Show notes:
I’m often asked – are wedding shows dead? Today I am chatting with two of my clients – Tara and Adam, founders of Just For Your Occasion. Since starting their business 3 years ago, they have gone from 0 wedding per year to over 150 – what is the secret to their success? Wedding Shows! Hear their story from getting started, to realising the constant need for change. It’s an honest, candid conversation from business owners who are right in the middle of their growth journey.
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Just for Your Occasion Website
Time Stamps:
00:00 – Introduction to Wedding Business Strategies
04:52 – Transitioning from Nursing to the Wedding Industry
07:11 – Starting a Business: The Journey Begins
20:53 – Navigating Wedding Fairs: Strategies and Insights
28:29 – The Transition to Full-Time Business
36:30 – The Importance of Continuous Learning in Business
41:41 – Adapting Strategies for Wedding Fairs
Transcript:
Adam
00:00:00.160 – 00:00:14.960
Be very open minded as to changing how you work, how you operate and how your business is run. Because I honestly feel that over the last few months, if we haven’t made some of the changes that we’ve made.
Becca
00:00:16.000 – 00:01:09.980
I’m Becca Poutney, wedding business marketing expert, speaker and blogger and you’re listening to the Wedding Pros who Are Ready to Grow podcast. I’m here to share with you actionable tips, strategies and real life examples to help you take your wedding business to the next level.
If you are an ambitious wedding business owner that wants to take your passion and use it to build a profitable, sustainable business doing what you love, then you’re in the right place. Let’s get going with today’s episode.
Today I’m chatting with the owners of Just for your Occasion, a Yorkshire based entertainment and prop high business hiring everything from mini golf to dartboards and even a full archery set. Tara and Adam are also members of my wedding Pro community, the Wed Pro Members Lounge and more recently, one to one clients.
I absolutely love getting guests on the podcast who are right in the midst of building their business and Tara and Adam are definitely that. I’m really looking forward to sharing their story with you. So guys, welcome to the podcast.
Tara
00:01:10.220 – 00:01:11.220
Thanks for having us.
Adam
00:01:11.220 – 00:01:11.740
Thank you.
Becca
00:01:11.820 – 00:01:48.910
Thank you so much for being here.
Now I am really excited because as I said in the intro, I love having people who are right in the middle of their business journey because it’s one thing hearing from people who have done it all and got to the top of their game. But actually most of my listeners are right where you are, which is right in the middle of building a business.
And sometimes it’s helpful to hear from people who are doing it alongside them right here, right now. But before we get into that, what’s also helpful for people is to hear your background.
So we’re going to go through each of you individually, but I would just love to hear about what you’ve done previously to your business, what career you’ve had, what work you’ve had. So Tara, let’s start with you. Tell me about your history.
Tara
00:01:49.390 – 00:02:11.910
So I am actually still a practicing nurse and I think some of our history further business comes back to in 2020 during the height of the virus, I were actually pregnant with our first child, very much in a patient facing role. So that’s what made us try and divert and go into something else.
Becca
00:02:12.710 – 00:02:20.150
Okay, so being a nurse and being in the wedding industry are two very different skill sets. So what was it that made you want to be a nurse in the.
Tara
00:02:20.150 – 00:02:45.990
First place, years and years ago. I can’t remember how old I was.
My granddad was on intensive care and I just remember like looking up at the nurses thinking, oh my God, these are angels. Like they were doing miracles and they actually kept my granddad alive. And I just from there like that’s just always.
My choices at school were always to be a nurse and that’s how I progressed into that.
Becca
00:02:46.470 – 00:03:04.310
Well, thank you for all that you do because absolutely no way that I could ever work in the medical field, especially during the pandemic. So I think it’s incredible that you’ve done that. But I also understand why you made the decisions. You have to try and move away from that too.
Adam, how about you, are you medically trained? What’s your background?
Adam
00:03:04.790 – 00:03:41.020
I’m not medically trained. I actually got an educational background. I’m an ex teacher myself.
I started in education when I was quite young actually it wasn’t my original career path. I originally wanted to be a police officer when I was younger but due to medical reasons I was unfortunately not able to go down that route.
So that’s when I stepped into working in education from the age of 19 onwards up until three years ago where I left teaching and started to work on, just for occasion full time.
Becca
00:03:41.180 – 00:03:48.860
Amazing. Another job that I absolutely couldn’t do and have a lot of admiration for is being a teacher. What age groups did you teach? Was it secondary? Primary?
Adam
00:03:49.020 – 00:03:53.020
I taught secondary and college. Six farm egg.
Becca
00:03:53.100 – 00:03:54.380
Wow. And what was your subject?
Adam
00:03:54.930 – 00:03:55.650
I taught music.
Becca
00:03:55.890 – 00:03:58.530
Ah, music. What musical instruments do you play? Musical instruments?
Adam
00:03:58.770 – 00:04:19.010
I’m a percussionist, so I’m initially a drummer. I am also a pianist. They’re my two main instruments that I play. But my specialty within music is world music.
So I do a lot of music surrounding the African genre of music. African genre of world music.
Becca
00:04:19.090 – 00:05:00.000
Amazing. So both you got very different career backgrounds? Absolutely. Not really anything to do with weddings.
Although I can definitely see that there’s skills from both sides of you that are going to come into handy when you’re in the wedding industry. I mean especially Utah as a nurse.
When we met up to do a one to one which we’ll talk about later, I had this weird freeze burn on my arm and I’ve never been more thankful that there was a nurse in the room to explain to me why I suddenly had this massive lump on my arm caused by a can of Diet Coke. So you never know when you might need a nurse on site. But it is very different to the wedding industry. So you alluded to, to it a little bit, Tara.
But why did you start thinking, you know, you know, let’s go and hire out mini golf courses.
Tara
00:05:00.400 – 00:07:10.940
It does go. So when we were pregnant, but it wasn’t just the pregnancy was. It ended up in an emergency C section, the, the birth. And I did hypnotherap.
