Wedding Fever

With one third of the Voodoo employees currently engaged to be wed, it’s a surprise when other more important topics of office conversation [football] manage get a look in. So when scraping the barrel for a blogging topic this week, ‘weddings’ jumped out at me like an underfed, cage-fighting trained, piranha.

From small intimate gatherings to grandiose overblown occasions, it’s the one facet of the British economy currently bucking the post-recessionary trend for frugality. With an estimated £5.5 billion spent on the wedding industry in 2009 alone - this pattern shows no signs of stopping.   

So why does saying “I do” and the pomp and circumstance that surrounds the moment, go against all the received wisdom of the current economic climate? Let’s explore some of the theories floating ‘round the office…and in cyberspace:

1.     Celebrity Influence

The old chestnut of blaming slebs for all the evils of the world could have some weight to it. With Chelsea ($3-5million), Robbie (£20,000 for the flowers & £160,000 for the ring) & Walliams (£80,000) tying the knot already in 2010, surely some of this extravagance must trickle down to us mere mortals. (Though I trust that not every celebrity-endorsed wedding item becomes a must-have.)

One would hope that today’s young couples would have the sense to filter through expenditure only on things they consider vital for making their ‘special day’ truly, errr, special. But when bombarded by THE INDUSTRY [‘Perfect Wedding’, ‘Wedding ideas’, ‘Weddings: How to spend more’ are just a few of the titles available from WH Smith (and all good newsagents)] Could it be that after digesting that quantity of hard sell, some degree of brain washing takes place, akin to watching far too many hours of ‘Crafting with colour step-by-step’ on QVC. All of a sudden [insert generically crap wedding item] becomes what’s been missing all your life. I’ve seen first hand, (normally considered ‘sane’) liberal, eco-conscious couples in their early to mid-twenties turning all bridezilla when there’s decisions to be made on ‘empire cream’ vs. ‘pearlescent ivory’ paper for the invites.   

2.     Blame the parents

For some unlucky brides and grooms-to-be their ‘big day’ doesn’t, in fact, belong to them. Yes, they may be centre stage for the event-  the leading man and lady- but it’s the big-money backers of these Hollywood-style productions who really hold all the cards: ‘Mom & Dad’. Whether it’s for religious, cultural - or in middle-England most likely- social reasons, if the parents are paying for these gatherings - it’s to get their money’s worth or at least to repay old debts. Entire guest lists can be populated by the ‘rents friends whose own children’s weddings your parents have already been invited to in previous years, and therefore need to ‘repay the kindness’. So once extended family is taken into consideration, before bride & groom even consider inviting anyone they actually want to be there - a bloated number of cast and crew has already been assembled thus racking up the costs.

3.     A return to traditional values

By virtue of our ‘post crunch’ research, and throughout projects for clients ranging from supermarkets, mobile networks right through to beauty products, we’ve noticed a common vein has flowed: Real signs of a return to the more traditional (conservative, if you will) values of our parents’ parents generation are coming to the fore - from ‘grow your own’ & ‘make do and mend’ through to ‘keeping it local’, the signs are there for all to see. If this is the case, in this context, a return to the ‘traditional white wedding’ makes perfect sense. Regarding the event of the wedding, as opposed to the marriage itself as the focus, is merely a C21^st morally bereft update of the convention.

So as part of a hungry research agency, aware of  the dramatic cross-industry cuts to insight budgets all around us- perhaps we should be going after projects where the real money lies… floral fascinators and sugared almond table favours.