Starting A Wedding Planning Business: First Steps

Wedding planning is a business with relatively low start-up costs and high flexibility. However, it's important to have a solid business plan, including a marketing strategy, branding, accounting and bookkeeping methods, and a choice of legal entity. You can also take courses or attend conferences to strengthen your knowledge of the industry and keep up with current trends. Building relationships with venues is also key to a wedding planner's growth.

Certification courses

Although you don’t need formal training to become a wedding planner, taking certification courses can help strengthen your knowledge of the industry. Organisations like the Association of Bridal Consultants offer certification courses for wedding planners. You can also take general event planning and business classes, such as marketing, customer service, and financial management.

In addition to certification courses, you can also explore other ways to learn about the wedding planning business. Consider attending networking meetups for wedding and event planners, where you can learn from other business owners. Alternatively, you can contact well-established wedding planners about internship opportunities, which will allow you to learn from an expert while gaining hands-on experience.

Building relationships with venues is also key to a planner's growth. You can do this by planning styled shoots, open houses, or writing blog posts to showcase the venue. By offering your help and asking what's missing for them, you can create strong venue relationships that will benefit your business.

Business classes

Although you don’t need formal training to become a wedding planner, taking business classes can help strengthen your knowledge of the industry. The more you can keep up with current trends, the better you can provide high-quality services for your clients.

Organisations like the Association of Bridal Consultants offer certification courses for wedding planners. You can also explore general event planning and business classes, such as marketing, customer service, and financial management. These classes will help you learn how to start and run a business for the first time. You will learn about trademarking, marketing strategy, branding, creating a solid business plan, accounting and bookkeeping methods, choosing the best type of legal entity (LLC, sole proprietor, etc.), business systems, planning process with clients, budgeting for business investments, and tax planning.

You can also consider attending networking meetups for wedding and event planners to learn from other business owners. Alternatively, you can contact well-established wedding planners about internship opportunities. They’re often grateful for extra help, and you’re bound to learn how to get into wedding planning by working side-by-side with an expert.

In addition to business classes, you will also need to write a business plan. This will help you to build the wedding planning business you want. It is also important to consider how you will fund your business. You could use a personal loan, a business loan, or crowdfunding.

Internships

Although you don’t need formal training to become a wedding planner, internships are a great way to get into the wedding planning business. Contact well-established wedding planners about internship opportunities – they’re often grateful for extra help, and you’re bound to learn a lot by working side-by-side with an expert.

You can also take courses or attend conferences to strengthen your knowledge of the industry. The more you can keep up with current trends, the better you can provide high-quality services for your clients. Organisations like the Association of Bridal Consultants offer certification courses for wedding planners. You can also explore general event planning and business classes, such as marketing, customer service, and financial management.

Consider attending networking meetups for wedding and event planners to learn from other business owners.

Business plans

Although you don’t need formal training to become a wedding planner, taking courses or attending conferences can help strengthen your knowledge of the industry. The Association of Bridal Consultants offers certification courses for wedding planners, and you can also explore general event planning and business classes, such as marketing, customer service, and financial management.

Consider attending networking meetups for wedding and event planners to learn from other business owners. Alternatively, you can contact well-established wedding planners about internship opportunities.

Before jumping into wedding planning, you could keep your day job elsewhere while building the business in your spare time, especially since most weddings occur on weekends. A wedding planning business has relatively low startup costs compared with other types of businesses and offers flexibility not found in many industries.

To build the wedding planning business you want, you have to write a strategy to get there. This includes creating a solid business plan, accounting and bookkeeping methods, choosing the best type of legal entity (LLC, sole proprietor, etc.), business systems, planning process with clients, budgeting for business investments, and tax planning.

Creating strong venue relationships is also key to a planner’s growth. You can typically do this by planning a styled shoot, an open house, or writing a blog post to showcase the venue.

Venue relationships

Although you don’t need formal training to become a wedding planner, it is important to have a good understanding of the industry and current trends. You can do this by taking courses or attending conferences. Organisations like the Association of Bridal Consultants offer certification courses for wedding planners. You can also take general event planning and business classes, such as marketing, customer service and financial management.

Building relationships with venues is key to a wedding planner’s growth. You can do this by first building a relationship digitally, and then setting up a tour of the property. Find out how you can be an advocate for the venue by planning a styled shoot, an open house, or writing a blog post to showcase it. Go into your in-person meeting curious to learn what the venue needs and how you can help bring business to them.

It is important to remember that building venue relationships may not work for every venue, and you may not get on every preferred list. However, by leaning into your curiosity and asking how you can help, you can create strong venue relationships that will benefit your business.

In addition to building venue relationships, there are many other considerations when starting a wedding planning business. These include trademarking, marketing strategy, branding, creating a solid business plan, accounting and bookkeeping methods, choosing the best type of legal entity, business systems, planning process with clients, budgeting for business investments, tax planning, and education.

Finally, it is important to note that a wedding planning business has relatively low startup costs compared to other types of businesses and offers flexibility not found in many industries. You can keep your day job elsewhere while building the business in your spare time, as most weddings occur on weekends.

Frequently asked questions