That’s just like a different story. But basically from the beginning, from when he was born, healthcare professionals didn’t really listen to us.
And as a nurse, it made me feel like really inferior. Like I’m not a children’s nurse, that is not my specialty, but I’m not uneducated. And he ended up with allergies and stuff like that.
We took him back and forth to A E and just people just didn’t listen to us. And it ultimately led me to being developing postnatal depression as well as the virus.
Like people couldn’t come over, they couldn’t help, they couldn’t support. And people just kept seeing babies cry. But I knew it wasn’t right. So I’d spend hours and hours, like when he was sleeping, like researching it.
Like it was just in my gut that something goes wrong. So ultimately we ended up paying privately and got him diagnosed.
And when as soon as you were on the proper formula, it was a new baby within days, but the damage had been done. Like some healthcare professional spoke to me like dirt. And that’s just embarrassing to say. That’s my field.
So my background, the ward where I worked was very high stress. And when he were going back, near to going back, I just, like, I can’t do it anymore. Like I can’t have the stress at home.
And stress, even though it settled down, but it was just still in the background, like it took a while to get over the postnatal depression. And I’m very open and honest about it, so I just wanted to pivot from there. And Adam, at the time you started decorating, didn’t you?
So I wanted to see the flexibility of him making some money around Eli. So I started doing balloon displays. So it meant that I could do it. It’s something fun.
We’re like choosing the colors, choosing the pattern, seeing little kids faces when they came and collected them, like that’s what I enjoyed. But we had garden games, didn’t we, at our wedding? From the venue, they supplied them, but they were a bit mismatched. But the, the kids loved them.
We loved them. And then we just started planning dimling building of a month’s.
Becca
00:07:11.500 – 00:07:48.730
I mean, it is amazing how priorities change as well. When you have kids, everything shifts in your mindset. I think, particularly as a woman.
But I think for both partners as well, it can change because all of a sudden your world just gets tipped upside down and what you wanted to do really shifts. And that’s why we see so many people starting businesses on maternity leave, because suddenly you’ve got this change of perspective.
And so you could see that you wanted to make change and rather than just sitting back and going, oh, that’s impossible, I’m a nurse. You were proactive and you went into balloons and then garden games. So how do you remember getting your first booking?
Do you remember the first people that booked you?
Adam
00:07:49.370 – 00:08:01.730
I do, yes. It was from our first wedding fair that we did at Holiday Inn in Wakefield, and that was on the 23rd of June or May. May.
Tara
00:08:01.730 – 00:08:03.930
June 14th of June.
Adam
00:08:05.370 – 00:08:38.760
Back end of that month. Well, somewhere around that time, we actually took five bookings from that fair, that first ever fair that we did.
So it’s quite hard to remember the first person who actually booked with us because we actually took five, like, pretty much immediately.
So I can remember some of the couples that booked with us from that fair and I do remember one in particular that booked with us because they were so happy that they saw us and they were so grateful after the wedding. So, yeah, that one does particularly stand out with me from that wedding fair.
Becca
00:08:38.840 – 00:08:50.000
So your initial strategy, then, when you started the business you set up, you decided, yeah, I want to have a business, we’re going to do some garden games, we’re going to do some balloons, was to go to wedding fairs. Is that how you decided to market your business?
Tara
00:08:50.000 – 00:09:20.860
From day one, we started marketing on the local Facebook groups, but that was just to get some trial bookings. So we did have a few that we didn’t charge for, just to get some photos. And then we went.
You researched and we started the first fair and then from that we.
We met loads of suppliers and the wedding fair team were actually having a big wedding fair the week after and they’re like, oh, would you be interested in coming? And we were like, what? And then, yeah, we just went to that and then we didn’t really look back, did we?
Adam
00:09:20.860 – 00:09:34.150
No, no, it just. It just became natural to look for wedding fairs.
And obviously, as time’s gone on, we’ve learned more about fairs, we’ve learned about different companies, what fairs work for us, etc. Etc.
Becca
00:09:35.270 – 00:09:52.710
It’s interesting, though, that it’s been such a strong strategy for you, because you hear a lot of people now in the industry saying, oh, don’t bother with wedding fairs anymore. Wedding fairs are a thing of the past, but I’m a big believer that they can still work. And clearly you’ve lived that.
Why do you think for your business wedding fairs have worked so well for you?
Adam
00:09:53.840 – 00:10:15.400
I think the main reason why wedding fairs have worked for us is with the products that we offer. The reason number one is that people don’t think about them until they see them. That could be for a number of reasons. Like, one, it’s not due to the.
It’s not part of the traditional, let’s say, wedding. I don’t know how to word it.
Tara
00:10:15.400 – 00:10:30.880
Really, because it’s a very niche thing. I think at the time when we started, there wasn’t a very many in our local area. There has been more since.
But if they’ve never been to a wedding, that have never had garden games and golf, initially when they saw them, they were like, oh, I didn’t know that.
Adam
00:10:30.880 – 00:11:09.390
We think, yeah, it’s something that you wouldn’t see at a traditional wedding. So a lot of people don’t think about it until they actually see it. And it’s also the second point of that. They have to see it.
So it’s sort of like a bit of a combination of the two in a sense that they can envision having garden games, but even so, they can envision it. They can’t envision it properly until they physically see the products in front of them.
So that’s one of the main reasons why we do fairs, because it does allow that exposure to the couples that actually physically need to see what we offer as opposed to just seeing photos online.
Tara
00:11:09.710 – 00:11:47.530
And I think, yeah, they need to see the quality of the items, the size of the items, because they’re very much different than what you can buy in a shop. They are large items. Like our dartboard is one of our most popular hire items. And as soon as.
Especially a lot of rooms, as soon as they see it, they’re like, wow. And it’s taller than Adam, so it’s over six foot. So it’s not like a traditional thing that you’d see at a wedding.
