Just me or does the world shift every time I think planning ahead is about to get easier?

The purpose of this article is to give you — a couple planning a wedding for 2022 — a little clarity as you navigate 2021 because the world will continue to shift but there are some benchmarks you can set to make things feel a little more stable.

If you found this article and are a 2021 couple, please head on over here.

OK, 2022, let’s go. Here are the top questions I hear from 2022 couples and my best advice as a professional wedding planner.

What do I say to my guests?

I’ve always been a little weird as a wedding planner in that I don’t advocate super hard for couples to immediately send save-the-dates and/or invites (i.e. the two main forms of communication couples use to update their guests about their wedding plans).

Here’s what I recommend for people planning a 2022 wedding:

Create a list of your Wedding VIPs. These are the people who if they’re not at your wedding in-person, your wedding won’t feel like your wedding.
Draft a message and send it ONLY to those VIPs. For a 2022 wedding, this can be pretty bare bones. Probably just the date and a general location (i.e. city and state or maybe specific venue(s) but not required).

The goal of this message is just to make sure that those people who MUST be at your wedding in-person to make it feel your wedding know the when and maybe the where.

When you send this message, PLEASE remember the pandemic. I know that’s so not fun and may even feel unnecessary (“Won’t the pandemic be over in 2021?”) but if we’ve learned anything in the past 12 months, it’s that nothing is certain.

Plus, mentioning COVID right from the jump has a HUGE benefit for your guests: It shows them that you and your partner love them enough to care about their health and safety. That both means a lot and can really help your guests’ brains from spinning when they get your message and are like “A wedding? OMG. How do I get there? How many people will be there? Will it be safe?”

Check out the bottom of this article for a template on what to say to your guests when inviting them to a 2022 wedding.

With steps 1 and 2 covered, you can totally stop here and regroup later

When is “later”? I believe the best answer here is “What is healthiest for you and your partner?” but sometimes I say that and people are still like, “Yeah, great. I still need a specific date.”

So, for those folks, “later” depends on your wedding date. The general rule of thumb is to send save-the-dates six to eight months before a wedding and invites two to three months before a wedding.

Here’s a little secret, though: I have always thought those timelines a touch aggressive, particularly if you do steps 1 and 2 above. If you do those steps, you’ve already covered your bases. Your most important wedding guests know about your wedding. It is on their calendar.

Now, during COVID when it feels like the world changes every two weeks, I find the recommended timings of save-the-dates and invites even more unnecessary. I say this because there is this strange phenomenon happening right now in weddings where guests get an invite to a wedding and their heads start to spin because of course they do! When was the last time any of us were in a crowd let alone went to a party?!

To save your guests that headache — as well as you and your partner the stress of answering an understandable flurry of frantic texts — I say: It’s OK to chill. I know there’s a fear that “All of my friends will book something else on my wedding day” to which I say, “Who is planning anything right now?” I mean, not to be glib here, but my social calendar is WIDE OPEN for the rest of this year, let alone next year.

Still want a date? Here’s a rough timeline for if you’re planning a, say, June 2022 wedding. This month or next, tell your VIPs your plans and then set a reminder to regroup in, idk, June 2021? That’s still more than a year out from your date so even given pre-pandemic timings, you and your partner would have plenty of time to send save-the-dates and/or invites.

If you read that and are like “OMG I won’t be able to sleep until I get out some form of guest correspondence,” OK cool. I get that. I am a professional overcommunicator. If that resonates with you, I recommend you and your partner follow the steps for a 2021 couple. You could probably leave out some of the more specific COVID bits that I recommend so strongly for 2021 couples but please do NOT leave out all mentions of the pandemic. Your guests will thank you for thinking of them.

But what about hiring my wedding vendors? I should do that ASAP, right?

I fundamentally believe that the wedding industry stresses couples out about hiring vendors because people spend more money when they feel stressed.

