Tips for Thriving During the Engagement Gap
Is your wedding season looking a little slower than last year? For us, it’s mostly hitting in the Spring and early Summer, but either way, we’re finding ourselves with a little extra space in our schedule after two very steady years of being fully booked for the wedding season.
Some people are calling this lull in weddings the engagement gap. Since less people started dating during the height of the pandemic, less couples are getting married this year.
Here are our tips for not only surviving but thriving during this short dip in wedding bookings:
Teach workshops
No matter where you are in your cake journey, you have skills that others would be interested in learning. I actually started teaching workshops as soon as I rented my first kitchen in 2010.
It takes a little bit of investment to get set-up with all the tools you need to host a workshop but you can start small and build up as you go. I still remember when we placed the order for enough turntables for a 12 person workshop. It felt like a lot at the time but since then, the turntables have been more than paid off. If you don’t have a ton to invest now, you can always borrow some of the tools you need from other cake friends. 💛
Diversify your offerings on your terms
At Sweet Heather Anne, we have three main revenue sources:
70% wedding/custom cakes with a minimum order based on the season
20% semi-custom and pre-designed cakes from our Online Shop
10% classes: both online and in person
This year, we are leaning harder into both our online shop offerings and classes to make up for an anticipated dip in wedding revenue.
One of the best parts about classes is that you’re in charge of when they are scheduled. You can look at your bookings and see where they are light and add classes at those times. July is looking particularly slow for us this year so we’re bringing on some new class offerings to fill in that gap.
Our online shop is beautiful because it allows us to take smaller, last minute orders on our own terms. We get to choose the designs that we want to create and customers can purchase those designs without all the back and forth of a custom cake.
This year, we’re adding lots of new designs including sheet cakes that clients can add on for extra servings. We hope this will help us reach clientele looking for wedding cakes at a more approachable budget than our custom work.
Check out, How to Accommodate Small, Last-Minute Cake Orders - And Preserve Your Sanity! to see how we set-up our online shop offerings to fit seamlessly into our custom cake production schedule.
Make a budget and set goals for the year
This is a big one! It’s hard to know how the dip in weddings is affecting you unless you understand the big picture of your business. Each year, we look at last year’s numbers and make projections for the current year. We make sure to include rent increases, salary increases, and any other expenses that we think will be higher or lower throughout the year.
The next step is setting monthly and annual goals. If we are behind on a monthly goal, we know we need to take action to make it up later in the year. For us, that often looks like scheduling more classes, promoting something in our online shop, or doing cross promotion with another business.
If creating a budget from scratch sounds overwhelming, reach out to your local SBDC for help. The branch in our area shared their budgeting spreadsheet and taught us how to use it, all for free!
If you want to dive in a little deeper, I’d highly recommend Be Sage Consulting. Michelle has provided countless valuable resources for us throughout our time in business.
The Good News
These changes will not only help you get past the engagement gap but also strengthen your business for the future. With more revenue streams to lean on and a better way to understand your cash flow, you’ll be ready to handle anything that comes your way!
Ready for more?
Interested in learning more about our business strategies, check out our Pricing and Selling Intricate Work course! For more tips like this delivered to your inbox, subscribe to The Cake Break, our once-per-month newsletter for cake decorators and artists.
