - not because I think I won’t survive it, but because I’m afraid of unknowingly passing it to someone else who won’t. Living constantly with the fear of my parents getting this virus, who are elderly (with several pre-existing underlying health issues) naturally. Not being able to see them, or any of my family, or any of my friends. Canceling trips, vacations and spa days I was so very much looking forward to. Feeling trapped at home (when normally I love being a hermit). Not being able to really go out and do anything that I love doing, even grocery shopping is now done either online, or if I go in-store I do so in complete fear and awareness I’ve never known. And can we just touch quick on the fact that while I AM an introvert, I’ll still strike up conversations with old people next to the apples in the grocery store. I hug strangers. I ask the Starbucks barista about their day and really listen. Not because I’m trying to be an extrovert, but because I believe in friendliness. It’s affecting my actual soul to not be able to do these things.
Now onto YOU, dear sweet bride — how is COVID-19 affecting your wedding (and what you can do about it!!)
Realistically, none of us know when this crap is going to end. If you at all feel like you need to look into postponing your wedding for the safety of yourselves, your family, friends, and to guarantee all those you love can actually safely be there - then please, just do it. I know dates are so so so important, but safety trumps dates. Ideally your best bet is to contact your venue and your photographer first — we two vendors are the ones with the least amount of flexibility in our schedules and most of us cannot cover multiple events in one day unlike most florists, DJ companies, hair/makeup etc. Get a list of available dates from your venue coordinator and your photographer and compare those dates to try and find one that works best for you all.
Please don’t just flat out cancel. I thank my lucky stars that so far my amazing brides have been able to postpone instead of cancel and I’m so so glad for it! Cancelling entirely, no matter what, is excruciating for wedding vendors like myself. For all the ways you’ve been looking forward to your wedding day, trust me — so are we. I love and adore my couples like my own dang family and knowing that I could potentially lose that day with you altogether breaks my heart.
Consider a non-prime date… I hate typing those words. This has already been a tough conversation to have with several of my own brides, but the truth of the matter goes back to what I said in the first bullet point. Photographers and venues just simply do not have the same flexibility, and though a Friday or Saturday for most of you is exactly everything you dreamed, for us, we can’t offer a lot of those due to them already being booked by someone else. And what happens then? We lose you completely. Trust me, it’s devastating. The other flip of that coin is looking at 2021, or even 2022 — obviously there is more availability on prime dates then, but what does that mean for us as a wedding vendor? It means we are forfeiting our ability to book someone new for that year on that date, when we would have, undoubtedly, and in turn that affects us greatly in a financial way. It’s painful friends, it’s all painful — like, there just isn’t a great answer here.
Let your guests know as soon as you can of the new date! There are multiple ways you can do this, and admittedly, chances are most of your guests will have already seen it coming. They’ll probably also (at least internally) thank you for not putting them at risk of health issues! You can create a new save-the-new-date-card (grab a free template for this here!!), you can update your wedding website if you have one, or you can also simply send out a mass email. There is no wrong way to do this!
Allow yourself to grieve the situation. Real talk, sweet bride — this isn’t at all how you envisioned your wedding day, we know that. I’ve done my very best to let my brides know that the thing that matters the absolute most is what you and your fiance share together, and you two already share that with or without your dream wedding day. Know that, lean into that, trust that. All that truth aside though, it is completely okay to not be okay with how things are shaking out and it is completely okay to let yourself be sad, mad, to cry, to throw things (maybe not AT your fiance though) — you do what you need to do, and don’t let anyone tell you that you shouldn’t feel all the feels and go through all the emotions.
Celebrate your original wedding date anyways — another piece of advice I’ve tried to give to my brides who have already postponed. Just because you won’t be going to your church or venue of choice on the date you intended, just because you won’t be saying your vows with your fiance on that date, doesn’t mean that date can’t still be celebrated. You can literally do whatever the heck you want to celebrate this day. You and your sweetheart could have a cozy date at home with lots of wine. You could go on a hike together (staying 6ft from others of course). You could get up, cook breakfast together, and binge Netflix all day. Or you could write letters to one another and then read them to each other in the privacy of your own backyard. Whatever you decide to do, find a way to honor the day that would have been your wedding day, and know that the new date will be just as meaningful.