And we found that the more modern couple, they just want a bit of fun. Don’t they want. They don’t want a stuffy day necessarily where they have to sit down. Everything they regimented, they just want something fun.
Adam
00:11:47.610 – 00:12:33.170
But the reason as well is just adding on to that for why couples need to see our stuff is because we build our products in a certain way. So like with dartboard for example, the reason it’s over six foot is because the dartboard needs to sit at a certain height.
Plus with our dartboard, it has a full rustic frame with it.
So then when it is going to venues and it’s going indoors, the venue itself, the surrounding areas as to where the dartboard is, is protected, which is what venues want.
And from experience, we have heard from venues that they wouldn’t allow dart boards initially because they would just come on a stand with no protection surrounding it. So obviously from a venue point of view, they don’t want a thousand little holes in their wall by the end of the wedding.
Becca
00:12:33.170 – 00:13:37.730
Absolutely. You don’t want some fancy manor house coming to you because you’ve managed to get darts all in their wall. So that’s absolutely sensible.
And it’s interesting, isn’t it, because I think you are in that category of almost non essential at a wedding. So we think of a wedding, they need a venue, they need food, they need a photographer and then an address. But actually your business is an add on.
And it’s also interesting, I think sometimes when people are in that scenario, they moan about it also. They say, oh, well, it’s really hard for us to get business because not everyone wants us and we’re not a photographer.
But actually what you’ve said is, well, we’ve just gone out and shown people why they should have us. We’ve got out and got in front of people. And that is marketing. That is what it is. We can’t just sit behind a website and hope that people come to us.
We have to show people what we do and why they should consider it.
And with something as practical and fun as garden games, of course they want to see them in the flesh and have a go at them and envisage how that can be. Like how that’s going to sit on their wedding day.
Has your wedding fair strategy evolved over time or are you still doing the same stuff that you did at your first fairs?
Adam
00:13:38.290 – 00:14:08.340
No, it pretty much evolves week in, week out. We’re constantly trying new things all the time.
I think we’ve tried that many different things and ways of doing fairs that if you, someone asked me, like, what did you do like two years ago, our first fair, I’d be like, no idea. Because it’s, we’ve done so much between now and then. It’s.
I just can’t, I can’t pinpoint like how we, how our initial strategy was at our first fairs that we started to do.
Tara
00:14:08.660 – 00:14:55.930
I think some of it is the first fairs, we’d take a bit of everything. So obviously setting that up meant we’d need a bigger stand. It means it’d take more time to set it up and then pack down.
So everyone else, like, no offense to photographers, but they could just take a box and a little stand, they’d be all gone and we’d be there still, like, lugging stuff to the van. Well, when we first started, we started in cars, so we’d have to take two cars just to fit everything in. So it was very time consuming.
So I think that helped us adapt because we’ve learned actually don’t need to see everything. We have had the odd few ask if they can come and see our arsenal, but other than that, they are happy just to see a few odd bits, aren’t they?
And the quality of them.
Becca
00:14:55.930 – 00:15:00.570
How many wedding fairs do you think you’ve done roughly, over the last few years? Because you’ve done a lot.
Adam
00:15:01.690 – 00:15:22.750
We’ve probably done. In 2024, we did. How many did we do to do? 52 in 2024 alone. So I think we did about 52 in 2024 alone. And then this year, so far, we’ve.
Yeah, we’ve probably done at least 80 over the last. Yeah, 8, 80.
Becca
00:15:23.390 – 00:15:49.750
I think we can safely say that you guys are definitely the wedding fair experts, having done so many, but it’s working for you. So obviously, why wouldn’t you keep on doing them?
For people listening that may be thinking about booking their first wedding fair or haven’t done very many. You said earlier they’re not all created equal.
Now, when you’re looking at choosing whether or not to do a fair, what are you looking for and what advice would you give to someone who’s thinking, like, how do they decide which one to go to?
Tara
00:15:50.230 – 00:17:27.469
Definitely, if you know some suppliers, definitely lean on them. I think if we weren’t treated how we was at our very first fair, our journey might have been different.
But our first fair, I was so nervous because we were niche, we were unique. We thought, even we thought customers, our clients might not like it. So we didn’t know what your general.
Not, you know, the other suppliers would think of us. But as soon as we. We went, we were flocked by a venue stylist, a florist, another, like, he does light up letters.
And they came to us and gave us so much, so much advice and support. And then that’s in turn made us think networking works. So we’ve just done it and done it and done it.
So if, well, you have to take stuff with a pinch of salt, because what might work for us might not work for another business, especially in the same niche or different niches. So it is trial and error and just ask the local suppliers that you know what works for them, what would they recommend?
Like, we’ve got a big fair coming up in October and there’s a new supplier that I’ve met yesterday and she said this, that loads of suppliers are recommending it. I’m like, yes, every time we’ve had several bookings at this fair, lean on it.
There’s so many experienced suppliers that are local to you and sometimes it can be Cassy, but for the most part it is a very supportive industry that we found. So they do want to impart their knowledge and experience that some people don’t want you to make mistakes, they want to try and support you.
So just lean on them. But like I said, do take stuff with a pinch of salt, because not everything works for everyone.
Adam
00:17:27.869 – 00:19:28.140
There is a lot of to and fro in at the beginning and you have got to sort of throw yourself out there and expose yourself essentially to as many fairs as you can, if you can do that. I think one of the crucial things that we’ve learned from fairs is that venue knowledge is crucial for us. In particular with regarding games, golf.
Like, we’ve got to know the venues both inside and out. So then if anybody asks any questions in regards to where would it be set up, where would it go, what happens if it rains? What could we do?
We’ve got an awkward day and now it’s become natural that we can just answer those questions straight away at fairs. And also giving couples the ideas of, for example, you can always use your ceremony room after if you’re not using it.
Because we’ve noticed recently that there’s a massive. There’s a massive footfall in thought of that people.
Once couples have used ceremony room, they don’t think about using it again because it’s been used for the ceremony.
