S4, EP1: Get Wed! Chatting to Wedshed founders

Eddy: Aleks!

Aleks: Eddy, can you believe we’ve reached season four of this tiny little podcast that we have that we like to call project engaged? It’s pretty unbelievable. No sponsors yet, so anyone listening hit us up. No, I’m just joking. Actually, I have to say, I’ve been listening to some podcasts, and the constant ads, the spoken ads are really annoying.

Aleks:  Like the ones that, like, where they just don’t put any effort to make it really tailored. Oh, yeah, there’s something to it. Really? Well, the one I will teach you to be rich. Convince me of anything.

Aleks: But he’s amazing, actually. I’m like, oh, I want that product.

Eddy: So that’s the podcast that you listen to?

Aleks:  Yes, I will teach you to be rich. You know one. The Netflix guy.

Eddy: Yeah, the Netflix guy. Well, let’s talk about our podcast a little bit more.

Aleks: Oh, yeah. Hi.

Eddy: Hello. Thank you for joining us for season four. We have one hell of an episode to kick things off with two very, very amazing people.

Aleks: Yes. We have Amy and Melany from. Or Mel, I should say, from Wedshed.

Eddy: Whoa.

Mel & Amy: Whoo hoo.

Aleks: Sound effect.

Eddy: No, no, I’ll do plenty of sound effects on the actual interview, so let’s just save them for sure.

Aleks: True, true. Now we are. It’s actually a great episode to kick off the new season with, because we talk about all the newest, hottest trends that we’re all seeing in weddings and what to expect next year and 2025, etcetera. There’s some really new stuff that we haven’t talked about on the podcast. For those of you who have suffered through three seasons, you’ll be happy to hear lots of new things.

Aleks: So I’m really excited about this one.

Eddy: And of those trends, we’ve actually jumped onto one of them ourselves.

Aleks: We have. We have the micro wedding trend.

Eddy: Oh, yeah.

Aleks: Not to say that we’re only doing micro weddings.

Eddy: No, we’re doing regular sized weddings as well. Still.

Aleks: We are doing regular sized weddings, but we have launched little love gatherings. I guess this is kind of an ad after all of that. After all that, little love gatherings is a micro wedding concept where basically, we are involved with a couple of other vendors. Epic, epic lineup in three back to back weddings.

Eddy: It’s pretty awesome. So the other epic people that are involved that you alluded to is Meleah from Lovegood images. And Amy, who is our wedding planner extraordinaire.

Aleks: Yes, that’s right. We also have florals by our lovely local florist, Babylon. Flowers we work with very often. And we have our first venue locked in as well, which is Crystal Palace and Courtyard.

Eddy: So good.

Aleks: Such a good venue in Carlton, North.

Eddy: Melbourne’s best kept secret, I think, in relation to. He’s gonna go gangbusters soon, but I’m glad we kind of snuck in.

Aleks: Yeah, we definitely snuck in for that. We have our first day, so basically couples can book in. We’ve got three slots. So three weddings on Sunday, the 25 February 2024.

Eddy: That is right. One kicks off at 11:00 a.m.

Aleks: It’s bright and early.

Eddy: Yes, until two. And each we have half an hour to kind of reset everything to run around like headless chickens. So the next one kicks off at 230 until 530. And then the final one is at six till nine, which I reckon is going to be the most popular slot.

Aleks: I think it will be too. And then you get 3 hours of partying. I’ll marry you as your celebrant. Ed will be providing tunes.

Eddy: I’ll mix up a somewhat of a storm if you like.

Aleks: Yes, you will. It’s going to be a fun day. Meleah taking photos, Amy looking after everything. And we even have our photo booth in there.

Eddy: Bonus.

Aleks: Yes. So get amongst it. Hit us up. We do have an Instagram. Little Love Gatherings, if you know anyone who is getting stressed about wedding planning wants to downsize family members.

Aleks: Yeah. I think the good thing is as well, you know, you can have your micro wedding and then you. A lot of our couples will want to go and party afterwards. One of the very many spots to choose from.

Eddy: Yeah. You’re not short of a watering hole, particularly around that area.

Aleks: Absolutely. And you’re close to Brunswick and East Brunswick.

Aleks: Fitzroy. Kind of.

Eddy: Carlton.

Aleks: Carlton. Yep. Beautiful. But even if you did want more people to join afterwards for the party, you can still do that.

Eddy: Some bolt ons for later.

Aleks: So. Yeah. So definitely check that out. Just going back to today’s episode. Part of the reason that we are chatting to Amy and Mel, apart from the fact that they’re absolute wedding experts, is that they’ve released a book called Get Wed.

Eddy: They have. And it’s funny. So they’ve released a book which you have in front of you right now.

Aleks: I do, I’m flickin’ through it.

Eddy: It’s pretty awesome.

Aleks: It’s pretty awesome.

Eddy: They released their website. They’ve just spruced that up too. Yeah. So that’s out and about now.

Aleks: Oh.

Eddy: But when we were chatting to them, it wasn’t, so I think that’s, I’ll just check.

Aleks: Well, anyway, there will be a spruce up, but the book is the complete guide to planning a wedding with minimum stress and maximum good vibes. I’ve had a look, had a read through and it is amazing. It is such a great resource for everything to do with weddings. Even things like what do you do for your hens, hucks, whatever you’re having to stuff after the wedding, to difficult conversations to have with guests that you’re uninviting, etcetera. I honestly cannot rave enough about this book.

Aleks: It is such a good resource if you planning things yourself and you want to kind of get a good idea of, you know, where to start and what to do. So we are very excited to be chatting to these amazing ladies.

Eddy: They. And they are amazing. Just so much knowledge between them.

Aleks: Loads. Loads of knowledge. We’re so excited to be back. This episode it is November, so we are. No, it isn’t.

Aleks: Yes, it is. There you go.

Eddy: It’s November.

Aleks: Yeah.

Eddy: Yeah. So we’re approaching the last week of November. Just about to dip into, obviously December. And it is gangbusters in relation to weddings. So we’ve been quite mad, to be honest.

Aleks: I would say I’ve bordered on mad a few times.

Eddy: Had a few. Yeah. It’s been an interesting time. No, it’s. Look, one day at a time, one wedding at a time.

Eddy: They’ve all been fantastic. Where are you this weekend?

Aleks: It’s been big vibes. I’m actually at a venue that’s new to me, but I’ve been very, very excited and looking forward to this one, which is grow event space, which is in a nursery, south side. Oh, yeah, it looks beautiful. Run by or at least catered by foresight friends at Fourside Events. So I’m very excited.

Eddy: We’ve got to get them on this show.

Aleks: Yeah, I know we. That’s actually. I’ll add that to list for season four.

Eddy: We need to just straight up to Katie, let’s put a date together.

Aleks: We haven’t spoken to anyone about catering before, so I’m very excited. And you are down the road.

Eddy: Yeah, I’m down the road. I’m at. Now, I always get this wrong because they used to be called Brunswick Mess Hall, but what are they now?

Aleks: The Hall at Welcome to Brunswick.

Eddy: There you go. Bit more of a mouthful for me to handle.

Aleks: The Hall is fine.

