On my continuing rant of “Where do they come up with this shit” I had some very interesting conversations this week.

I was talking to a planner that is trying to, umm, fix the budget a bride prepared for her. Some of the little things the bride got WRONG:

Budget for invitations: $0.47 each. Can you even get a postcard and mail it for that?

Total budget for bouquets for herself and 8 attendants: $200. No, not one bouquet, all of them. Oh ya, she did toss in an extra $50 for the 9 bouts.

Moving on. I spoke with a florist that was dealing with a bride that found the perfect rose in the perfect color online. Problem is, the rose was on a site for hybrid tea roses, the kind you grow in your garden and they only came as bare root plants. The wedding is 2 weeks out. Um, that’s not happening!

Same florist different bride. Bride wants anemones for her wedding in November. Florist double checked with growers. Anemones start hitting the market in late December and hit their peak from January to April. Bride said,”NO, we Googled it and they come into season in October.” Maybe Google knows something the growers don’t.

Then I found this little video from Planet Money. The author obviously forgot little things like shipping and overhead for the shop selling it and maybe even a bit of profit. I’ll bet she is also the first one to scream”SWEATSHOP” at the first mention of Chinese manufacturing.

One of your jobs as professionals is to educate your brides. That isn’t the easiest thing to do. There is a show on HGTV that I am addicted to called Property Brothers. They have figured out a way to educate their clients; it’s called shock therapy! They show them the house of their dreams and give them just enough time to fall in love with it. Then they hit them with the asking price which usually runs about double their budget.

Reality Check!

Once the shock wears off, the client is ready to tackle some less than perfect homes and some serious renovations to get what they want.

You may want to consider this with your clients. That is if you have the chops to pull it off.
A very wise friend once told me,

“It’s easy to pull off a gorgeous wedding when you have a $60,000 budget. It’s the real pros that can do it for $15,000.”

Please, oh please leave your examples of brides in need of a reality check. I could use the chuckle.
Besides, it would be good for us all to know we aren’t the only ones hearing this shit!!