Industry professionals hope that 2022 will finally mark the return of marriage celebrated with a party (AFP/Archives/LUDOVIC MARIN)
Will the year 2022 finally mark the return of the wedding celebrated with a party, “as before”? This is what the bride and groom and professionals in the sector hoped for at the wedding fair on Saturday and Sunday, at the Porte de Versailles exhibition center in Paris.
Since March 2020, many couples have postponed their union. While 224,000 marriages were celebrated in 2019, Insee only counted 155,000 in 2020 … And “only 30 to 40,000 were followed by a party”, said Stéphane Seban, founder and show organizer for 15 years.
Met in the aisles of the salon, Camille Roux, 25-year-old administrative agent, who came with her family, says that she has been trying to schedule her wedding date since 2020, a “super hassle”, she says. It was only “in September 2021 that everything really unlocked” with the service providers. Finally, his wedding will be celebrated next August.
In the pre-Covid world, many couples came to this salon to prepare for their party. This weekend, the organizers hoped for 25,000 visitors, against 40,000 usually before the health crisis.
A sign of the consequences of the pandemic on the sector, this edition welcomes “180 exhibitors against 300” in 2020, according to Stéphane Seban.
Many event companies, including caterers, have gone out of business. “Unlike a restaurant, you can’t reopen overnight, a wedding is being prepared months in advance,” he explains.
He wants to believe that if “the Covid worries the bride and groom less and less about the holding of their wedding party, the lack of availability of dates” to reserve the place of celebration and the service providers is felt more.
In 2021, the number of marriages has effectively returned to its level before the health crisis according to INSEE.
– Already 2024 –
“In 2022 we are already full and above all we had to adapt, we do weddings from Monday to Sunday whereas before it was mainly Saturday and Sunday. With the postponements for 2021 and the addition of weddings from 2022, we have at least 50% more weddings this year”, explains Stéphane Ferry-Balin, owner of the Château de Jallanges since 1986.
Since March 2020, many couples have postponed their union (AFP/Archives/JEAN-PIERRE MULLER)
For the squire, the consequences of the pandemic concern more the contracts signed in 2019. “The prices of the time no longer correspond to today’s reality. The supply costs have taken between 25 and 30%”.
“The cost of the wage bill will also increase by 16% from April”, he adds, with the new salary scale in the hotel and catering industry that the main employers’ organization in the sector hopes to see applied in the spring. .
But some professionals say it is still too early to speak of a real “catch-up effect”.
“To say that all the caterers are full is wrong”, annoys Gilles Ranco, owner of the Villemartin hotel business in Essonne, when he is told that in the aisles of the show, many couples are worried about s too late for a wedding this year.
“Before the crisis, we were doing around sixty performances a year. 2021 was insignificant, with around ten weddings. I think that 2022 will improve, but not at the level before,” said the manager.
A point will “not help”, underlines the deputy of the place, Christine Mondin, “we lose four weekends in April and June with the legislative and presidential elections”.
The timidity of the recovery can also be seen for Aurélie Vergnes, sales manager of the manor of Gressy, in Seine-et-Marne. “Generally we know that in January we already have three quarters of the dates reserved, there we have not even reached a quarter but we hope at the last minute. For example last week we signed a wedding for March 5.”
Wedding planner since 2011, Aurélie Vergnes notes “more last minute reservations than before, whereas generally the reservation of the place is made 12 to 18 months in advance”.
Another surprise for the professional, “many are already inquiring about 2024”, to “reassure themselves”.
© 2022 AFP
Did you like this article ? Share it with your friends with the buttons below.