So we’ve sort of caught them onto that and started advising me, look, if you’re worried about space or weather, you can always use your ceremony room afterwards if you’re not using it again, which nine times out of 10, a lot of couples don’t. You can put stuff in there, but.
Yeah, but overall, the main points for looking at fairs is going out there, trying as many as you can, don’t be sat and you don’t get anything from it, and just building your knowledge of venues. Because we’ve.
We still do Several fairs a weekend now and we have got that venue knowledge there behind us so that we can answer those couples questions. But now we’ve done a lot of fairs over nearly a two year period.
Now we know which fairs work for us in regards to whether we know couples will book the products that we offer for that venue or not.
Tara
00:19:28.140 – 00:20:23.680
Yeah. Because some of the venues, it’s a bit pointless for us to go if it’s not our type of clientele.
So it is about knowing your clients as well, what type of person that you couple, what you’re trying to aim for. Like we trying to aim for middle ground.
We’re not really fussed about someone that’s really wanting loads of luxury and we also know that we’re not necessarily for the budget couple. We need someone that’s in the middle ground, that wants a bit of extra for the day. So then it’s knowing how the venue, how it works.
And I think by doing so many affairs we have, we have learned that and gained the knowledge of them. Venues. Like for instance, yesterday we were a different venue but several couples were getting married at venues we’ve had bookings for.
We’re like, oh yeah, we can show you the photo of this set up, we can tell you what we do, we can tell you where we set up and what time and blah blah, blah. Because we know that.
Becca
00:20:24.160 – 00:20:52.500
So what I’m hearing really is that you’re getting so much out of doing or you have got so much out of doing these fares because not only have you got couples and bookings, but actually it’s far reaching in that you’ve also built relationships with other people that are at the fairs and built your network. You’ve got to know the venues and so your knowledge has increased. So therefore you’re giving a better service to your clients.
But also the venues are getting to know you and you’re getting better relationships with the venues. And I believe a lot of those venues are now also recommending you, is that right?
Adam
00:20:52.980 – 00:20:57.420
Yes. We’ve hit now a total of 16 venues that we are recommended.
Tara
00:20:57.420 – 00:21:31.110
So suppliers at now and that we’re through.
If my biggest advice, if someone’s wanting to try it, maybe not for your first one, but get to the big fairs, have a look what venues are there, kind of strategize. If you’re a florist or a cake maker, it might be a bit more difficult because they might already have preferred suppliers like that.
But that’s what you did.
You’d hunt them down, you’d be like, sounds like you’re a shark, but you’d write what venues and would research those venues, see if they’re any use for us. And then you’d go and speak to him at the fair.
Adam
00:21:31.430 – 00:22:58.880
Yeah.
One of the main things that we did was like what Tara just said, that I would go around and speak to the venues at the fairs, particularly when we first started, because that was crucial for us to get on board with venues as well as trying to get business in at the same time. Yeah.
As time’s gone on, some of those venues we don’t work with now because as we’ve built our knowledge up, we found that, look, that venue is not suitable for what we offer. Not necessarily for what we offer, but from a more practical, logistical point of view as well.
But it’s, we’ve, we’ve tried it and it’s just like we said, look, it’s not. This isn’t going to work at this venue for weddings. So it’s. Yeah, it is.
Again, going back to that trial and error aspect, but as well, go around, speak to. Speak to venues, have a chat with them.
But again, like what Taris said, yeah, most venues have a recommended photographer, most venues have a recommended florist and so on. But there’s no harm in trying to build some knowledge of that venue whilst you’re talking to them.
Because when most venues are at shows, they’ve got displays, they’ve got photos of the venue, photos that other photographers have taken. And there’s no harm in just looking and thinking that could work for me, that might not. If it doesn’t work, then that’s fine, it’s, it’s okay.
Move, move on. But there’s still no harm in trying to build that knowledge as you go along.
Tara
00:22:59.040 – 00:23:09.280
What I was going to say is when we first started, after we built stuff, before we did any fairs, we emailed probably like 30 to 40 wedding venues and we.
Adam
00:23:09.280 – 00:23:12.320
It were 34 venues and we heard.
Tara
00:23:12.320 – 00:23:50.750
Back from maybe five if the odd two might have been interested.
But then the ghosted us and then we actually found during the big fairs, some of these venues actually then came to us and like, oh my God, you’re amazing. Do you want to be a recommended supplier and come to us? So sometimes some of it could have gone into junk folders, we don’t know.
But I think actually venue seeing us seen that we, we were serious about the business, that we weren’t just playing it, I think it helps then develop them, then relationships and then in turn we got bookings that way. So I do definitely recommend doing big fairs.
Adam
00:23:50.750 – 00:24:11.750
Yeah. And it is like with the venues, it is a slow burner sometimes. There’s some venues where we’ve instantly become recommended suppliers.
There’s some venues that we’ve worked on for two years before we’ve even been asked to be a recommended supplier. So, yeah, it is a lot of to in and fro in, but you have just got to stick with it.
Tara
00:24:11.920 – 00:24:44.820
But we’re all going to say, I know a florist that she’s just gone to the venues that are local and just showed a face and introduced themselves. And then that meant when the preferred suppliers had to step back for whatever reason, then she’s at the forefront of their mind.
Or for balloons, we’ve got a local venue that they’ve got a recommended supplier for balloons, but because she weren’t available, they then reached out to us. So it doesn’t hurt to them still show your face and build social relationships, especially if the venues that you’re interested in.
Becca
00:24:44.820 – 00:25:42.510
Yeah, absolutely.
I always say that wedding fairs are a great place to chat with venues because we all know if we’ve done a wedding fair, there’s a lot of busy time, but there’s also a lot of downtime, especially first thing or right towards the end of the day when people are starting to pack up. And actually often those people are looking for conversation. They’re maybe not very entertained. They’ve still got to stand on their stool.
It’s not like they’re in their venue doing tours, doing busy things.
