Looking For Advice

Hi there, I am hoping to get advice from you except I am not planning a wedding but a business!
I'll tell you a little bit about how come I am here.....
My son started school last year and after taking 5 years off work to be a stay at home mum (I knew I wasn't going to have another child and wanted to spend as much time as I could with him) I found it wasn't so easy to find a job that suited round school hours any more and I wasn't going to find a job that would pay enough to pay for childcare so I was stuck at home getting more bored and more down, trying to think of something I could do.
Having so much spare time on my hands meant that I had no excuse not to sort out stuff (and stuff and stuff and stuff!!)I came across loads of wedding favours, some I couldn't even remember who's wedding they had came from!!!
I felt pretty bad, these where gifts from friends and family to thank me for spending their big day with them! But it did give me a idea. Why don't people give favours that their guests will want to keep on show? Something that can sit on a shelf, hang in a window, be carried in a bag, something that doesn't really take up any space but will remind them of your wedding every time they look at it. Something hand made, that can be as classy or as quirky as you wanted.
After years of mostly "mummy" chat, my brain is waking up again. I've got some great ideas for wedding favours with a difference.
So, my questions are, how important are wedding favours nowadays? Does it matter that they get put away in a box and forgotten or worse still, the bucket (I know people that do this!) How much would you spend on them? Would you pay more for something personalised to your wedding?
I guess I basically need some honest advice on whether this idea could work?
I know you've all probably got a million other things to e thinking about so I thank you for taking the time to read this and if you can offer any advice it will be gratefully received.

 

Hi Nicola,

I know that when I was planning my wedding at one point I considered scrapping wedding favours. Purely because of the cost of everything else in the wedding I thought was it really worth spending a further £200-£300 on favours. Although some favours can start from about £2-£3 the cost does add up especially when you have a lot of guests (I had 250 ).

So the point is I think wedding favours are important but need to be affordable. Suppliers need to consider overall package deals rather than individual costs per item especially for bigger weddings. I mean most people would love to give a simple gift of appreciation to their guests for coming but do not want the further hassle if it will break the bank.

I ended up doing DIY in the end. I brought favour boxes from eBay coloured tissue paper and a bag of sweets and my family made them the day before the wedding. I found a great deal on eBay something like 250 boxes for £50-£70 somewhere thereabouts and tissue paper from my local crafts shop. Believe me if I was more creative I would have even made the boxes myself.

Hope this helps,

Kirbz

 

Hi Nicola

Agree that favours can be something that you look at and go 'ooh nice' but then either forget to take with you or promptly lose when you're home.

For me I think edible favours are the way to go as they'll more than likely be enjoyed on the day and are relatively easy to DIY which seems to be a way many people are going these days.

I agree with Kirbz that cost will be a large consideration for people as, although favours may rank high on the original budget, they can slip down the priority list as other costs mount up. But it certainly sounds like a good idea and perhaps ensuring you have favour options in a range of budgets would be the key to success?

Good luck!

 

Welcome to the forum! Are you making edible favours for your wedding guests? If so what have you opted for?

 

Bit late to this thread but wedding favours are still very popular. Virtually every wedding I photograph have them. But we also struggled with the cost last year when we were planning our own wedding.

The biggest problem with this as a business idea is sales & marketing. Where would you advertise? Wedding businesses despite popular belief are ultra competitive and it's a cutthroat market out there.