Change the date: COVID-19 halts Lexington weddings, turns industry upside down
Couples put thousands of dollars into planning their weddings, and during the COVID-19 outbreak, those plans — and the people who depend on them for a living — have been thrown into uncertainty.
Weddings across the state and country are being postponed, canceled or adapted to more intimate gatherings, It’s devastating couples who’ve been preparing for months, and it’s forcing the industry into new territory.
“The impact is just tremendous,” said Alissa Tibe, president of Lundy’s Special Events. “The hospitality world will be changed because of this, there is absolutely no denying.”
While the wedding industry tries to stay afloat, couples who had weddings planned for the coming weeks are having their worlds turned upside down in a different way.
Elyas Jazayeri and Shirin Bigdeliazari were set to marry on May 23 in front of 200 invited guests. Of those invited, 60 or 70 were going to be coming from out of state or out of the country.
“We’re going to have guests from all around the world, Iran, California, people already locked down,” Jazayeri said. “We don’t want to put them in jeopardy to tell them to come.”
The couple’s wedding date had been picked very intentionally, as it fell between Bigdeliazari’s graduation from the University of Kentucky and the start of her pharmacy residency.
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“What they said is, ‘let’s just postpone the wedding to a future date.’ We were like what time are we talking about, in July?” Jazayeri said. “We don’t know when coronavirus will be gone, now we are forced to choose a date blindly.”
Another problem: The couple has already hired and paid deposits for several vendors, including a DJ, photographer and videographer. Trying to find a new date that works for those vendors, the venue and the family is going to be a challenge, Jazayeri said.
Wedding vendors: No work to no time in fall
Vendors like Sabrina Hounshell, owner of Seriously Sabrina Photography, face their own challenges.
Hounshell said when the outbreak started, photographers weren’t sure what to do — especially with smaller photo shoots, like engagement portraits.
“When the news about COVID-19 first started coming out there was obviously a lot of hesitation, people weren’t sure how to react,” Hounshell said. “Should we be doing this? Should we distance from clients?”
At first Hounshell limited the number of people in the photo shoots, and tried to take pictures outside, she said. It soon became clear that none of the photo shoots with clients was without risk of catching or spreading COVID-19.
“It changes when you’re a service provider, how do you continue to provide a service that’s very much person-to-person interaction?” Hounshell said. “It’s not a product you can deliver to people’s porches, it becomes a lot more difficult to figure out what that looks like.”
Area photographers are trying to adapt by offering to photograph products for local businesses and by doing photography that doesn’t require working closely with people.
“With the cherry blossoms blooming, everyone’s dying to get out and shoot,” Hounshell said. “But if one person does it, it’s going to make others want to and that’s only going to prolong the shutdowns.”
It’s uncertain how long social distancing will last. In the interim, photographers were asking the community to support them by buying gift certificates, buying future sessions and liking and sharing their work on social media.
When wedding photographers are able to get back to work, all of the postponed events along with previously scheduled weddings will make for serious scheduling difficulties.
“If things are back to normal . . . people are going to be working twice as hard in the fall trying to make up for the income that was lost in the summer,” Hounshell said.
Postponed weddings create unique venue problems
Area wedding venues are having a similarly hard time figuring out how they’re going to manage all of the postponed weddings once social distancing mandates let up.
One Lexington venues company, 903 Venues, is hoping that their three adjacent spaces will help cater to all of the couples and events that get pushed to the fall or winter, said Kimberly Gaunce. Gaunce is director of venues for 903 Venues, which is currently doing business under Bluegrass Catering & Events.
903 Venues includes The Grand Reserve, The Speakeasy and Distillery Square, off Manchester Street.
“It is a little scary about how busy our fall and winter may be, but I think we’ll need it with everything going on now,” Gaunce said.
With the lack of business income, getting refunds for cancellations to clients quickly may be difficult, Gaunce said.
“This is out of everybody’s hands,” Gaunce said. “It might be a couple weeks, but we’re going to do what’s right for the couples.”
Almost every couple with upcoming wedding dates so far has opted to postpone rather than cancel, Gaunce said. One couple opted to let the company cater their at-home wedding rather than asking for a refund, she said.
Like other Kentuckians, Gaunce said she closely watches Gov. Andy Beshear’s daily briefings to learn what’s coming.
“It’s day by day,” Gaunce said. “Every day at 5 o’clock you get on and watch and it’s something new.”
With the uncertainty, the venues company pushed back all weddings through May and offered June couples the option of two dates — their current day and a contingency day if the state is shut down through June.
But as the outbreak continues, it’s going to be difficult to continue blocking out two weekends for couples when it’s unclear which will be used.
“At some point, we have to keep running the business and make sure we have weekends booked,” Gaunce said.
Meanwhile, the company is remodeling during the downtime. Employees were off two weeks as a precaution. But after that, the company is considering using its catering kitchen to make curbside pickup meals or boxed lunches for health care workers. The company has also offered the use of their event tents for triage hospitals if needed, Gaunce said.
Alissa Tibe, president of Lundy’s Special Events, said her company also is working to help couples find ways to make the most out of their big day despite all of the changes and uncertainty. The company owns the Carrick House off North Limestone in Lexington and also does catering.
“Just because it was scheduled for May 5, it will be just as special on Sept. 5,” Tibe said.
Lundy’s Special Events also does off-premises catering and is willing to work with couples who have to reschedule without using the Carrick House.
“We’re trying to be creative,” Tibe said. “If there’s a new date that a young lady might have that we’re booked at the Carrick House, we’re willing to work with other venues.”
Different groups in the wedding industry in Lexington have been consulting with each other, Tibe said.
“We’re working together to make sure our customers are taken care of,” Tibe said. “If it works out that I lose a bride, I’m going to do my best to find another property that will take care of her as well as we would have.”
Lundy’s Special Events is part of The Lundergan Group, a company that also makes temporary structures in natural disasters like triage tents it constructed in Florida. Other companies in the wedding industry don’t have those other streams of income, Tibe said.
“Some of us, God willing ,will be able to survive,” Tibe said. “But some of us won’t.”
This story was originally published March 27, 2020 at 7:46 AM.