Actually, it’s the perfect time to go and have a conversation, whether or not you’re exhibiting at that fair or just going to check out the fair with the thought of exhibiting in the future and using it as a network opportunity. And again, you guys have done that really well.
So let’s talk about numbers and the business then, because a lot of people be thinking, wow, 80 wedding fairs, that sounds scary, that sounds like a lot of investment. But it’s obviously paid off for you guys.
So I’m not asking for your in depth financials, but how does it look from a business perspective in terms of how many bookings have you had over the last couple of years as a result of all of the marketing you’ve done?
Adam
00:25:42.670 – 00:27:12.770
So from the first wedding fair that we did in June 23, from June 23 to December 23, I’m not 100% sure how many wedding fairs we did, but we did 10 bookings. Like we fulfilled 10 bookings between June and December.
And that’s people that had booked with us from June and that were having either events or weddings from June to December 2023. We didn’t do lots of wedding fairs between that. I think we did about. I think we did about 10 between June and December 23.
When we hit January 24, we very much went full pelt with the fairs that we did. And in January alone we did 16 wedding fairs in January 2024 alone and in February we did another nine.
So over that two month period we’d done 20 free wedding pairs from January to January 2024 to December 2024. We finished the year on one hundred and twenty one bookings fulfilled in 2024. And that was sort of our first proper Turnover. We had 2025.
We are currently sitting on the here to have completed, completed nearly 190 bookings with a sales increase of 50% at the moment compared to last year.
Becca
00:27:13.010 – 00:27:14.130
Wedding first, don’t worry.
Adam
00:27:14.130 – 00:27:15.010
Right, yeah.
Becca
00:27:15.970 – 00:27:41.230
With all these bookings it is an insane amount. Like the numbers are just insane.
There’ll be people whose heads are exploding hearing about the numbers of weddings that you guys have been doing in your first couple of years of business.
And it is an incredible testament to the hard work that you’ve put in, the way you’ve put yourselves out there, the way you’ve networked, the way you’ve grown the business. At what point then, Adam, did you decide you actually needed to quit your job and come into the business as you’re full time?
Adam
00:27:42.270 – 00:28:39.450
I was still working my old job up until March this year, but our second son, Ezra came six weeks early again by, well, he came by natural birth in time compared to he Elijah did. But it was still a shock that he came six weeks early, especially when five hours prior we were sat in the cinema watching Moana too.
So yeah, very, very whirlwind moment.
I had a bit of an epiphany at that point as soon as he was born and I immediately said I need to get onto just three or occasion full time as soon as possible. And I don’t know, I presume it was from them, but that’s where that thought process came from.
And in at the beginning of April 25, I stepped away from my business and I closed my business and I moved on to just your occasion full time.
Tara
00:28:39.450 – 00:28:57.710
Because I think the big thing for us is if we’d not had kids, I don’t think we’d have a business. So we’ve always had the reason why we we pushed so many fares in 2024 is because we Knew we wanted another baby. We knew we needed it to work.
We bought our kids our biggest motivational. Like, we’ve always something to be able to work around them.
Becca
00:28:57.950 – 00:29:20.910
So let’s talk about the juggle then. Because people, again, people are going to be listening to this and thinking, oh, my goodness me. They’ve grown this massive business.
They’ve done all these fairs, they’ve got all these bookings, They’ve had to quit their job, go full time. And you’ve also talked about having two children in those same years. How does it work for you as a family? How are you managing the juggle?
The good sides and the not so good sides?
Adam
00:29:21.150 – 00:30:17.720
It’s hard. It’s very hard. It’s. We can’t hide the fact that it’s not hard. The amount of people.
Even yesterday when we started doing Bears again for this season, there were several people that looked at me when I walk in, when we’re walking past each other and said to me, I don’t know how you do it with two kids. We even took Ezra to the wedding fair that we did yesterday and we just did it between us. Yeah.
And several people walk past going, I do not know how you do it. Especially when it’s just pretty much at the moment. Myself, Tara, and we do have some ad hoc staff available. But it does.
Does make me feel proud when I notice when some people are saying to us that I’ve got quadruple the stuff that we’ve got that were managing. So it does make me feel proud with that. But, yeah, it is hard. It’s a lot of organizing.
Tara
00:30:18.120 – 00:31:07.310
Yeah. And it isn’t always plain sailing, is it? Like in August, we had 53 bookings, so to say. By the end of August, we were very, very burnt out.
Especially between me parenting pretty much on my own and you out sometimes. You were getting two hours sleep, weren’t you? Then going back out. But we’ve managed to do it.
It’s meant that we’ve learned a lot and that’s what I think we’re always doing. We’re always learning, adapting. We’ve reached out to you to help to try and automate stuff. Just trying to figure out what works and just improving.
Our biggest motivation is that we want it to succeed. So if something goes wrong, we’re not. We don’t go stagnant. We don’t go, oh, that’s it. We should just do something.
We’ve just learned and adapt and change past them.
Adam
00:31:07.390 – 00:32:25.860
Yeah. If anything needs to be changed, it gets changed immediately. We don’t wait to see if, oh, it might be different next time.
No, we change it immediately because we, we are very open to learning, especially with us being so passionate about the business.
And that’s some other advice I would give to other suppliers out there is that be very open minded as to changing how you work, how you operate and how your business is run.
Because if I honestly feel that over the last few months, if we haven’t have made some of the changes that we’ve made now, like openly we’ve made mistakes over summer, we couldn’t predict that until it happened, but we immediately changed how that will now not happen again.
And it’s just been that open minded and as well, going back to when we’re talking about affairs is that again, be very open minded about how you can do things differently.
Like and just be really open about learning from, not actual in the wedding aspect of things when you’re actually at the wedding, just learning stuff from that. But when you’re out of the wedding as well and dealing with customers, fairs, working with other suppliers and just, yeah, just being very open.
Becca
00:32:26.020 – 00:32:29.220
Yeah. And your, your business has grown a lot in a short amount of time.
