New ways to say 'I do'
Plus: Some lucky residents will be named 'Recycling Warriors' (with yard sign); Charlotte Ballet brings 'Sleeping Beauty' to life; Another HQ move from uptown to South End; Housing prices still rising
Good morning! Today is Monday, April 25, 2022. You’re reading The Charlotte Ledger, an e-newsletter with local business-y news and insights for Charlotte, N.C.
Need to subscribe — or upgrade your Ledger e-newsletter subscription? Details here.
Today’s Charlotte Ledger is sponsored by SPARK Publications, which custom publishes your nonfiction books (business, coffee table, cookbooks, workbooks) to help grow your business and platform. Need to build your brand by publishing a book? Fabi Preslar helps create that vision with you. Get more info here!
From mid-week weddings to smaller gatherings and shorter engagements, the trends in getting hitched are changing
by Cristina Bolling
If there was a slow-dance wedding song to represent how engaged couples and the bridal industry feel now that weddings are off Zoom and back in person full-force (for the most part), it would have to be Etta James’ “At Last.”
After three years of canceled and postponed ceremonies that led to a backlog of weddings, couples are finally able to get invitations out confidently. And as they do, they’re doing things a little differently than they did pre-Covid.
We talked to a host of local wedding insiders about the new trends they’re seeing, from what days of the week couples are tying the knot, to where they want to say “I do” and how long they’re spending planning a wedding.
➡️ Not just for Saturdays: The occasional Friday or Sunday weddings weren’t too unusual before Covid, but non-Saturday weddings are picking up at some venues, industry experts say. There are only 52 Saturdays a year, which aren’t enough for all the couples jockeying to reschedule postponed weddings or those who are newly engaged and don’t want to wait years to get married.
“It’s really any day of the week” that couples are choosing to get married, said Elizabeth Bowers, communications director at Anne Springs Close Greenway, which has 12 sites that can be used for weddings, including the Founders Dairy Barn. “The pandemic gave us all an excuse to just throw your preconceived notions to the wall and do whatever you want to do,” Bowers said.
Bowers said she’s noticed that more couples are choosing dates based on the day’s numerals now than ever before.
“Maybe they want their wedding on 2-22, or something else that’s meaningful to them,” she said.
Samantha Green, who’s both a 2022 bride and the catering and events manager at Dilworth Neighborhood Grille, said she planned her own wedding for a Friday, which is both a cost savings (venues often charge less for weekday weddings) and allows more time for wedding guests to hang out together on the weekend after the big day.
“As both an event manager and 2022 bride, I can confidently say that (the) day of the week is mattering less and less to couples planning a wedding,” Green said in an email to The Ledger.
Dilworth Neighborhood Grille, which has a roomy event space, is a popular spot for rehearsal dinners, and Green said they’ve seen a boost in weeknight business from couples who are having weekday weddings and are having rehearsal dinners earlier in the week.
Wedding online website theknot.com, which keeps data on industry trends, gave this breakdown for 2022 weddings:
65% of weddings are taking place on Saturdays
25% of weddings are taking place on Fridays or Sundays
10% of weddings are happening on Monday through Thursday — a slight increase from 2019, when 8% were happening on Monday through Thursday.
When it comes to destination weddings, 13% of destination weddings in 2021 took place on a Monday through Thursday, up from 5% in 2019.
The Mint Museum, which hosts weddings both at its uptown and Randolph Road locations, offers couples a “Marry-Mint” discount for having their weddings on Fridays or Sundays. The uptown Mint location is a popular destination wedding venue for out-of-town couples who want to have a party with a skyline view in a city environment, and 2023 weekends are booking up quickly, said special events director Laura Hale.
➡️ More on the RSVP ‘yes’ list: Event planners aren’t sure whether it’s because people are simply ready to get out and party or if Covid has made us value important moments more, but they say they’re seeing a higher yield of “yes” responses from invited guests now than they did before the pandemic.
“It used to be that about 75% of the guest list would come. Now, it’s more like 95%,” said Alyssa Lepow, event stylist with Something Classic Catering. Couples “should plan on everyone they’re inviting saying ‘yes.’”
