It costs how much? The

truth behind events

In today's market money is tight, and we are all looking for a good deal, who doesn't like a good deal, 10% off, 30% off and my personal favourite BOGOF (Buy One Get One Free). You want the best for your Wedding or Event, however your budget may not stretch that far, this leaves you spending hours searching round for the cheapest deal and juggling your budget. Deep down we all know when something looks to go to be true, it normally is, but the truth is when booking your wedding or event you are lead by your heart, not your head, you get carried way with the excitement of the moment.

But such a price difference!

Gathering quotes from suppliers means you could end up with a vast difference in prices, why is this, surely it's the same service, it must be these higher prices are companies just trying to rip you off, especially when they hear the word "Wedding". It's a bit more complicated, no matter if they are a sole trader or a large company, in order to operate a business there are running costs, we all know this but often forget it. As an example, we supply a lot of fairy light canopies, it's just a bunch of fairy lights, they're cheap, therefore it should be cheap to have them right? If only it was that simple, stringing fairy lights across the room means they have to support their own weight, I won't bore you with the details of stress and tension, but they have to be up to the job, cheap sets of lights off eBay are not good enough and can fail (dangerously). To get this quality you have to use professional grade fairy lights, as you probably guess these are not cheap. Installation, in most cases can only be done at night because the area needs to be clear of tables and chairs due to the use of ladders, being ladder work you have to have two people on site, and normally installation is night working at 1 or 2 am after the function the night before finishes and before the room is set for your BIG day.   Hanging anything above anybody means having the correct specialist insurance, standard Public Liability Insurance (PLI) does not cover this, we also have to pay staff, tax and other expenses just for operating. So on the surface what looks like "just fairy lights" should cost £100, in reality by the time you have paid 2 engineers fitting them, coming back the following night to remove them, taken out the other business costs, fuel costs etc, means that these "cheap fairy lights" are now costing £500 or £600, but whichever way you spin it, I will agree you're just getting fairy lights. This goes across all suppliers in the industry, example DJs are just there to play music, photographers just point and click, right? Wrong, back in the day I was a professional DJ, for an average evening event I started getting ready at 1pm, would load the van with anything up to £10k of equipment, and when the function finished, would pack, drive home and offload the van and get to see my bed 14 hours later at 3am. Photographers spend thousands on their cameras, spend all day taking photos, and then another 2 or 3 days sorting, editing, and finalising to give you the best memories. One way to look at this, let say you were going to do it yourself, how much would it cost you, £2k, £5k, £10k do buy all the required equipment and insurance? Does that £500 look so bad now?

Race to the bottom

I cover this more in another blog "Finding and booking your supplier", social media such as Facebook has changed the way we look for services, with a large number of Facebook groups (especially for Weddings) suppliers are offering their services, however there is a worrying amount of 2 types of post.  "I'm looking a service, on a budget, who's the cheapest", then a screen full of suppliers all trying to undercut each other for a lower price to get you business, hence the "race to the bottom" The more devastating is "HELP, Ive just been let down by my suppler, and my event is in 4 weeks" The cold hard, and somewhat harsh reality is there is a direct link, Cheap services are not good, and Good Services are not cheap It's a really tough call, as a client you don't care about business costs and why should you, but as a professional business these have to be considered in every quote. Suppliers offering services at very cheap prices, often they don't last very long or end up by letting people down because they just can't handle the work, or realise their running costs are to high. This unfortunately makes it very complicated for professionals when they say yes our product is four or five times what you been quoted, but we're going to do it correctly.

Who am I to tell you what's right and wrong?

I'm not, I can only past on some advice. I have been in the wedding and events industry since 1990 (yes I really am that old), I've seen the good, the bad and the oh dear lord ! Over the past few years there has been a overwhelming increase in Wedding and Event "specialist", all claiming they are "professional", "reliable", and "trusted". Social Media has been the biggest change in the way we find suppliers, with a large number of Facebook groups (especially for Weddings) suppliers are offering their services. We have a separate blog on finding, checking and booking suppliers here, this goes into more details and may be worth a read.

Should I ask for a better deal?

We should always ask what's the best deal, however, consider this. Monday afternoon your boss comes to you saying I've had a client on the phone that really want our product, but can't afford it, so I've looked at the figures and have decided for the next 2 weeks I'm going to cut your wages by a 1/3 so I can offer them our product. This may sound a bit extreme, but most companies in the Wedding and Events industry are classed as "small businesses", and with most Weddings and Events held between March and October that’s only 9 months of the year they are working, the business running cost are all year round, sometime they just can't offer a lower price to make sure you get a professional and reliable service.  Brian Canning BDJC Events January 2018