As crazy as it is, 2022 is getting closer and closer! Our wedding calendar is already filling up for next year. Brides are looking ahead and planning their special day for 2022.

While it might seem KINDA soon, but the wedding industry is changing thanks to COVID. We are seeing much longer engagements and couples are planning out way in advance. Before the pandemic, the average couple planned for 9 months. Now we are seeing couples planning 11 or more months in advance.

In light of how everything is going, we thought it would be wise to offer some advice and tips from people inside of the wedding industry.

Contact Wedding Vendors ASAP

With so many couples postponing and others getting engaged, there is more and more competition for a limited number of vendors. If you have a specific vendor or venue in mind, we suggest you contact them as soon as you can.

Not only did couples have to postpone, but some wedding vendors and venues have left the wedding industry during the pandemic. We’ve seen businesses decide to move into different specialties out of necessity, which means fewer vendors for more couples.

If you’re even remotely considering a vendor or venue, go ahead and talk to them. There is no harm in reaching out to a planner or venue owner to see if they are free on your date. But there is the chance that you wait a couple of weeks and then they are already booked.

Have a Wedding Plan B

If there is one thing we’ve learned from last year, it’s you never know what’s going to happen.

We worked with so many couples and had so many friends who had to change their wedding plans because of COVID. Thankfully, all of the weddings still happened and they were all amazing, but they had to make a lot of changes.

Hopefully, your plan A goes off without a hitch and everything goes exactly how you imagined, but the importance of having a backup option is more important than ever.

So, what does a Wedding Plan B look like? That all depends on your Plan A and how flexible you are.

Here is what some of our couples have done in the past. They had their original plan, including the venue and all of the vendors. Then they would have another ceremony location in mind they knew they could use in case of emergency. This could be a friend’s house or even a park.

An additional tip is to be flexible with your own plans and with the vendor.

Make Your Guests Comfortable

Nobody can predict the future. We obviously have NO idea what weddings and events will look like in 6 months. Over the past several months, we have seen weddings become a lot smaller than we’ve seen in the past.

Guests want to be comfortable and for some people, it makes them anxious thinking about going to a wedding surrounded by a lot of other guests.

Leading up to the wedding, COMMUNICATE with your guests. Let them know what to expect from the wedding day. This could be anything about safety measures, Plan B, or any venue requirements.

We’ve been on both sides of this, both as vendors and as wedding guests. As guests, it made us feel so much better. Knowing what the mask requirements were, the distance policy, and how we would know about any changes.

Consider a Non-Saturday Wedding

This is probably the most important tip on our list for planning a 2022 wedding. We know that everything automatically plans for a wedding on a Saturday. For some reason, that’s just the norm. But times are changing and COVID has put a wrench into the wedding planning operation.

Here is why we think you should consider a non-Saturday wedding:

• Costs
• Availability

That’s it. Those are the two obvious reasons.

More than likely, a wedding in 2022 is going to be more expensive. Everything is in higher demand which typically means higher costs. Getting married on a Sunday or Friday will save you money on venues and vendors. In fact, most vendors offer special non-Saturday rates.