➡️ Shorter engagements: Typical lengths of engagements ebb and flow over the years, but some wedding industry experts say couples are going quicker from “will you marry me?” to “I do” nowadays.
“We’ve seen a lot shorter periods between the inquiry and the wedding,” said Jessica Stewart of Big Chill special events venue. “Since Covid, I think we’d all say we’ve noticed people are booking a lot closer to the wedding.”
➡️ More ‘micro-weddings’ in non-traditional spaces: Small, intimate ceremonies were the only option during the heights of Covid, but event coordinators say the trend of “micro-weddings,” with just close family or friends, seems to have stuck around.
Bowers, of Anne Springs Close Greenway, says tiny “pop-up” ceremonies with fewer than a dozen people on simple green open spaces are what some couples are looking for.
And couples are increasingly getting married in places you wouldn’t typically think of as wedding venues.
Green, of Dilworth Neighborhood Grille, said she’s also noticed an uptick in couples looking for untraditional venues such as restaurants, which tend to have more availability and which stay open later than event halls.
➡️ Busy spring for event planners: For event planners, an already packed spring wedding season is colliding with events they’re planning for big companies who are trying to lure employees back to reopened offices.
“Corporate business has been insane,” said Lepow of Something Classic, because companies have surplus event budgets sitting around and are eager to spend big bucks to make their employees feel good about coming back to cubicles.
“Usually with corporate (events), it’s very budget-oriented, and I’m plugging in numbers” to make cost trims, Lepow said. But now, some companies are pulling out the stops and are directing their event planners to pile on extras they wouldn’t have before.
Blow-out budgets and weddings and events coming out the wazoo? For event planners, it’s a great problem to have.
“We love it,” Lepow laughed, “but it’s a lot.”
Cristina Bolling is managing editor of The Ledger: cristina@cltledger.com
Today’s supporting sponsors are T.R. Lawing Realty …
… and Whitehead Manor Conference Center, a peaceful, private, and stress-free space for your organization’s next off-site meeting or event. Conveniently located in South Charlotte, Whitehead Manor is locally owned and operated and provides modern meeting capabilities with attention to stellar service!
City to inspect some residents’ recycling — and honor ‘Recycling Warriors’ (with celebratory yard sign)
A Ledger reader wrote in last week to tell us of a letter he received from the city’s Solid Waste Services department.
Seems that his neighborhood, near Mountain Island Lake, had been audited by the city, which found that residents had been placing unrecyclable materials in their green recycling bins. Solid Waste Services, the letter said, “is going to do its part to help you recycle right.”
It continued:
Starting April 29 until July 29, Solid Waste Services will monitor recycling carts in your area for contamination. If there are no contamination issues, you will receive a yard sign indicating you are a Recycling Warrior. Additionally, you will have the opportunity to be featured as one of the city’s Recycling Warriors on the city’s social media pages.
‘Private ceremony’: The city, the letter said, will pick 20 addresses each week for the honor, and residents are encouraged to take photos of themselves with the “Recycling Warrior” sign and post them on social media. The letter also notes: “All Recycling Warriors will be honored during a private ceremony with city officials in the fall.”
Materials that are not supposed to be placed in recycling bins include food, plastic bags, shredded paper, plastic wrappers and cords.
Our reader tells us he’s happy to recycle correctly but that he doesn’t want a yard sign: “They are violations of the homeowner association rules,” he says. —TM
‘Sleeping Beauty’ comes to life
Charlotte Ballet dancers Sarah Hayes Harkins and James Kopecky (shown here) will be one of four Aurora-Prince pairings as Charlotte Ballet opens “Sleeping Beauty: A Fairy-Tailored Classic” at the Knight Theater on Friday. The show will be a poignant one for Charlotte Ballet, because dancers were just hours away from performing the “Sleeping Beauty: A Fairy-Tailored Classic" world premiere by choreographer Matthew Hart on March 13, 2020, when the city’s performing arts venues shut down suddenly due to Covid. The show will run through May 8. (Photo courtesy of Charlotte Ballet)
Flashback: The Ledger on Earnest Winston’s hiring
From “Another CMS personnel head-scratcher,” Aug. 5, 2019:
Score one for the consistency of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school board: its hiring decisions are as baffling as its firing decisions.