Eddy: The Hall, The Hall. Welcome to Brunswick. Yeah. So lovely, lovely, lovely clients. We’ve got an audio guest book in there as well. One of ours, which is really cool, epic music, brief like hip hop or the best eighties.

Eddy: And we’re just gonna bring it home with some house and nineties dance bangers oh, yeah.

Aleks: I forgot I was a DJ. I didn’t say anything about the music.

Eddy: Look, we will obviously do our weekend round up.

Aleks: Yes.

Eddy: Let’s save it for that after this episode.

Aleks: Yeah. One thing I do want to say a couple of things I’ve noticed this wedding season. First of all, our photo booth has gotten a bloody good workout. It’s been really, really fun. We have one.

Aleks: So if you are thinking about adding it to your booking, get in touch with us to check that it’s available for your date. But it’s been so much fun. We’ve had so many different backdrops. People reusing their ceremony arbours or ceremony backdrops, florals, etcetera. We’ve had disco balls.

Aleks: We’ve had Banging Hangins. We’ve had curtains. We’ve had all sorts. It’s been flower walls. Yeah, it’s been lots of fun.

Aleks: Same with audio guest book that’s been used as well and has been an absolute hoot. We get to listen to all the messages after.

Eddy: So, yeah, somebody. Somebody actually asked me, like, what is in this season? And I think not all weddings, and some weddings do this very well with neutral tones and things like that. But I’ve found that there’s been just splashes and pops of colour absolutely everywhere. And I’m not talking pastel colours.

Eddy: I’m talking real bold, rich colours.

Aleks: Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I’ve seen a lot of blue. I don’t know if you’ve seen this. I’m loving this blue trend.

Aleks: Like, pops of blue everywhere. It’s. That’s been. But I know what you’re saying. Yeah.

Aleks: Just the pops of colour, rather than. Yeah. Depends. Some of our clients just love to have a rainbow of a wedding, which is good, too. Um, and also, the other thing that I have noticed is very short time frames for planning or inquiries.

Aleks: I should say. Currently got a quote out with a client who’s getting married in under two weeks. I better get on to that, actually. And if you’re listening, guys.

Eddy: Um, and who. Who recommended us?

Aleks: Madeline Kate?

Eddy: Yes. Yeah, I was testing this. Yeah. Maddie, thank you so much for that recommendation. She’s a phenomenal photographer in Melbourne.

Eddy: And. Yeah, that was just thinking. Wow. Hang on, is it this 2024? Right?

Aleks: I know.

Mel & Amy: Like.

Eddy: Oh, my God.

Aleks: I know. I know. So, yeah, we’ve seen a lot of that. I mean, not. That’s obviously a very extreme example, but there has been a lot of, like, three months out, four months out, you know, which is great.

Aleks: But also, if it’s, like, November or March any year, it’s always tough.

Eddy: Probably Saturdays. Yeah, in March and Saturday, November. Always the. The hardest. So if you haven’t yet locked in some of your key vendors and you’re listening to this podcast, stop listening and jump on now.

Eddy: Yeah, those vendors. Because if you are, you know, having those high date weddings.

Aleks: Yeah.

Eddy: Then yeah, it is tough. People get booked up pretty quickly, as you know. You no doubt know.

Aleks: Yeah. Yeah. You don’t want to miss out. Anyway, that’s enough from us.

Eddy: I reckon that’s enough.

Aleks: Thank you for joining us for the first episode of season four.

Eddy: Strap yourselves in. This is going to be a good one. Welcome to Project Engaged, our podcast for fun loving couples planning their non traditional wedding.

Aleks: We’re wedding DJs Aleks and Eddy Mac from Melbourne. We run a business called One More Song and our tagline is No More Nutbush.

Eddy: In this podcast, we’ll share our wedding experiences and chat to some of our past couples.

Aleks: We’ll also interview bold wedding suppliers who share our philosophy of your wedding being a celebration of you as a couple and one epic party.

Eddy: Let’s get into today’s episode. Alrighty. Today we are kicking off season four with a bang.

Mel & Amy: Woo.

Aleks: We’re so excited to be chatting to Melany and Amy, the creators of Wedshed, which is an award winning online marketplace connecting engaged couples with unique venues and talented vendors.

Eddy: And they’ve just launched a book called Get Wed, a one way pass to getting hitched with maximum vibes and minimum stress.

Aleks: So good. The book is an incredibly practical guide offering so many useful tips for modern couples who want to do their day the right way.

Eddy: So we’re going to chat to them about a number of hot wedding trends that they predict we’ll see for 2024 and beyond.

Aleks: Woo. Let’s welcome Amy and Melany.

Eddy: Oh, yes.

Mel & Amy: Hey, guys.

Aleks: Wow, we must have like a low podcast budget because we didn’t get any new sound effects for season four.

Eddy: Yeah, that’s my bad. I’ve been busy.

Mel & Amy: I love that. I’m pumped. That was. That was an intro. Love it.

Aleks: How are you both doing? You’ve obviously been incredibly busy.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, we’re good, thank you. Hanging in there. Probably just same as you guys. Just, you know, taking it week by week at the moment. Yeah.

Mel & Amy: Busy bees.

Aleks: Love that. Love that.

Eddy: Yeah, I definitely feel you day by day, actually.

Aleks: Yeah.

Mel & Amy: Okay. Actually, a minute by minute by minute.

Aleks: Hey, when we’re behind the decks, it’s literally like second by second sometimes song by song. It’s true. It’s true. All right, let’s start from the very beginning. And can you tell our listeners a little bit about how Wedshed came about?

Mel & Amy: Yeah, absolutely. So Wedshed launched in 2015, so we’re a few years in, but Mel and I have actually known each other a lot longer than that. We have been best mates since we were about five or six years old. So we met, I know, in the playgrounds of primary school, and we’ve just kind of followed each other throughout life. We’ve both had kids together.

Mel & Amy: Well, not together together. Actually. It would have been actually easier if we were sexually attracted to each other because we kind of do everything together. But we’ve had kids with our respective partners. With other people.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, yeah, with other people, exactly. But we just have sort of came into our late twenties and we’re on the path of probably getting married. Kind of thought that we were headed down that way. We’d been with our partners for quite a long time, and it was at that stage that the first of our close girlfriends was getting married and her wedding fell through. Sorry, her wedding.

Mel & Amy: That sounds dramatic. Her wedding venue. Her wedding venue pulled the pin about six weeks before the date. And so she came to us and was like, holy crap, what do I do? Help me.

Mel & Amy: And we jumped online thinking, oh, it’ll be a piece of cake. There’s got to be so many different platforms out there that bring together the curated best of properties, people that you want to actually get married at, not just places that are paying to be on a directory. And we just couldn’t find it. And so we thought, well, here’s a gap, let’s kind of fill it at the same time as well. We’d grown up having family with family farms and we could see there was this gap in the market.

Mel & Amy: Or I guess there was this opportunity where there were heaps of underutilised properties out there that had farm sheds or shearing sheds that were just used for weeks in a year. And we thought, well, what can we do to capitalise on these and give all these different farmers a way to future proof their properties? And, I mean, things have changed a lot in the last ten years. Climate issues become a lot more prevalent. And so we like to think that opening up their properties to weddings also gives them a bit of an opportunity to keep those family farms in the family for just a bit longer while they might be changing operations.