So, if you are planning a 2022 wedding, it’s OK to wait. I hesitate to tell you this because I think of all my vendor friends, including myself, who are currently on unemployment. I also think of the rush of excitement I feel whenever I get a lead for 2022. Yay! A wedding I may actually be able to work without endangering my husband!

That said, I’m hearing from more and more 2022 couples that they feel all this pressure to book. right. now. because COVID is gobbling up all the “good” vendors. This isn’t not true but it also isn’t a good-enough reason for you and your partner to invest thousands of dollars if you’re not sure you want to do that yet.

Not convinced? Still want to move ahead? Totally cool but please don’t get weird when vendors ask for the higher end of their rates since we’re talking about them working for you for 12+ months. As for how many vendors to book, my general rule of thumb is one a month but again, you are getting married next year. This can wait.

Of course, throw all of the above advice out the window if there’s someone you REALLY want to work at your wedding say, a particular photographer whom you love or a musician that you’ve just gotta have. If that’s the case, prioritize that person. If not having them at your wedding will negatively change how you feel about your wedding, hire 'em!

Are you sure I’m not missing out if I wait?

If you haven’t already picked up, I believe “Am I missing all the ‘good’ days and/or vendors?” is an unnecessary extra stress to put on yourself during an already stressful time.

Like I mentioned above, if you have a very particular person you want to hire for your wedding and are in a place where paying that person’s deposit makes sense, go for it. But please don’t feel like you have to ratchet up your wedding planning just because my industry is topsy-turvy right now. It’s just not worth it, particularly right now when we’re all exhausted from a global pandemic.

What if a vendor you really liked isn’t free when you contact them? Ask their advice. That could look like: “I’m bummed to hear that you’re already booked. Do you have any recommendations on other vendors who do what you do for a similar price point?” Many vendors will happily provide this information if only because no one likes to be a dead end.

What about booking a venue?

Venues are a little different than vendors if only because, in my experience, people often have stronger opinions about where they have their wedding than who they hire to work at their wedding.

Booking a venue is usually also a key part of answering one of the biggest questions in wedding planning: When is the wedding? A venue’s availability often determines a couple’s wedding date so I understand if you want to book your venue ASAP so you can at least have a date.

The only thing I suggest when booking a venue is to read that contract. When is your money due? Is it non-refundable? Does the venue have a new refund or reschedule policy because of COVID? Is that policy in black and white in the contract and not just a verbal agreement?

Ask these questions so you know your options. That’s always good advice.

Additional tips

Here’s my best advice that didn’t fit earlier in this article:

Review all of your contracts. This doesn’t just apply to your venue, as I wrote above. Before you sign anything, be sure you know when your money is due, what is and isn’t non-refundable, and what the policy is around refunds and rescheduling. Vendors and venues think A LOT about this stuff, particularly with COVID, and a quality vendor or venue will have quality answers.
Work on things that don’t cost a lot of money. If you’re like my husband and I, the last thing you want to do right now is spend a lot of money. I totally get that (even if, as a small business owner, I wish it wasn’t the case). The upside is that because this is wedding planning, there’s always plenty to do.

A few ideas, none of which are required: Work on your vows. Shop for your wedding clothes. Pick out music. Create a wedding website. If you’ve ever seen one of the internet’s millions of wedding to-do lists, you know there are plenty of ways to work on your wedding that cost little to no money.
Check in with each other. The most important thing you can do while wedding planning during COVID is to make sure you still want to marry the person you are planning to marry. That sounds stupid but seriously? If you find that wedding planning just totally pushes you and your partner over the edge right now, stop doing it!

Take a break and come back in a month or whenever you two feel like it’s a better time to talk. You’re doing this whole wedding thing because you want to celebrate your relationship. That means how you two feel about your relationship is always more important than some arbitrary checklist.

Still got questions?

Planning a wedding is a very choose-your-own-adventure kind of situation so on the very good chance that I didn’t fully answer your question, consider hiring my wedding planner brain.

If those options don’t make work for you and your partner, totally fair. You can also email me (elisabeth@elisabethkramer.com). I’ll do my best to help.