how to postpone your wedding without stress-eating two dozen cupcakes
Photo by Emily Grant Photography
Postponement
In light of recent events, couples and event organizers are becoming all too familiar with the term “postponement”. Let me first start by saying I’m sorry that we’re here. I’m sorry that your wedding may not be what you envisioned. I’ve worked with couples that didn’t care about what day they got married on, as long as it was a Saturday. I’ve also worked with couples who chose a specific date to honor their grandparents’ anniversary. It’s heartbreaking to all industry professionals to watch you grieve this, as it’s part of our role to ensure that you aren’t “feeling the heat” of the planning process. Sometimes, especially with this situation, it’s inevitable.
Aside from COVID-19, you may be postponing your celebration due to other reasons. Today in this article, we’ll explore how to ensure that all of your vendors are on the same page, and (hopefully) prevent you from stress-eating those cupcakes you bought at the store. (But honestly, no judgement. Do you.)
The Value of Planners
As you can imagine, there is nothing more “easy button” than having a Planner when you’re looking to postpone your celebration or event. We do all of the legwork, and we’ll continue to run the baton of planning across that finish line for you (whether that finish line is in sight or down the road a bit.)
As soon as you know that you’re going to be postponing your event, reach out to your Planner to loop them in. It’s helpful if you have three dates (or even a month) in mind that you’d like to relocate your event to. When checking availability with other vendors, I utilize your wished-for dates and preferences to ensure that your vision is kept intact. There may be clarifying questions I’ll have for you, but outside of that – you get to relax, and I’ll let you know when your new date has been secured and solidified.
A Collaborative Process
As your Planner (or you, if you’ve chosen to tackle this yourself) start(s) to reach out to your vendors, patience is key. Within our current climate, wedding and event industry professionals are inundated with emails and calls inquiring about moving dates. As hard as it is for all of us to see you suffer, we’re also trying to run a business that could potentially be losing a lot of revenue in 2020.
Those three dates, or your idea of a timeframe that you’d like to postpone to, will come in handy here. As tempting as it is to tell a vendor, “This is my new date”, try instead to keep the conversation as collaborative as possible. “We were thinking of one of these three dates” or “What is your schedule looking like next Spring?” are both great starters for these kinds of conversations.
What I’m about to say might sting a little. In any postponement situation, you should mentally prepare yourself to lose your retainer (or deposit), and feel [insert your chosen adjective for content and happy here] if your vendor allows you to take those funds and move them to a different date. It’s an ouch moment. I get it. All vendors will be as flexible as they can with your investment until it hurts their business to do so.
Insurance
Any planner you hire should carry E&O (Errors & Omissions) insurance, but there are two types of insurance you’ll want to look at when it comes to your event. Liability insurance will cover you for property damage and bodily injury, and cancellation/postponement insurance will help you to recoup some, if not all of the costs associated with moving your date.
Lucky for you guys, I found a site that wraps the explanations of insurance up nicely and even gives you a breakdown of their ratings for a few of the different insurance companies out there that specialize in weddings and events. Check it out here: https://www.consumersadvocate.org/wedding-insurance
Remember – I’m always here to help if you’ve got questions. Feel free to slide into my DMs! Cheers to your rad wedding.
XO,