Mel & Amy: Anyway, we sort of started with venues. It’s expanded a lot now into vendors. We do a bit of venue management. We have a whole bunch of different resources for couples to help plan their weddings. And now we have a book as well, which just hit shelves this week, so that’s a bit of a pinch me moment.

Aleks: Big milestone. I think that deserves some sort of round of applause.

Eddy: Another round of applause. Another one. Yes.

Aleks: I always get death stares because I, like, put him on the spot.

Eddy: Yeah.

Mel & Amy: And he has to find the right button.

Eddy: I’m always ready. I know. The yellow is the applaud yellow button.

Mel & Amy: I really amazing following us around just with these pre recorded. Having a hype person constantly following you around.

Eddy: That’d be so cool, actually, to have someone with sound effects when you do something good.

Aleks: There’s a gap in the market.

Eddy: Just in general life, like, just got a coffee. Yeah, I’m winning.

Aleks: It’s gonna be a good day.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, maybe it’ll be a thing. Now that AI is approaching everyone’s lives rapidly, perhaps it will become a reality.

Aleks: Yeah, that’s a great idea. You do want a robot free anyway.

Eddy: Well, then I’ll have a single friend. A robot one. Anyway, let’s move on. So let’s talk about your new book, get wed. Tell us about the inspiration for publishing it.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, sure. So I guess we’ve been writing this book, I guess, for like eight years, since we launched wet shed, probably without even realising it, creating tons of advice. And just through our blog, we get so many DM’s people asking for advice. And then throughout the pandemic, that just really ramped up, as you can imagine. And we created this Facebook group, which now has nearly 25,000 people in it, all sharing that advice with each other.

Mel & Amy: And at the same time, luckily for us, a commissioning editor of a publisher in Australia got engaged and saw that gap. And she approached us after reading a lot of our content online. So I guess the inspiration for publishing it was inbound, which is really lucky for us that she recognised, you know, the content that we’re putting out there. But, yeah, it’s been years and years in the making, I’d say. Yeah.

Mel & Amy: And I think the other thing was when she approached us, the publisher, that is, she was like, oh, do you guys want to write a book? And we were like, yeah, how hard can it be? And to be fair, very, very hard.

Aleks: Very hard.

Mel & Amy: But I think, you know, there are some pretty common confusions that arise from couples that we’ve, that we’ve seen recurring over the years. And we just thought, well, if we can make this into a book form that isn’t just a book that’s full of blank pages and that really still leaves people clueless about how to actually plan a day, then job well done. Let’s write the book that we wanted, which is a start to finish Bible, if you will, or kind of a road map on how to actually get married in a way that’s really personal and reflective of what you guys are actually all about and what you want for the day.

Aleks: Does it mean now when you get a question in your DM’s, you have like an autoresponder? Please refer to. This is where you can purchase Get Wed.

Mel & Amy: We actually need to do that. We. Yeah. Again, we just. Are we going to talk about AI this whole time?

Mel & Amy: I feel like we need to. We need some sophisticated wedding bot to like, come and work for us. But yeah, it’s kind of a. We get some common stuff come through, but we also get some really, really personal, really curly ones where we kind of feel like one privileged to be, you know, having a couple share this with us. But also two extremely underqualified to be responding because we’re not therapists.

Eddy: So that’s.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, yeah. Bit of a mix.

Eddy: I can imagine there was a lot of those during COVID as well.

Mel & Amy: Oh, man, so much. And just family stuff, you know, weddings bring out the best and also sometimes.

Eddy: The not so best.

Mel & Amy: The worst. Not so best. Yeah. So it’s interesting.

Eddy: Emotions running high.

Aleks: Yeah, you. We see a lot of it beingDJs.

Mel & Amy: Oh, and you would see it in real life. Yeah, I was gonna say you would see. And like escalating as well because I mean, when people are getting very merry, shall we say, and like very end of the night, like. Yes, I guess some real characters come out. I’d love to.

Mel & Amy: Love to know what your most interesting moments have been. I feel like that’s a. Be a really good chat.

Aleks: We should do. We should do an episode on that. Should we? I don’t want to bring up painful memories. It’d be therapeutic perhaps, you know, cathartic.

Aleks: Yes, yes. You definitely. You definitely get a good sense of family dynamics, you know, as well, which is always interesting.

Eddy: It really does talk to the supposed 6th sense that human beings have. Sometimes you’ll walk into a room and the vibes do something wrong. There’s the vibes. And then you go and talk to all the vendors and you talk to the bar staff. Staff and the catering staff and they all say the exact same thing.

Eddy: So I think we do have a legitimate 6th sense.

Aleks: Yeah, yeah, I agree with that. But I think it’s got to do also with, you know, who you invite to your wedding. And like you said, Amy, you know, about the family pressures. That’s been something that’s come across on the podcast quite a bit from our couples that we’ve, you know, had a chat to about, you know, oh, what’s been the most difficult bit, the family pressure of, you know, doing certain things, inviting certain people.

Eddy: Well, that’s what we found, and I’m sure it’s no different for you guys. But we found that during the pandemic with regards to guest lists and the venues only allowing x amount of people in their venue at any given time, they’re actually relieved that, like, they could cut down a lot of guests, the ones that they didn’t really want there in the first place.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, I think it actually was such a blessing in disguise for a lot of people, and I think, I mean, probably jumping a little bit ahead or sort of segwaying into something else. But that’s, I think, a lot of reason why micro weddings have just grown so much in popularity, because people have. They might have attended a small wedding as well. That was maybe small by necessity because of COVID And then they’ve since realised, okay, actually, this is awesome. It was so intimate, so special.

Mel & Amy: I’m going to do that, too. And I’m also going to, you know, it means I don’t have to invite weird uncle Bert and worry about, he is such a frank.

Aleks: He will just stare at the DJ the whole time for 2 hours. Like, how’s the music coming out?

Mel & Amy: Or something weird like, oh, I’m so sorry, Aleks. I feel like you’ve dealt with so many Berts in your life. That’s right.

Aleks: Ed’s had all the Karens in the world. So, you know, we’re even. We’re even in that regard. We are. We will go into upcoming trends, definitely.

Aleks: But let’s kind of start at the beginning of the wedding planning process. Big, big question, but where do you think couples engaged? Where do you think they should start?

Mel & Amy: Do you want to take this one? I feel like we’ve got it in the book. Yeah, definitely. So I reckon, or we both reckon, that the first thing you should do when you get engaged is just get crystal clear on what’s important to you and figure out what your priorities are. We find that there’s a tendency to jump straight into budget, and that’s what we did when we first got engaged, not sort of knowing perhaps the best way to go about it.

Mel & Amy: And in our opinion, that’s probably not a good shout for a couple of reasons. Firstly, you tend to pluck a number out of the sky and just think, okay, I’m happy to spend x amount on my wedding. But secondly, you actually have no idea what things cost either, so it’s never going to be accurate. And you just end up setting yourself up to fail or just to feel really, you know, terrible in as you sort of go about it. So we reckon that the best way to go about getting, well, planning your wedding is figure out your priorities.

