There are countless details and elements to coordinate when planning a wedding: invites, flowers, music, food and drink, venue, photographer, hair and make up—the list goes on. Across all of these services, small businesses are competing against big vendors to provide couples with the best wedding experience.
Intuit QuickBooks surveyed 500 US adults who were married within the last 12 months to understand how couples are enlisting small businesses for their weddings. A whopping 95% said they worked with at least one small business, demonstrating a clear appetite from consumers to choose small businesses for their special day.
Why hire a small business?
For many, the decision to hire small business wedding vendors is simple. Nearly all (98%) respondents said it was important to work with a small business, and of those who said it was important, 83% said it was either "extremely" or "very" important.
Additionally, consumers know they can trust small businesses with one of the most special days of their lives: 44% of respondents said they felt a small business would provide better and more personalized services.
Challenges facing the wedding industry
While consumers’ willingness to support small businesses is high, the supply chain is a massive problem for couples planning their weddings. The majority (88%) of respondents reported that they had to sacrifice elements of their big day due to supply chain issues, and nearly one-fifth (19%) reported that these issues had a significant impact on their wedding celebrations.
Additionally, inflation proved to be one of the largest hurdles for small businesses. Nearly half (41%) of consumer respondents said they experienced an unexpected price hike for some products or services leading up to their wedding.
“Unfortunately, with gas and food prices increasing, we are in turn having to increase our pricing for our new clients as well as our service charges to offset those price hikes,” said Stephanie Brown, owner of Off the Beaten Path, a wedding and event business. “We have also had to amend our contract to protect ourselves from unexpected price increases in the future, adding a clause that if you book catering more than six months out, we reserve the right to increase the pricing by up to 5% should the market necessitate it.”
Off-setting the increased costs that are passed on to customers with incentives, like a referral program, or communicating differences in quality of service, are a few ways small businesses can work around inflation. That being said, increased costs of services can lead to a potential loss of customers.
Opportunities for small businesses
Small businesses have an opportunity to expand and modernize methods of accepting payment. While more than two-thirds (67%) of consumers said that they paid wedding vendors with a credit card, more than half (56%) paid via cash. On the other hand, some early adopters of technologies paid with cryptocurrency (21%). Small businesses should look to adopt digital solutions and tools—if they haven’t already—to ensure a more seamless payments experience.
Despite any challenges, customers continue to love their small business partners. The majority of respondents (68%) said there was a business that “saved the day,” and among those, 74% noted that a small business was their wedding hero. Cheers to the small business heroes powering the busy wedding season!
For more insights, read the full wedding survey report here.