Adam
00:32:29.220 – 00:32:29.500
Right.
Becca
00:32:29.500 – 00:33:04.770
And so you’re kind of trying to keep up with the momentum.
And when we met and we worked one to one, I just, I was astounded by the fact that you’ve got so many bookings and yet you were still doing so much manually.
And Tara, you were just sending emails and emails for days and days and days and actually just realizing, right, we need to sort this out, we need to get some automation in place.
We need to look at a CRM system, we need to get some of this off your plate is an example of realizing, okay, this has worked for us, but we now need to evolve before this doesn’t work for us anymore.
Tara
00:33:04.770 – 00:33:14.610
Yeah. And we’ve found like the emailing to check in, was it a new thing? Was it that in June I started on May because last week, sorry, I’m.
Adam
00:33:14.610 – 00:33:17.169
Talking this week in June, you started that.
Tara
00:33:17.170 – 00:33:52.530
Yeah. And because it were a last minute thing, I did want to send it more in advance but I found I could only keep up week by week.
But it did mean that then people were a bit happier that we’ve kept in touch and if stuff did go wrong, like another thing we do is a little congratulations card and we try and leave a little gift.
I don’t want to say too much, but we have found if we accidentally forget a game or they’ve swapped stuff out that for the Most part, a lot of our couples have been more forgiving because they know us, they know that we’ve not done it maliciously.
Adam
00:33:52.690 – 00:34:24.720
Yeah. Or if there’s a reason why we couldn’t provide a game, we would provide something else immediately.
Or yeah, we, we do make sure that we provide something. If something’s happened to a game, it’s got broken or there’s been pieces missing from it.
So we can’t actually, we could physically provide it, but we can’t. They can’t actually then physically pay the gate to play the game because we haven’t got the accessories to it.
So, yeah, it’s just, again, it’s just being again, open minded and just reacting to it quickly and just knowing instinctively what to do with that.
Becca
00:34:24.800 – 00:35:03.250
One of the things I thought was. Sorry.
One of the things I thought was really interesting when we talked was that you identified an issue that actually a lot of wedding pros have, which is that you take the booking and then sometimes you don’t actually speak to these people for 6, 12, 18 months, 2 years until the wedding day and they start to panic and then that actually creates more admin.
And so by just doing a check in email or just sending something which eventually will be automated so you’re not doing on a week by week basis already, a simple act like that lowers the stress for the couple, lowers the amount of panicked admin for you and just reminds people, yeah, no, we’re on it, we’re on it, it’s going to be okay.
Tara
00:35:03.250 – 00:35:54.750
Yeah.
Because we’ve actually had I think two or three, 20, 28 inquiries, which I think is insane and it’s very organized on their end, but that’s three years away. We do need to get back to them. So if they do end up booking like for three years, they potentially might not hear from us.
But I think as couples, because we do so many fares, it gives them the option, oh, we can’t attend them, but we can attend that one. So we can come and check in.
And I think because we’ve, we’ve given people that in our background, like when stuff personally, like when Ezra ended up coming early, people then come to fairs and like saying, we just wanted to come and support you, we just wanted to come and see you. And, and it depends what you’re comfortable with and how much you want to share.
But because of our journey, people know, know us as people and they were coming to support us and say it’s okay.
Becca
00:35:55.310 – 00:36:45.790
Yeah, well, people understand that we’re human and actually when we bring the Humanness and the personal stuff to the forefront of our business. Actually, people resonate with us.
I think where we make mistakes is when we try and act as if everything’s okay and that we’re perfect and then we let people down.
I think often people just appreciate hearing your genuine story and hearing the struggles and hearing what’s going on and you being open and honest and constantly trying to improve and constantly trying to better their experience by going above and beyond. Now, one of the other things that you mentioned a little while ago is that for you it’s important to keep on learning.
And one of the things you have done over the last couple of years as well as recently working one to one, was joining the members lounge, which is my wedding pro community online where we do training and accountability. Monday we do the lounge calls, all of those kind of things. What was it that made his think, yeah, I need to be part of.
Tara
00:36:45.790 – 00:38:53.200
A community like that over the time. So flashback to when Adam was doing his decorating.
There’s a local female networking group in Wakefield and I actually paid her for business coaching because we’ve not got business background by any means. We literally knew nothing. And that coaching was for Adam, even though she’s a female only.
And because of that she said I could come to the networking groups for Adam. So sometimes she do a social media talk. She gets a bit like what you do, but just more local based.
She gets local women in business that does talks about their, their aspects and stuff like that.
So I did that for a little bit and then I think with us we’re very, we probably could be on the spectrum somewhere somehow and we, we have a focus and we’re like, right, well how can we improve that? That’s what we always do. So then social media, I joined a social media group for a little bit and that’s how I improve social media.
Like I think a lot of it, especially older suppliers, think that we’ve just took stuff naturally, but we’ve not. If we want to improve something, we’ve gone out and been like, oh, how can I improve it?
So I’ve been to social media classes with both a local one and online and then ultimately I just searched because I like to swim. At the time I think I was driving around a lot, like if I were going to wedding fairs.
So I just searched wedding podcasts and then started came across your podcast because I don’t know about anyone else listening, but I have to like your voice and some, some of the podcasts that you come across, like, I can’t I can’t hear. I can’t acknowledge what they’re saying because it’s not nice voice. And I found your soothing and then you can retain the information.
So then after listening to your podcast that the free and so invaluable. That’s why I’m like shouting about you all the time. I was like. And you kept mentioning the, the members pro lounge.
I’m like, maybe we, we should like there’s only so much you can get from the podcast, but there’s so much invaluable knowledge that I then just joined.
Becca
00:38:53.840 – 00:41:26.940
Well, I’m glad you joined and I’m glad you like the sound of my voice. My husband calls it my podcasting voice. Why do you put on your podcasting voice?
Like, because it’s just what you do when you’re listening on a podcast. But I’m with you. If I don’t like someone’s voice, I cannot listen to the pod.