Mel & Amy: You know, we suggest doing what we call a wine and priorities exercise, but that can be a tea or water, whatever you. Green juice. Green juice, yeah, exactly. But just grab some paper with you and sit down with your partner, both of you. Write down the five things that are most important to you and then swap or just share your answers.

Mel & Amy: And that could be like making sure that we have a pumping dance floor, making sure there’s a venue that, you know is accessible for Nan or for any mobility impaired mates. Making sure that, you know, you can bring your dog, whatever your priorities actually are. See how similarly you see, I guess, see how aligned you are if you both write totally different things. Just remove your engagement rings and. No, not really.

Mel & Amy: You know, it opens up a conversation. Right? Yeah. And actually, though. But it kind of allows you to have this conversation where you’re like, okay, actually, these are the things that really matter to us.

Mel & Amy: And those things that you are able to define as a priority is where you should be putting your wedding budget and everything else after that really is a nice to have. But you can use those priorities as the North Star for what your wedding is going to be. I think that’s a really helpful way to get started. Couldn’t agree. Well, I think, as well creates a little bit of accountability on both sides.

Mel & Amy: You know, if you both put an effort into those things, then you’re both working towards that North Star that you’re speaking about, rather than just one person taking charge from the start and making all the decisions around budgets, like you said. So it’s a great way to sort of even the playing field as well when it comes to planning.

Aleks: We couldn’t agree totally.

Eddy: Yeah, that’s an amazing idea. And you’re going to have an automatic sort of Venn diagram at the end of that, too, because I’m sure that, like, you know, if you don’t need couples counselling, three or maybe even four of those things you’re both writing down are going to be identical, potentially. We love a Venn diagram. Any way I can get a Venn diagram into conversation, I just will.

Aleks: Every episode you talk about the Venn diagram.

Mel & Amy: Are you guys sitting there with a wine and just drinking every time you say Venn diagram?

Aleks: I actually have already had a glass of wine.

Mel & Amy: Oh, I wish I joined you. I should have done that. I know. It is a good idea. Yeah.

Aleks: No, no, we love that. And it’s so funny, like, we were talking about this earlier, you know, when you mentioned about what things cost. Like, it is so hard. And there is such, you know, differences in vendors as well. You know, when you look at from the very bottom, like, where, you know, the cheapest vendors to the most expensive end, like, I mean, it’s.

Aleks: There’s no comparison. And it’s so difficult if you haven’t got those priorities set straight. And there are definitely things that can kind of not do away with, but, you know, not spend as much focus on if you’re not. I think it’s important as the couple that you enjoy your own wedding, too. Sometimes people forget that.

Aleks: It’s like, no, you need to enjoy it. It needs to be great. It needs to be your day, and it needs to be. Yeah. The way you want it.

Aleks: So I think it is important to get those priorities straight. Funny, you didn’t mention, ask parents about what they would.

Mel & Amy: Oh, whoops. Yeah. Shocking. I know.

Eddy: They’re gonna tell you anyway.

Aleks: Yeah, don’t worry, you don’t have to.

Mel & Amy: Ask at all, but, you know, you’ll have to take that $5,000 little injection if they’re willing to give it.

Eddy: So that’s the trade off, I suppose.

Mel & Amy: Yeah.

Aleks: Well, that, yeah, that’s a complicated. That can be a complicated thing as well.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, it can be. Yeah. I think.

Eddy: Oh, sorry. You go.

Mel & Amy: I was going to say when it comes to taking money from parents, like, we always think that’s definitely not a permission slip to then inject all of their desires for your wedding as well. So just making sure that if you are, you know, fortunate enough to be able to accept a financial contribution from family or from anyone, it comes with a really clear conversation around, you know, thank you so much. Really appreciate this. This is what we are wanting to do for our day, you know, and perhaps you can kind of soften or make it clear that while you respect them and their opinions, you guys are the ones that are ultimately going to make the final opinions. What we find, I think, like, is helpful for bearing parents is to give.

Mel & Amy: To be very considerate in trying to give them like this or that or, like, ask them for advice on stuff that you actually don’t really mind which way they choose which option they choose. No, exactly. So give them the a and b of two things that you actually just would be so happy to have. Either or you don’t give a shit.

Eddy: Wow. That’s.

Mel & Amy: And that makes them feel excited.

Eddy: It’s amazing.

Mel & Amy: They feel involved and it’s great.

Aleks: And, you know, sling them a song request to the DJ. As long as it’s not something you don’t like. Maybe give them beautiful.

Eddy: That’s such a good.

Aleks: Here are five songs because we have had.

Mel & Amy: Which one?

Aleks: Yeah, which one do you want? And then the ones that you like. I love that. That’s great advice. Great advice.

Eddy: Well, I guess we’re sort of. It’s a nice little segue into our next question, I suppose, in that what do you think? This is the biggest challenge for couples planning their weddings and how best can they overcome them?

Mel & Amy: Oh, that’s a good one. And good segue. And again, you probably, like, also start with budgets. But I have to say, maybe even lately we’ve been seeing this a lot in our Facebook group, but just that pressure to have, like, a perfect wedding, I think, can be really overwhelming for a lot of couples. And, you know, perfection is subjective and I reckon it would just lead to so much disappointment.

Mel & Amy: Perhaps a way to overcome that is to just, you know, really not set that bar too high and really just focus on, you know, all those things we just spoke about. Because disappointment is just, you know, you’re just really setting yourself up for that disappointment if you can’t achieve that said perfect wedding. We’ve been talking a lot recently about, like, weddings don’t have to be perfect because they won’t ever be perfect in the sense that everything goes 100% to the minute to plan, but they can’t. We sort of talk about best not perfect. Like, it’s going to be one of the best days of your life, but if we can just drop the idea that it has to be a perfect day, you’re going to get so much more out of it and you’re going to come out of it feeling so much better with better memories from it, too, because you won’t feel like anything failed.

Mel & Amy: Yeah. We always think back to our favourite memories from all our mates weddings. And it’s always like someone that stuffed up their speech or, like, the wedding cake fell over, someone, like, slipped a disc on the desk, you know, their pants open. You know, there’s always these, like, hilarious moments in the next day when you’re, you know, a little bit hungover and you’re having those hilarious chats it’s always about all those funny stories that necessarily weren’t that perfect wedding. So I think that supervision slip to.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, definitely not expect the perfect. To happen.

Eddy: Yeah, no, I think that’s a really good point. It’s the human side that you do remember the most, and I certainly cringe when people sort of say, oh, this is the most important day of my life. I’m like, like, wow. I mean, yeah, it’s definitely hugely important. Massive milestone, but the most.

Mel & Amy: Yeah. And it can. It can probably feel like that at the time, but in hindsight, you know, when you’re 510 years down the track, your mindset shifts so much, and you’re like, you know, maybe it does take hindsight to get there, but you just, you know, I think giving couples as much advice and, you know, us industry folk, you know, allowing them to get in that right headspace, because, you know, I think there’s not enough maybe chat around the headspace stuff. So, you know, we’ll. We’ll put that out there for them.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, I totally agree. I think it might also sound counterintuitive, but I think it’s also helpful to remember that weddings are only one day. And, like, I know that you might not expect to hear that from someone who’s in the wedding industry. I don’t say that to diminish the weddings themselves, but really just to remind people that if you have this one day to celebrate your love, you might as well make decisions that feel right to you. Block out all the noise, go into it with a really healthy frame of mind around the fact that this is all about the fact that we get to get married and celebrate with our friends and family, because not everyone in the world, particularly right now, gets to have such a privileged life event around us as well.

