The wedding industry is massive. In the United States, the market was worth $57.9 billion. This does include all services, from venues to vendors to services, but one thing remains consistent – it’s a lucrative industry to get involved in.
The average cost of a wedding in 2020 was $20,300, and even this rate is less than average (likely due to pandemic restrictions). In comparison, in 2019, the average wedding cost $28,000. With restrictions lifting and weddings once again allowed to be large-scale events, the cost is set to increase.
One of the largest costs is the reception venue. On average, it takes up 18% of the wedding budget, and that percentage only increases if the wedding itself also takes place at the event. While a large portion of the budget goes to the venue, you still need to work to increase the number of interesting bookings. To help you increase business for your wedding venue, use these tips:
Improving Your Venue
Your venue needs to be striking and memorable, and it also needs to be customizable. While it should be up to the happy couple what finishing touches they want to add, you can invest in a few very useful upgrades like dimmable lights, spotlights, a sound system, and so on. This way, they can complete the overall experience to their specification, and you can get more interest for bookings and business for your venue.
Ways to Increase the Ticket Price
You want couples to have control over their wedding. This means you need to be flexible, but in that flexibility, you can actually upsell your venue by bundling additional services for more. For example, you can offer a base rate to rent one of your rooms for a day. Have beautiful banquet chairs, centerpieces, tablecloths, and more in storage for them to choose from and charge more for the rental for the day.
You can bundle décor to add to the venue if the couple wants it. You can partner with local businesses to offer bundled services (for example, catering as part of the wedding package). Bundling these services, especially when you own those banquet chairs and that other décor is a great, easy way to increase the ticket price. More often than not, you’ll find that couples are happy to pay more to you to have as much of their wedding handled and done up by the time that they get there. Wedding planning is difficult enough. Bundle as much of the planning as you can into different packages, and you will more often than not get more money per event.
Improve the Marketing of Your Business
You can have a stunning venue that never gets hired out because happy couples just simply cannot find it. To get more business to your door, you will want to market your wedding by:
- Creating a stunning website that allows interested parties to make a request online.
- Have your venue on as many relevant wedding venue directories as you can find.
- Hiring a professional photographer and videographer to create marketing assets for your venue.
- Use PR marketing to get social media and media hype around your venue.
Always tweak your approach and use analytics to understand what is working and what needs improvement. Do this, and you will grow the notoriety and value of your venue.