And sometimes I like a voice that’s soothing that I can take in or sends me to sleep, depending on the time of day that I’m trying to do. So hopefully my podcast is helping you in the swimming pool, not sending you to sleep. But it’s been great to have you.
And I think the thing is with the Web Pro members lounge, I always say it’s my best kept secret. I do not talk about it enough, I do not shout about it enough.
But it is so invaluable to have that safe space of other people that understand the industry because we can go to networking groups. I’ve been to loads of network groups and I love it. But the wedding industry is a different beast.
Like the way it operates, the way that people work together, just everything about it is so different to so many other businesses. Even from being a decorator to being in the business you are now, it’s a totally different thing.
And we’re always having to find new clients because actually we can’t. We don’t often have very much repeat business.
And so I do think if anyone’s listening and you’re thinking, I’m a bit alone in business, I need to do something. I do check out the web Pro members. I was like I said it’s my best kept secret. I’m not very good at talking about it, but.
But it is a great community and it’s a great place to share, to learn, to get new knowledge.
And I think what I find really inspiring about both of you and your story is despite all of the stuff you’ve had going on at Home, the kids are posting a depression. You’ve. You’ve taken all of that stuff and gone, no, we want to do this. And you have done everything you can to make it possible.
I meet so many people that say, yeah, I want to start this business. We’re not getting any bookings. I say, well, what are you doing proactively?
Nothing, you know, and you absolutely can never be accused of doing nothing because if anything, you guys do so much, probably too much, but you’ve seen the fruit of your labor, because ultimately, business comes down to numbers.
And the more people that see what you do and like what you do, the more people will inquire with you, the more people will book with you and the more people will rave about you, their friends.
So I think for people listening, if you take anything from today’s episode, it’s that, you know, any form of marketing can work, any form of learning can work, but you have to throw yourselves into it, learn from it, and not wait to find the perfect wedding show or not go, I don’t want to spend any money on marketing.
And then bemoan the fact you’ve got no business because you’ve done a proven strategy, which is, we’re going to get out there, we’re going to have great quality products, we’re going to go to every wedding fair we can, and we’re going to shout about our business to as many people as we can. And ultimately, now you’ve got hundreds of bookings.
Tara
00:41:27.020 – 00:41:49.340
So we know our strategy isn’t for everyone, because fairs do cost a lot of money, especially big fare, because you’ve got to work out how much many bookings, depending what you do, that you need to get from that day to make it financially viable. But we have. It is something that’s worked for us and we understand why sometimes suppliers are scared of it.
Adam
00:41:49.740 – 00:43:01.860
Yeah, we normally set like, we set like a minimum, minimum number of bookings to take from when we do fares. So, for example, when we do a small fair, we normally say, like, right, we’d like a couple of bookings from each of us fares.
If we do a big show when we generally say, right, we would like a minimum of four bookings from those fares. Yeah, it sounds. It sounds quite unrealistic sometimes, particularly when, for example, yesterday we did three wedding fairs.
So that’s a minimum of six bookings across all those fairs.
We’ve already taken one from one of the shows that we did, the one show that we did yesterday, we’ve had five inquiries from one other show that we did yesterday and we haven’t had anything from the third yet. But realistically it balances it out and yeah, it is, it is achievable. It’s again, going back to the fairs.
What we’re talking about early, just learning from what you actually do at fairs and knowing what, what works and what doesn’t.
Tara
00:43:02.180 – 00:43:52.870
And I think one of my other biggest tips is we are very goal orientated people. So when we met you, I brought my goal thing for 2025. I was thinking what year were.
And some of them goals, we were like, right, this would not be achievable, not in a million years. I wrote 150 bookings on and we’ve surpassed that by nearly 40. So have realistic goals in mind to keep your focus.
So if you are spending a lot of money on money on fairs, you can keep focus and just think, right, is this working? Is this worthwhile to do? And then you can just adjust your strategy instead of.
We know some suppliers that I don’t think really have goals or just know that it’s worked before. So they just do it.
Adam
00:43:52.950 – 00:44:50.050
Yeah. And just keep doing the same thing over and over again. It’s like with our setups at fairs, we never take the same setup to affair at all.
It will be different week in, week out. So, for example, next week again we’ve got three fairs on next weekend. One more fair, it’s just going to be a table set up.
One fair there is going to be one of the golf courses there and another fair, there’s going to be a mixture of stuff there. And again it’s just again about doing things differently all the time. Just don’t, don’t be predictable, don’t be.
I don’t know, I feel a bit routine, boring. But yeah, just try, just try. Spice things up a bit.
Like with our, like we, we had customers playing games yesterday, we only took three games with us. But just taking those particular games allowed customers to play. So again, it worked. And it’s just about trying things differently.
Tara
00:44:50.050 – 00:44:50.410
Yeah.
Becca
00:44:50.410 – 00:45:00.770
And keep on improving every, all the time. Trying to make everything 1% better. Even if wedding fairs are working for you, trying to make yourself even better. So it works even better.
How’s 2026 looking in terms of bookings right now?
Adam
00:45:01.350 – 00:45:02.510
I think you’ve been doing admin.
Tara
00:45:02.510 – 00:45:53.080
Not me, but I’m not a numbers person. That’s what I think works so well for us, is because what my flaws are, are your strengths.
I’m very statistical and I know it’s hard if you work on it Just your own, because you have no choice but then to do everything on your own, dear. But I think we’ve got probably about 90, which is.
It shocked us because for the last two years we’ve took 50% of our booking for that year from January to March, and we’ve already got Saturdays that we’re closing. Multiple Saturdays, not just one, the odd one. So it is shocked us and I’m not sure how it’s going to then pan out. I think you can’t get stagnated.
I think you have to keep learning and adapting. So it has made me a bit worried for that period because if we’ve already got so many closed dates and we’re. How many? Four months till January.