Mel & Amy: I think Mel and I talk a lot about milestones in life, and there really are only a couple of ones where you get together with your whole friends and family, and it’s your wedding and your funeral, and you’re not there. Well, I guess in the physical form.

Aleks: Oh, my God.

Mel & Amy: The second one. We’re getting dark and deep here, but you know what I mean. I think it’s just. It’s just a reminder that, you know, weddings can be whatever you want them to be, and really, they’re about the people at the core of it. Everything else is just kind of fluff.

Mel & Amy: So don’t get too caught up on all the fluffy stuff.

Eddy: Yeah.

Aleks: And there’s a big difference in how you. How you actually enjoy your day when you have that mindset. And we’ve seen it with our couples when they’re really relaxed and, you know, I’ve seen brides with, like, muddy dresses and just present. Yeah. And they just, yeah.

Aleks: And they just, like, shake that stuff off and, you know, and also, like, you know, obviously trusting in your vendors as well that, you know, if things don’t run to plan, they’ve got, they’ve got it sorted, they’ve got your back.

Mel & Amy: Totally. Amy, what were you saying the other day about big couple energy? I loved that because I feel like that’s, you know, it’s such a challenge to get in the right headspace on the day and you’re, you know, you’ve got all this anxiety pre ceremony, even though that’s one of the funnest parts that you realise later. But, you know. Yeah, let on about that.

Mel & Amy Yeah. I think, like, I was thinking about this a bit and what actually is my sort of the thing that I would sort of impart to couples as well. And, like, you’ve got this decision when you wake up on your wedding day, right? And it’s, you know, you could get bogged down with all the stuff that you’ve still got to do or the fact that it’s pissing down with rain outside or you could be riled up because someone said something to you the day before and you’re still dwelling on it. But I think that one of the challenges that couples face that you really need to be conscious of is that when you wake up on your wedding day, it’s really, really helpful to be super conscious of the energy that you’re bringing.

Mel & Amy: And we were talking about it. I mean, you guys mentioned it before. You guys can go into a wedding and you can just kind of feel if the energies off. And so we really feel that it’s so important for couples to go into their wedding with BCE, which is big couple energy. So, like, get in there, wake up on the day.

Mel & Amy: Just know that you’re going to, whatever happens, you are dedicated to going with the flow. You’re going to slap a smile on your face. You’re going to look people in the eye, be super present, as you guys have said, as well, and just be so, you know, be really conscious about trying to bring your best energy, stay connected to each other throughout the whole process. Because if you bring your BCE, that, like, automatically creates BGE, which is the big guest energy. And, like, your guests, your family, your friends and your vendors as well, they’re going to thrive off the energy that you’re feeding out to everyone and it just becomes this, like, big, beautiful circle of fun, celebratory loving energy.

Aleks: He’s got a Venn diagram. Are you doing a Venn diagram with a big couple?

Eddy: I’m definitely thinking.

Aleks: All right, so we’ve got a Venn diagram, right? And we’ve got.

Mel & Amy: We’ve got the BCE. We’ve got the BGE.

Aleks: Yeah. So I reckon the BCE is the big one. Let’s see later.

Eddy: Bert is on the other side.

Aleks: Uncle Bert. Uncle Bert’s just, he’s on the outside. He’s a floating bubble.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, he is. He’s not welcome in the van.

Aleks: I love that you guys talk about this because it is huge, especially when it comes to the party time of the wedding. The dance floor, like, when the couple is not on the dance floor enjoying themselves and depending on, like, what your guest list looks like, if you’ve got guests that maybe don’t know each other that well, you know, like, you haven’t got big families. You might have, like, past colleagues and second cousins and, like, disparate kind of groups of people, and you’re not on there. Like, it’s so hard to keep the energy up on the. Because people almost, like, need, like, to be given permission by seeing the couple on the dance.

Aleks: Like, okay, cool. Like, when it’s party time, we’re dancing, everyone’s happy. Like, they’re in a good place. So it has such a huge impact on everyone.

Eddy: It’s simple energy. You need to bring that.

Aleks: Yeah, bring it, guys. Have some tequila’s. Whatever it takes. Bring that.

Mel & Amy: Whatever it takes. Yeah, bring it to the day and take it to the dance floor. Bring it to the end. That’s so true.

Aleks: Shouldn’t be encouraging people to shots of the dance or a water or a big, sparkling, bubbly water with some lime.

Eddy: Yeah, whatever your jam is.

Aleks: Yeah, it’s not drinking at the moment. He’s so smug. Really smug about. It’s really annoying. Anyway, do you feel heaps better for.

Eddy: It if I wasn’t so tired all the time? Amazing.

Mel & Amy: Yeah.

Aleks: I did think you.

Mel & Amy: I think it takes three.

Eddy: I think it takes three months. It’s been just over a month.

Aleks: Yeah.

Mel & Amy: Look, I did it for nine months, two times. And doesn’t. You don’t feel better?

Aleks You don’t.

Eddy: I feel like I’m missing out a lot of things.

Aleks: Yeah, you’re really judging, but I just keep going.

Mel & Amy: I don’t care.

Aleks: I don’t need a friend to drink. Anyway.

Eddy: Um, moving on.

Aleks: Yes. All right. We’ve got so many questions you guys is actually out of control, I think. No, no, no. I think we should get stuck into some trends for 2024.

Aleks: I’m excited you guys have some stuff that, like, whoa, this is new. Amy, do you want to kick us off with a couple of things that we haven’t seen before that you expect we’ll see at weddings in 2024?

Mel & Amy: Yeah, for sure. I mean, we’re seeing such a relaxing of traditions, which we all love as well. I think the biggest thing that we’re seeing is weddings reflecting real life better. And I guess some examples of that are in the wedding ceremony, because it’s not. For example, it’s not often you have to play favorites with your parents.

Mel & Amy: And, you know, this reality is reflected in brides choosing to walk down the aisle, you know, flanked by mum and dad rather than just walking down with dad. Or we’re seeing more couples choose to walk down together, hand in hand or ditch the aisle altogether and just, you know, be mingling with guests and all of a sudden kind of just walk to the front and the wedding kicks off as well. And I think, like, in terms of the other sort of stuff, other reflections of real life, we’re just saying, I guess it’s kind of, it’s evolved off very rational thought and that post pandemic perspective. But, like, couples, not, they’re having mixed gendered wedding parties, odd numbered wedding parties, so that they’re not just, you know, kind of trying to balance out both wedding parties, because that’s not the reality of life as well. You know, if your partner has three best mates, you’ve only got two best mates, or you only want to have two people there beside you, why would you try and even things out as well?

Mel & Amy: So we’re loving just seeing just a more authentic reflection of just people’s lives as they’re reflected in the weddings as well. Something else that we’re seeing a lot as well are content creators. And have you guys been seeing this as well?

Aleks: We brought our own.

