292. (ALERT) How Tariffs are Affecting the Wedding Industry.

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The economy might be uncertain, but your business doesn’t have to be.  

In this episode, I’m breaking down how tariffs, inflation, and shifting booking patterns are affecting the wedding industry—and more importantly, what you can do to keep your leads flowing and profits growing. 

If you're tired of feeling like everything is out of your control, it’s time to take it back. 

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EPISODE SHOW NOTES BLOG & MORE:

https://weddingproceo.com/tariffs-wedding-industry-impact-2025/

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Thank you for tuning in to this episode of the Wedding Pro CEO Podcast. If you find these strategies helpful, make sure to share this episode with your fellow wedding pros. And remember, in the world of weddings, it's all about building genuine relationships and showcasing your best work. Until next time, keep shining, CEOs!

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Chapters

• 0:00 Tariffs, Inflation, Supply Chain Chaos
• 0:33 The Elephant in the Room
• 3:08 How to Navigate the Chaos
• 6:28 The Uncertainty is Real
• 7:01 Transparent Communication
• 7:48 Flexible (not discounted) Packages
• 8:43 Value Add Ons
• 11:20 Keep Up with Economic News
• 12:13 Book A Free Business Assessment

Transcript

0:00

Tariffs, inflation, supply chain, chaos. Everything is getting more expensive, especially in the wedding industry. Florals up, dresses up. Food. Don't even get me started, But here's the thing, the problem isn't just the economy. The problem is also staying stuck in only using strategies that work in a booming economy, because when costs rise and couples start to tighten their wallets, the good gets separated from the great. Let's talk about how you become one of the great. So let's talk about the elephant in the room, the tariffs and how they are affecting the wedding industry and what you can do about it. So what specifically are tariffs? Tariffs are a tax that are imposed on imported goods into the United States. That's the simplest form to know about what it is now. How is it affecting the wedding industry? a significant amount of the goods, including dresses, rentals, florals, all come from outside the United States and are shipped in And with all the hubbub about tariffs, there is a lot of conversation about how this is affecting not just the cost, but how it's affecting lead flow here in 2025. The truth of the matter is, the only thing that all of us are sure of about the tariffs is that no one has any idea how these are actually going to be implemented moving forward long term. so it's leaving small businesses. Very challenged over how to implement the fees into their structure. Now there's a lot of news on both sides of the aisle as to whether these tariffs are gonna be a good thing or a bad thing long-term for America. I'm gonna stay out of the political side of this debate and say the only thing that all of us are certain of is that none of us have any idea how this is going to affect us in the next few months. What we do know is that it is causing some turmoil and it's causing couples to really evaluate how they're gonna spend their budgets and when they're gonna get married, which is affecting lead flow. The wedding industry. What we're seeing across the board is we're seeing a lot of couples that are either booking very short term, meaning they've kind of been holding off on booking some of their vendors, but now they're like, okay, let's go. Let's just have this thing. So a lot of vendors are seeing very short term bookings in the year for the year, which is a great thing, right? But it makes it very difficult to budget because in past years you typically have an eight to 12 month lead frame. Now we're starting to see sometimes. Closer to four to six months. Again, exciting because they're booking in the year for the year, but also making things feel very uncertain. Another thing that we're seeing is longer booking time. So we're seeing couples take a long time to decide. So if their wedding isn't until 2026, often they're gathering information and sitting on that information for a significant amount of time. We've seen a lot of data coming out telling us that couples are waiting sometimes six to eight weeks to actually sign off on a contract, which is insane. So as a wedding pro that's sitting here thinking, okay, Brandee, thanks for all of this uncertainty. How do I navigate it? Here's what I want you to know. Wedding Pro, the number one. Thing that you have to understand as a business owner is anyone can be successful in a booming economy, wedding vendors are a lot like realtors. I, it's interesting how similar our industries are, but the cost to enter the industry is so low. The barrier to entry is so low that often when we're having a booming economy, we have tons of vendors that flood the market, And to be honest, that's because it's pretty easy to book couples when everything is great. But what I love about an uncertain economy or a down economy, I don't even know that you could call this a down economy. I would say it's filled with uncertainty. We have. Honestly, no idea what six months from now is gonna look like for this economy. But what I love about this, having been in business for almost 18 years now, is that these type of economies are what separates the good from the great. And what I mean by that is that. Because anyone can book clients in a booming economy. A lot of them don't have strategy. They're just here. They're scooping up clients. They're scooping up engaged couples so easily because there are so many people getting engaged. But in an uncertain economy, strategy has to be employed . You have to be able to ebb and flow your strategy. You have to be able to. Understand your data, so exactly, so that you know where your leads are coming from, where your most qualified leads are coming from. You have to understand what you can do differently. You have to understand what couples are looking for to be able to maintain the lead flow that you're used to. Wedding pros who came into the industry during a booming market often don't have these strategies because those muscles have not been flexed. That means that you, as someone who is in tune with your business, who understands the strategy of growing a thriving wedding business are going to be able to rise to the occasion in this type of an economy. But that takes you being willing to change your strategies to be able to really see that rise to the occasion moment. Right? I genuinely love this type of economy, and if you don't believe me, you can go back to some of the episodes at the end of 2022 and 2023 where I talked about this same thing. When the economy really started to rebalance itself after the boom of 2021, we. Saw a down, definitely a down economy then. And I was saying the same thing. This is how we separate the good from the great. So will you be great or are you just gonna kind of say, uh, the economy sucks, I guess I'm not gonna have any leads this month. That is a settle mentality. That is a lazy mentality, and I don't want that for you. the most successful business owners understand that their business cannot be driven by the economy. You have to be in it. You have to understand when the economy gets tough, you get tougher. I love this quote that I heard by Tony Robbins that said, when things start to seem out of control, that's when you have to take control. And I was like, yes. I wrote it down in my notes immediately because I was like, this is exactly what I want. The