On Friday, the board named Earnest Winston as permanent superintendent. For the last couple weeks, Winston had been the acting superintendent, following the suspension and forced resignation of previous CMS leader Clayton Wilcox. …
He’s nice, but is he qualified? By all accounts, Winston, age 44, is a nice guy. But also by all accounts, his qualifications as an educator and manager appear thin. …
The board signed Winston to a three-year contract worth $280K a year. The stated reason was that the board wanted to spare the community yet another long and anguishing national search. But the speed of the Wilcox departure and Winston ascension also smack of a desire to put this troublesome episode in the rearview mirror and move past lingering questions about the board’s competence and transparency and the quality of its legal advice.
Bypassed: In selecting Winston, the board surely bypassed dozens of assistant superintendents, principals and other administrators with more traditional credentials in favor of a guy with two years of classroom experience who has since mostly been an aide to prior superintendents (several of whom were ousted by the CMS board). How do you think other top administrators are feeling about his selection?
Maybe Winston is the right guy for the job. Maybe he has intangibles that can’t be measured by academic degrees. Maybe his lack of traditional educational leadership experience is a plus. Maybe there are examples of his making unpopular decisions and telling unpleasant truths because it was the right thing to do. It’s a big job filled with plenty of conflict. We’ll see how a widely acclaimed nice guy fares. We should all wish for the best.
In brief:
Carowinds lawsuit: Cedar Fair, the parent company of Carowinds, is the target of a class-action lawsuit alleging that season passholders should have received refunds for the 2020 season because of Covid. A judge last week allowed the suit to continue, saying Cedar Fair might not have adequately warned passholders that an act of God could force the closure of its parks. (Akron Beacon Journal)
Bladen County defendant dies: McCrae Dowless, who was at the center of investigations into voting irregularities in Bladen County in the 2018 election, has died, his attorney said. He was battling cancer. He was scheduled to go to trial this summer on charges of election fraud. (WSOC)
From uptown to South End: Real estate company Foundry Commercial is moving its 80-person office from uptown to The Line on Hawkins Street in South End next month. “Uptown has been really good to us since our inception here ... But I don’t think you can deny the appeal, the interest level and the investment that’s happening in South End,” market leader John Ball told the Charlotte Business Journal. (Biz Journal)
Home sales decline, prices rise: The number of completed residential real estate sales in Mecklenburg County fell 17% in March compared with a year earlier, while the median price rose 19%, to $403,000, according to new figures from Canopy Realtor Association. It continues the trend of tighter inventory and higher prices. (Canopy)
New superintendent: Hugh Hattabaugh starts today as Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools’ interim superintendent. (WBTV)
Crossword solution
Here’s the solution to Saturday’s crossword. You can find all puzzles and solutions from our kinda-weekly Charlotte-themed crosswords on the Ledger crosswords page.
Taking stock
Unless you are a day trader, checking your stocks daily is unhealthy. So how about weekly? How local stocks of note fared last week (through Friday’s close), and year to date:
Need to sign up for this e-newsletter? We offer a free version, as well as paid memberships for full access to all 4 of our local newsletters:
➡️ Opt in or out of different newsletters on your “My Account” page.
➡️ Learn more about The Charlotte Ledger
The Charlotte Ledger is a locally owned media company that delivers smart and essential news through e-newsletters and on a website. We strive for fairness and accuracy and will correct all known errors. The content reflects the independent editorial judgment of The Charlotte Ledger. Any advertising, paid marketing, or sponsored content will be clearly labeled.
Like what we are doing? Feel free to forward this along and to tell a friend.
Social media: On Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn.
Sponsorship information: email brie@cltledger.com.
Executive editor: Tony Mecia; Managing editor: Cristina Bolling; Contributing editor: Tim Whitmire, CXN Advisory; Contributing photographer/videographer: Kevin Young, The 5 and 2 Project