Mel & Amy: Yeah.

Eddy: The answer is absolutely.

Aleks: We have.

Eddy: Yeah. I think it’s fantastic.

Mel & Amy: Yeah.

Aleks: Yeah.

Mel & Amy: I feel like this is. That’s. This is something that’s very much just this, like, it’s kicking off this season of weddings and, like, brand new, I would say. I haven’t seen it in seasons previously and I reckon it’s here to stay as well.

Eddy: Yeah.

Mel & Amy: That being. Yeah, lots of couples choosing to have someone who’s there just capturing that behind the scenes footage that they can use on social media afterwards or just have, you know, that kind of, like, just, you know, hand just, you know, iPhone footage, basically, versus having a professional videographer come and capture it, or in addition to having a videographer as well, you know, depending on what you want, which is, like, really interesting, I think, to be honest, when we first saw that, we were a bit like, oh, that’s really like taking sort of social media to the next level. But we have since realised, actually, no, you just get, you just get more gorgeous footage of yourselves behind the scenes. And, you know, if you, if you don’t want to put it up on social media, you just get to have, it’s just perhaps sometimes a more affordable way and maybe a more, a less produced snippet of what the day actually was as well, which is really cool, too. I don’t think that first looks are going anywhere.

Mel & Amy: We’re still seeing heaps of destination weddings. We’re seeing a few love, like the rise of love parties. And I feel like, you know, that’s kind of maybe just some new language around what we’ve seen in the past, but that’s when a couple will have a really intimate ceremony. So basically have, like, an elopement, but they’ll follow it immediately just with a massive party with friends and family. So they’re basically having a private ceremony and taking the pressure down off themselves as well, which is kind of a nice way, a nice mix of both worlds if you don’t feel really comfortable, you know, standing in front of people and saying your vows, too.

Mel & Amy: So that’s, you know, a few things that we’re seeing as well. We’re seeing more digital gift registries. We are biased there because we have one.

Aleks: Oh, do tell us. Do tell us. Give us a big plug.

Mel & Amy: Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So, I mean, for us, we, we sort of had always wanted to create a digital gift registry because we, even though we had physical wishing wells at our own weddings, it really felt a bit, kind of, just a bit impersonal to us. The idea of having to quickly run to an ATM before a wedding’s about to kick off, you know, ten minutes beforehand, you’re just sweating and, and just shoving some cash into an envelope. So we created a digital wedding registry.

Mel & Amy: It’s called gravy during the pandemic, because we were like, okay, well, everyone lives together, generally speaking. Everyone’s got their, you know, the crockery, their sheets, their, all the stuff that they need. What they really need when they’re getting married is money. But if there’s an, there’s got to be a less awkward way to ask for cash. So by using a digital wedding registry, like gravy, for example, you can ask for things like, you know, I’d love for you guys to contribute to what?

Mel & Amy: Our honeymoon fund, or a new lounge or IVF or helping us pay off our HECs. But what makes gravy different is you can also ask your guests to do stuff that won’t cost them a cent. So you can ask guests to help us paint our house or dog sit for us while we’re away next, or go and donate blood, because that’s important to us, like, any number of things. Just, you know, asking people to do stuff that’s just human effort and actually enriches your life. And so we’ve, I think, about one in five of the thousands of gifts that are given on gravy are those gifts.

Mel & Amy: We call them pledges, those gifts of human effort. And it’s just been so, so cool to see people contributing to other people’s lives in quite a tangible way as a gift. And a lot of the time, I think that that’s the most meaningful kind of stuff that you can really give as well.

Aleks: That’s so cool. I did not know that I knew about gravy, but I didn’t know that you could do the human effort stuff.

Eddy: Pleasures. Yeah.

Mel & Amy: Yeah.

Aleks: And what about the HECs? Hey, you.

Eddy: I just thought.

Aleks: Yeah, you looked at me. Well, if we got married, right, we could get someone to, like, cook for us. When it’s busy wedding season, we could get someone to look after the cat so we can go on a holiday. We could pay off your HECs debt.

Eddy: Oh, gravy. Yeah. On the gravy train.

Aleks: Yeah.

Mel & Amy: So much you could do. Yeah. Jump on board. I’ll also say that couples who have online wedding registries actually get more money in the end. About 30% to 40%.

Mel & Amy: Often they are gifted more. The amount of. The amount of gifts that we money see coming through on the day and after the day is crazy. And we have only realised this since having an online wedding registry, I think because, you know, your guests often in the lead up, they’re really excited. They, you know, might pop on there and they’re in control of the amount that they can give, and they see these tangible things that you’re putting that money towards.

Mel & Amy: And also, you know, on the day, it can be hard. We’re not. It’s a bit of a cashless society these days. So you’re like, running to the ATM. You’re all sweaty.

Eddy: Yeah. No, I think it’s awesome.

Aleks: And what about all those people who, like, steal from the wishing, you’re effectively.

Eddy: Incentivising people to give more because they’re seeing that it’s for something rather than just a stash of cash, which can be uncomfortable to actually carry as well. And you think, am I gonna get mugged? Or.

Aleks: So many practicalities. Wow.

Eddy: But 30%, that’s a huge number.

Aleks: Yeah, it’s huge.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, it’s crazy. It’s pretty significant. And yeah, we do sadly say every wedding season, that awful media story pop up again and again about some, you know, someone stealing a wedding. Like a physical wishing well.

Eddy: Sorry. One of my favourite shows is current affair. So it always comes up.

Aleks: We don’t watch. We don’t watch.

Eddy: It’s only free to air till we don’t watch any.

Aleks: Free to air. But he just loves the coronavirus.

Eddy: Love it. I love it when the neighbours, like, have wars. This is great. It’s great stuff.

Aleks: And you get really offended when it’s not like a typical. They’ve really slipped, really dropped the ball today.

Mel & Amy: It’s either quarelling neighbours, dodgy plumbers, or. Yeah. Or wedding registries being stolen. That’s it. That’s the recurring thing.

Mel & Amy: Which one? All day this week.

Aleks: Yeah, that’s, yeah, that’s super interesting. Yeah, I like that it’s headed in that direction. It feels very impersonal. Just to stash a bit of time. You’re like, how much do I give?

Aleks: And it always feels better when you’re giving a gift.

Eddy: Don’t even have cash.

Aleks: Yeah, we don’t have a bank branch. Yeah, I’m getting the giggles now. No, we don’t. We have to go to the post office to put money into it anyway. Very, very interesting, Mel, let’s talk about our favourite or not so favourite subject of the cost of living.

Aleks: I went to Aldi today, and our normal soda water that used to be $0.75 is now a dollar five overnight.

Mel & Amy: Okay.

Aleks: That’s one example.

Mel & Amy: So.

Aleks: We should do a soda stream, I think.

Eddy: Yeah. We talking about it.

Mel & Amy: That’s a good idea. I went to the shops and bought milk and bread the other day. $12.45 for milk and bread. So that’s. I was like, oh, I don’t know.

Mel & Amy: It felt really good. I know. Yeah, it was bad. It’s grim. It’s grim out there.