CEOs who listen to my podcast, who are part of my programs, who are part of the wedding Pro CEO community to hear. It is uncertain right now what our economy is going to do. But when you have data to back up the information that you need to get the leads into your business, to turn them into consultations and to then turn them into paying clients, that is going to make you part of the most successful wedding wedding pros in this season of business. okay, so what does this mean in practical terms? You know what that, I love to give you guys practical, tangible things that you can do in your business right now to overcome the uncertainty that we're feeling. And so here's a couple of things that I want you to really focus on. Number one, I want you to have transparent communication. Couples are nervous. The Knot just came out with a report that said that 72% of couples are feeling financial anxiety about planning a wedding in this year simply because they have no idea. What the costs are gonna look like once these tariffs go into effect, or if the tariffs go into effect. And so one of the things I want you to really think about is just keeping very transparent communication and understanding how your business will. Handle the tariffs, should they be imposed and affect your business? You can go back to episode 2 91 to listen to Paige. Griffith and I talk about how you can manage the tariffs and the fees that are being incurred, how you can manage that legally with your contracts, if this is something that is going to affect you as these tariffs go into effect. Number two, I want you to consider having flexible packages. And what this could mean is meeting couples where they are now, what I don't want you to hear me say is, discount, discount, discount, discount. Race to the bottom, lower all your packages. That's not what I want you because guys, tariffs. Are not affecting everyone, right? Like there are lots of people who want to spend money and want your expertise and want to pay for your highest package for you to take care of them. So I don't want that to mean just like discount everything, but what it could mean is creating maybe. A package that you can offer to couples who may be feeling the strain of a budget that would work well for both your brand and for what they're looking for. So having slightly different packages that you can offer when the economy is a little uncertain, is a little tight, would be a really great thing for you to draw in some of those clients who might be a little bit more conscious of their budget. number three is my favorite one is to have upsells have value adds to your service. And the reason that this is important is because what's happening right now in an uncertain economy, is that people are still going to get married. The wedding industry is expected to grow significantly over the next five years. And weddings tend to be fairly economy proof, like people are still gonna get married, but they aren't certain right now of what their budget is gonna be because they're kind of like, I wanna see how the tariffs affect maybe my florals or my decor, or you know, my dress, whatever. Right? And so what I would encourage you to do is to get them in at your base level package or to get them in at just your core offer. and then to upsell them throughout the planning process to offer them other things that they can purchase with your company to raise that average ticket. So what do I mean by that? I love seeing this done with photographers, DJs, honestly, even Floris, I think this can be done really, really well, is to get them in at your core offer. So let's say that you're a DJ and you get them in at, Hey, we're gonna do. Four hours reception. Maybe you even have ceremony, right?'cause they know they need it. But you get them in for just that core offer. Then throughout the planning process, you're gonna offer them things like uplighting or your photo booth, the the DJ booth surround. You're gonna offer them a live musician. You're gonna offer them dancing on a cloud These are things that in a more booming economy, you may offer as an all in one package, right? Like, hey, here's everything we can give you. It's $10,000, blah, blah, blah. Right? But purchasing that big of a package right from the beginning is. May be anxiety inducing for a couple who's kind of like, Ugh, I don't know what the tariffs are gonna do to our floral budget. So we want these things, but we're just not sure yet. Right? So selling them on that core offer, getting them in as a client, getting them to love you. Putting that Nurture series into play so that they can get to know your company even more and be excited about their wedding. Then you can start to offer things like, Hey, did you know we have a photo booth? It's available for your wedding day. I'd love to offer it to you for $600. Right? Or you can offer the dancing on a cloud. You can offer videography services. You can offer the lighting services, whatever that looks like for you. All of these things that you offer as part of your company can be done after they're already a client because now they love you. They're an existing client. They want these things anyway, but they need to see how the rest of their budget is gonna flesh out, right? So getting them in at a core offer and then offering them upsells throughout the planning process is going to be a strategy that's gonna win in this uncertain economy. The last thing that you can do as a business owner right here in 2025 is to stay aware of what's going on with these tariffs. I know that a lot of us are like, Ugh, I don't wanna hear about it. It's all political, it's chaos. But it does affect us in a big way. And so it's really, really important that you are staying aware of how it could affect your business. You're having that clear communication with your clients, and then most of all, that you're understanding that you can win in any economy As somebody who's been in business for 18 years, I've seen it all. I've been through the great Recession. I've been through COVI, and I've thrived through all of those different economies, and this is gonna be no different. You have to understand what works in your business. You've gotta have the data, to back it up. And you've got to be constantly looking at strategies that you can implement to grow and scale your business. And if you're thinking, yeah, I want that Brandee, like I want to be a successful wedding pro here in 2025, I want to be one of the greats, but honestly, I haven't been through an economy like this. It's scaring me, and I want to know more about what those strategies look like to really thrive in this type of an economy. I'd love for you to book an appointment with our team. We call them gap assessments, and we can jump into your business and look at what's working and what's not working for your marketing, your sales, your profitability. We can give you strategies and we can also tell you how we can help you to really navigate all of this so that you are part of the 1%. You're part of that thriving successful community that can get through any type of economy. Our team is here to help. We have thrived through these type of economies our entire coaching team has, and we would love to see you on a gap assessment. You can click the link in the description below and book a time that works for you. And hey, I wanna know from you, what are some of the things that you're doing in your business to navigate what's happening this year and to really thrive. I'd love to get some conversation started so that we can all thrive in this economy, thanks for being here every single week, and I'll see you next time.