Adam
00:45:53.320 – 00:46:55.940
Yeah. In January 2024 to April 2024, we took 73, 2024 alone. So when you think about in 2024, we did 121 bookings across the board.
73 of them were taken between January and April.
So, yes, again, another point to show that the fairs do work, because at that point as well on social media, we were nowhere in a position as to what Tara’s put us in now. But, yeah, for 2026 we are.
Last time I looked at, unfortunately, I can’t do a lot of looking when I’m sat behind a transit van wheel for most of the weekend. We are, we are looking at 90 plus bookings for 2026. And as Tara said, we have closed several Saturdays off already now for 2026.
And to say that we’ve not even done this part of the wedding fair season and got into January 2026 yet we are anticipating that next year is going to be a very, very, very busy year.
Becca
00:46:56.660 – 00:48:15.620
Yeah, but what great problems to have. I mean, so many conversations I’m having with people. Are we not getting the dates in for next year?
And so the fact that you can close bookings early, yes, it comes with its own set of challenges.
And yes, I know that for 2026, that’s why we’re looking at things like automation, making sure that you’ve got less admin to do, looking at how you can have other people working in the business taking some of that work off you, and how we can improve your website and your social media so that you can lessen the amount of wedding fairs that you go to as part of your strategy. But that’s all part of how we learn, how we evolve and how you grow the business.
But I think you should take a moment to just sit back in that fact and go, actually, we’re really smashing this because if we’ve got 90 weddings already booked for next year and we’ve not got into wedding show season, what a privileged position that is to be in. And a testament to all the hard work you’ve done so far and the fact that you’re already thinking forward.
And that’s why we’ve worked together to think, okay, we can see this is coming. How are we going to make sure we get ahead of that problem and keep giving our customers great customer service?
It’s been such a pleasure to talk with you both. I love chatting about people who are right in the thick of business.
Where can people find you if they want to find out more about what you have to offer or chat to you or even get your advice about whether or not they should work with me or join the members ads? Where are the best places for them to find you?
Tara
00:48:15.930 – 00:48:20.810
And probably most active it’s on Instagram, but at Just youf Pro Yard occasion.
Becca
00:48:21.130 – 00:48:48.620
Fantastic. Well, I’ll make sure I put all of your links in the show notes.
If you’re listening to this and you’re inspired by what Adam and Tara have to say or you want to just find out more about their business, do go over, follow them on Instagram, drop them a message and I’m sure they would love to hear from you. Now I have to end my podcast with the question I always end every podcast with.
And Tara, as a listener you will know what this is and hopefully you’ve got a great answer for it. And that’s what’s one thing you both wish you’d known sooner in business. Tara, we’ll start with you.
Tara
00:48:48.620 – 00:49:33.580
Honestly that we’re going to be okay. But I do, I do have probably a bit of anxiety. It’s not diagnosed but like the history.
But it was so nerve wracking something new that we’ve not really seen much on the market. We just didn’t know how people were going to take to it.
Especially because we invested money and time like it’s like another baby in it because you built it. You physically built, built it and designed it with your hands.
Like we’ve got a little sketchbook that we drew, started months of drawing and just take a leap for it. Like we know sometimes suppliers, they’re a bit nervous, will go to fairs and have a look round before they actually book on.
But from day one we’ve just jumped in feet first and just thought about the consequences afterwards, aren’t we?
Adam
00:49:33.580 – 00:49:53.880
Yeah. So like with a holiday in wedding fair we can be there in two minutes. So it was more the fact of, like, oh, that’s really local. We’ll go do that one.
It wasn’t. We didn’t do any, like, anything research into it. Like, we didn’t do any in depth for. In any way, shape or form into. It’s gone.
Right, that’s two minutes up road. We’ll go do that one.
Tara
00:49:53.880 – 00:50:24.070
And I think because we have very career backgrounds, no one we knew were very. They weren’t not supportive, but, well, I can say they weren’t really supportive. The only person.
There were only one person we knew that was supportive. A lot of people, like, why do you want to start your own business? Business, Like, a lot of my friends are professionals.
Like, they didn’t really understand, but now we’ve had that experience and knowledge, it’s been very worthwhile. So just focus on what you want and what’s best for you. Yeah, absolutely.
Becca
00:50:24.070 – 00:50:27.149
Adam, is yours the same? What’s one thing you wish you’d known sooner in business?
Adam
00:50:28.510 – 00:51:17.510
Me being a teacher, ex teacher, I’m quite adaptable to most things, so me standing and talking to couples came very, very natural to me. So when I was out doing fairs and stuff and talking to people, customers, suppliers, that was all quite natural.
I think the main thing for me was actually just how to run a business more in the background. I think that’s been the big thing for me because in a teaching aspect, yes, I was managing my own time, but it was more. It was still more regimented.
Whereas now, yes, I am managing my own time, but we’re managing everything. And I think, yeah, I think if I had a bit more knowledge about that to begin with, it would have helped a lot.
Becca
00:51:17.910 – 00:51:43.600
Fantastic. Well, I wish you guys all the success for the coming year. I’m excited to continue to work alongside you and to see what 2026 brings.
I’m excited for you to get this CRM system up and running because I know how much time it’s going to save you all. And hopefully you can continue to have that additional time with your kids, which is what it was all about in the first place.
Adam, Tara, thank you so much for being guests on the podcast. It’s been great to chat to you.
Tara
00:51:43.600 – 00:51:45.040
Thank you for having us.
Becca
00:51:45.280 – 00:52:13.580
What a fantastic conversation.
I, as I said at the beginning, absolutely love talking to people who are right in the midst of their business and can share their honest journey, share what’s working, share some of the struggles and just be real about what’s going on. And what I love about both Adam and Tara, is that they’re focused.
They know what they want, and they’re not sitting back and waiting for it to come to them. They’re super proactive. They’re getting out there. They’re doing crazy amounts of wedding fairs, but it’s working, and the numbers prove it.
I hope you’ve been inspired by today’s episode, and I’ll see you next time.
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