Aleks: Well, obviously it’s going to have a little bit of an impact on wedding budgets. Do you have any good tips for couples who still want to get married? You know, maybe budget is a bit of a thing at the moment. But they don’t want to really compromise on the impact.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, yeah, that’s, um. I’d say, like, three things that you could do. So, like, prioritise. We’ve kind of covered that a little bit. But, you know, if the killer photographer or DJ is on that priority list, perhaps it’s opt for a digital invite.

Mel & Amy: So something that’s, you know, lesser down the list, or you might, you know, you love tangible things that might be at the top, so you just got to, you know, work your way backwards and look at those things that are at the bottom and start trimming the fat. So the other one would be to trim. So things like, you know, the welcome sign. You know, I love signage. I feel like it can create a great atmosphere.

Mel & Amy: But a lot of the time, if you pop that welcome sign, you know, down the front of the entry of the venue, a lot of the time people just walk past it. So, you know, trimming those extra bits that aren’t going to make the huge difference to your day. Or, you know, if you want flowers, they’re really important, but do you really need an extra, extra large arrangement? You know, a single stem on a table can look really beautiful, too. So there’s that, like, prioritising, trimming, being really open minded, too.

Mel & Amy: Like, don’t rule out a lunchtime wedding if that’s not, you know, if you don’t really care what time of the day. Like, you know, venues are so open to having something during the day and you might be able to do it, you know, on a non peak time, not during. I know that one gets thrown out there a lot, but we’re starting to see the rise of lunchtime weddings. And we’re in Australia, there’s curfews everywhere. So it really does enable you to elongate, you know, that one of the best days of your life and, you know, so I wouldn’t rule out and be a little bit more flexible and open minded and sadly, I hate this one.

Mel & Amy: But, you know, a surefire way to bring your budget back in check is don’t invite everyone. And really, yeah, if you can bring the numbers down and you haven’t seen, you know, a mate in many, many years and you don’t think that maybe you’re going to see them in the future, it’s, again, trim, trim, trim, trim. Where you can.

Aleks: Now, you have some helpful templates in your book.

Mel & Amy: Yes.

Aleks: How to uninvite guests. Nice words for tricky situations. I like.

Eddy: I love this.

Aleks: How do you invite guests later? It’s all there. It’s all there in the book. Get wed available now at all your favorite bookstores.

Mel & Amy: Sorry, go on, Alex.

Eddy: This is a side of Alex I’ve never seen before.

Aleks: No, I’m. Come on, you know, I’ve got a pr background anyway.

Eddy: You do?

Mel & Amy: Yes. Thank you, Amy. Do you have any more on there? I feel like. Yeah.

Mel & Amy: Prioritise, trim, be open minded are probably my three things. Yeah, no, I think you nailed it. I think. Yeah, it kind of is unfortunately just basic maths, which is probably the capacity for the math that I have. The less people you have, the less money you’re going to spend.

Mel & Amy: So if you can, you know, if you’re really trying to figure out, look, I’d also say talk to your vendors as well around it and just have really honest conversations because, you know, everyone in the industry still really wants to be working as well. But if you can just be open about, look, this is the budget that we have. What can I do for this? You’re just going to get a better outcome and you’re not going to have anyone feeling like they’ve been miscommunicated with. And you’ll both be on the same page and your vendors will be able to help you come to some wedding plans that actually suit what your budget, but also suit what you, your aesthetic or what you were hoping for for the day as well.

Mel & Amy: There’s always a happy medium. And if there’s not a happy medium, then again, as Mel said, perhaps it’s focus your money, trim and put your money somewhere else or something else. I think those supplier conversations are really good when it comes to networking. They might have someone, if a particular vendor is out of your budget based on super valid reasons like experience or their schedule, they might be able to point you in the direction of someone perhaps newer or, you know, not as experienced, but could do still just as good a job. So the networks that vendors can provide you, priceless.

Mel & Amy: I’ll also say on that the always have the hat on of like the wedding tax is an absolute myth as well. You know, these are all small businesses, so never think that someone, because it is, you know, this time that we’re living in where interest rates are higher, then no one’s putting up their prices to make extra money because they want to, it’s optional because they have to, because they’re a business themselves and the cost of software and everything’s going up. So keep that in mind as well if that, if there are some increases.

Aleks: Thank you for saying that. So true. We’re affected by cost of living too, and everything has gone up. I would say lunchtime weddings. What a vibe.

Aleks: Oh, I’m all for. And because I. Yeah, I also think it then gives you, you know, the option of just having something really relaxed after. Just go to a bar, go to.

Eddy: A pub, and then you got your after party and it’s not like crazy o’clock. It’s like regular o’clock still and, you know.

Mel & Amy: Yeah. And your mates are happy to pay for their drinks after a certain point too, because you’ve kind of moved on. For the official lunch, you can then go to a bar like, hey, after party’s here. And there’s no expectation at all for you to pay for those drinks. So because it’s kind of an opt in part of the day.

Eddy: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Aleks: People don’t have to go, like if they have to go to work or whatever, they can leave at a reasonable time or they can kick on and party. I love it.

Mel & Amy: Exactly.

Aleks: Yeah, I am all for it. We talked a little bit about, you know, kind of the rise of micro weddings. I want to talk a little bit about how couples, and obviously you’ve got a lot of tips in your book. Get word available at major bookstores. What are some other, what are some ways interesting ways that you guys have seen that couples can incorporate kind of more unique and less traditional elements into their weddings?

Mel & Amy: I think people, we’re just seeing people get really intentional about adding in stuff that’s reflective of their personalities. And so rather than just kind of going through the box and thinking, okay, these are the traditions we’re seeing. Hates people. Ditch traditions or adapt them. Say, for example, you know, the whole flow flower.

Mel & Amy: What do you call it? The throwing of flowers? The bouquet toss. My God, how long have I been in this industry for? Like, we’ve seen people, you know, do a chip, like heaps of people just kind of a ditching that.

Mel & Amy: But also they might be adapting it by throwing a packet of chips or something that the bride really loves or if, you know, someone’s really into wine. We’ve seen a lot of couples, or not a lot, but we’ve seen some couples be like, you know what? Rather than bringing us a gift, we’d love for you to come and just bring a really gorgeous bottle of wine for us to sell her. So just really thinking about the sort of stuff that you and your partner are into and thinking about how you could incorporate some of those passions actually into the day as well. What do you reckon, Mel?

Mel & Amy: I love everything you just said. Yeah. I think you nailed it.

Aleks: Yeah, we love that. And we definitely notice when couples have super, super personal touches.

Eddy: Well, there are. We play post office hotel quite a bit, and they have their own sort of beer that they brew. So you can brew that, name it for your wedding. You can be the first person to pour it behind the bar. So the couple would jump behind the bar and pour that.

Eddy: So in a similar vein to the wine and things like that. So there are venues that are jumping on board and making things as unique as possible, which is awesome.

Aleks: Yeah.

Mel & Amy: Yeah. That’s so nice.

Aleks: Yeah, I think, you know, I’ve seen a lot of, like, I had a wedding recently where the couple just had, like, a board of just, like, photos of them on holiday. Just like, it’s so simple and it’s a bit like, you know, sort of home project, but it’s just such a nice way to add a touch.

