After putting some posters up at The Bursledon Brickworks, promoting we were able to host weddings there, we quickly booked our first wedding. It’s like anything, if people don’t know about it, they can’t buy what you’re selling. So we needed to let people know we existed.
We held our first Wedding Fayre in March 2019. We set the room up with a group of wedding suppliers including a Make-Up Artist, Photographer, DJ, Car Supplier, Florist, Mobile Bar and of course…cake. All of the people we asked to exhibit were people who we have met along the way on our journey around the wedding circuit and who we would be happy to recommend.
For us, it was a huge success. In comparison to the big Wedding Fayres that some venues host with hundreds of exhibitors and even more visitors… it was small fry! But for us, it was fayrely busy. Given that we didn’t have a following at all, we were more than happy with the turnout. We booked one wedding off of the back of that Fayre but I’ll tell you more about that next time.
“It’s like anything, if people don’t know about it, they can’t buy what you’re selling. So we needed to let people know we existed.”
One of the photographers who exhibited at the Wedding Fayre approached us about organising a styled shoot at The Brickworks. A styled shoot is basically a photoshoot where different wedding suppliers use their talents and supplying products for the shoot. It replicates a real wedding and everyone benefits from professional photographs that can be used for marketing purposes.
So, a few weeks after the Wedding Fayre, we set up the Brickworks again, wedding ready for a photoshoot. It was very exciting, I had never been a part of anything like that before. Wonderberrys supplied the cake and Weddings by Wonderberrys dressed the venue, which in this case was the Brickworks.
We did a full day’s shoot. The site has so many wonderful photo opportunities for couples who want something slightly different to a traditional venue that we took the opportunity to take as many photos as we could to capture the spirit and showcase of the Brickworks.
I called on the help of my friend Kizzie to be our model for the day, I really had to twist her arm and convince her to put on her wedding dress again and get all glammed up…lol! She did a fantastic job and I was so pleased with the outcome.
Adam from A Knights Tale Photography was our photographer and Kizzie’s hair was done by Rachel Smith Hairdressing, and looked wonderful. Victoria from Victoria Oke Make-Up did Kizzie’s make up, She airbrushed her foundation - I was obsessed. Any make-up artists who want to come and do that for me daily…that would be fabulous. Last but not least, Bloomin’ Clares supplied the bouquet.
On top of that my friend Mr Maggs supplied us with a Steam Traction Engine for the day. He is so wonderful and has agreed that if he is available he will supply an engine for our couples at the Brickworks as a photo backdrop on their wedding day. I’m sure we'll hear a lot more about him in a future blog.
These photos then allowed us to create a brochure for future couples so that we could show them what the Brickworks looks like, when set up for a wedding. It can be hard to look into an empty room and visualise what it will look like when it’s wedding ready!
And that was it, photoshoot done, brochure ready and wedding bookings starting to come in. Weddings By Wonderberrys was born.
Thank you for reading our first blog post, I hope you enjoyed it!
Next time….Annelies and Ed’s Wedding!
Charlotte xx