Eddy: And they’re the things that the guests will remember. Coming back to what we were saying before, those human elements, those. Those touches, those, you know, uniqueness.

Aleks: Um, this. In this wedding as well, the bride is a animate illustrator for Disney, I think. So she does, like, animate stuff. So cool. So she drew, like, she did the welcome sign, but then she did these little, like, activity sheets for people.

Aleks: And I had just, like, an outline of people and, like, some questions. And you had to, like, draw, like, your outfit, like, what are you wearing today and how you feeling? So I absolutely loved that. You know, it’s a venue we work in often, but I haven’t seen something like that there, so it’s very, very memorable.

Mel & Amy: I love really cool like that.

Aleks: Speaking of DIY, we hear that there’s a hot new anti DIY movement. Yeah, a little bit more about this.

Mel & Amy: Yes. We’ve coined it. We’ve coined it. Done for you. DFY.

Mel & Amy: Yeah. DFY. Yeah. Well, DIY has its charm. We’ve certainly seen the shift towards, you know, trusting the professionals to bring your vision to life.

Mel & Amy: And we think it a thousand percent reduces stress for the couple, particularly if you’re not that DIY type person, which I am 1000% not. And I stupidly went down the DIY path and immediately regretted it during the process. But, you know, I was eight to ten years ago, so that’s when DIY was really hot. And, yeah, we’ve definitely seen a shift towards the done for you trend, and we are totally vibing it. We think it’s a great idea.

Mel & Amy: And, you know, the. As many. As much as you think that it’s going to save you money, diying it. We don’t think it does at all. There’s, you know, it’s all about balance.

Mel & Amy: Some DIY elements, you know, like you said, can add that personal touch, but a lot of the time, you know, the work that goes into it, you don’t actually save that much money. Trying to think of an example off the top of my head. Amy, do you have one where your wedding was a classic example? Oh, man. We were a full DIY.

Mel & Amy: So that we have wedding venue that we got married at was actually just a hay shed that we spotted on the side of the road. And we walked onto the property, some may say trespass, but we went and found the farmer on the property and just said, hey, don’t answer us now, but we love that shed. Would you mind if we got married in it? Here’s our phone number. Give us a call once you’ve had a chat to the family.

Mel & Amy: And blessed. They were the most gorgeous family. And we still visit them every year in Mudgee. But we completely underestimated the amount of time, energy, just stress that is involved in turning something that was admittedly extremely blank canvas. Not every venue is like this.

Mel & Amy: Like, it literally had nothing there except for a water tank. But I think that there’s a lesson to be learned there. As Mel was sort of saying, if you can maybe find a helpful balance of doing, if you’re going to take on diY, do the stuff that you actually care about and that you really love and then outsource the rest of it. I think as well, when we got married, the trends were very Diy led. Like, it was very much like bunting and jazz jars and hessian and stuff like that that I look back at now and I’m like, cringe.

Mel & Amy: But we, you know, we kind of didn’t have too much of our weddings. But the trends now and are, like, a lot more elevated, but also classic. They’re harder. They require, actually, professionals to do expertise. Otherwise it could end up like a Pinterest tale.

Mel & Amy:
So it’s like, if you’re going to do DIY, make it a simplified version of it. Take just be very, very honest with yourself. Like, what do you have the capacity for? What do you actually have the predisposition for? What?

Mel & Amy: Who are the people in your life that you can kind of lean on to help you out on certain things without, you know, kind of pushing the friendship too hard? I think that COVID exhausted us, to be quite frank, as well. And a lot of couples and just society in general are still feeling the effects of that they still want to get married and they want to do it in a way that is beautiful without compromising too much. But they also don’t want to have to roll their sleeves up and be tackling, you know, learning how to do calligraphy every Tuesday night for the year in the advance to the wedding, so. Or dipping skulls of cows in acid like that we had to do for Amy’s.

Mel & Amy: Yeah. I asked a lot of my family and friends, and I formally apologised. You heard it here first. They were. They were absolute troopers.

Mel & Amy: Yeah. There was a lot on. So I think, yeah, DIY is a balance. We are definitely seeing more of an anti DIY movement. But also you’ve got to, you know, like, it’s.

Mel & Amy: It’s all well and good for us to sit here and say that, too, without, like, you got to fit it into your budget. So it’s just figuring out about what’s the kind of stuff that you feel like you can execute, who can you lean on to help you there and for everything else that you actually really want. And that’s a priority to you. Make sure you bring in a shithot team to life. Don’t stress yourself out.

Mel & Amy: DIY done for you. I feel like there’s a Venn diagram here as well.

Eddy: Oh, absolutely.

Aleks: Are you noting down the Venn diagrams.

Eddy: That we need to draw on 20 Venn diagrams?

Mel & Amy: All five.

Aleks: Right, we’ll do. Don’t let the girls have to do one.

Mel & Amy: Eddy would be drunk if he was drinking.

Eddy: Oh, my God. Yes. I’d be on the floor.

Aleks: Right. So, look, I think the. I think the summary is. Everyone get the book? Yeah.

Eddy: Available in all major stores.

Mel & Amy: Online.

Aleks: No, I honestly, this book is great. There is so much stuff. How long do you think it would take to read cover to cover?

Mel & Amy: Oh, that’s a really good question. We need a tester. We need a tester. Yeah, but it’s 392 pages.

Aleks: It’s chunky, but it’s reasonable, reasonably sized font. It’s good.

Mel & Amy: I like the size. Yeah. There’s not too much on each page. Maybe a week. You could smash it out.

Mel & Amy: A weekend with a bottle of wine. I don’t know. Yeah. I will say it is designed so that you can pick it up and jump in wherever you need to. So it’s very handily marked into kind of chronological chapters.

Mel & Amy: So getting started, the planning, the lead up on the day and after the day.

Eddy: Yep.

Mel & Amy: And you can just jump in wherever you need to and easily kind of find your feet.

Eddy: I’ve got to say that I love seeing pages and pages in there for after the big day as well. That was a surprise for me.

Aleks: Yeah.

Mel & Amy: You know, I think it’s important, and there’s kind of an analogy here in child in, like, having babies as well. Like, there’s so much focus when you are pregnant on the lead up to the thing and the birth, which, you know, in this case is the wedding day, but then you’ve got the whole fucking child.

Aleks: All right, we have to put our explicit warning on now for Apple podcasts. I hope people aren’t listening in the car with their kids, but whatever, it’s fine.

Mel & Amy: I’m so sorry.

Aleks: I love this analogy. Yes. 60 years to worry about.

Mel & Amy: After the birthday, you’ve got a marriage to tend. Right. And so you just want to make sure that it’s. The focus doesn’t end after the day, because also, that’s when people can fall into a post wedding slump. So just think about what happens afterwards.

Mel & Amy: Have stuff to get excited about. That’s, you know, that you’ve got on the radar beyond the day, and just. I think it’s important to remember what it’s all about. And that is the fact that you guys get to start a marriage with a bang, which is the wedding, but it really is the marriage to come. That is the main event.

Eddy: Exactly. And that’s why you may hear this, too, or you definitely would. This is why I love when some couples kind of postpone, if they’re doing a honeymoon, they postpone their honeymoon for, like, six months, sometimes to a year, because that’s something you can continually kind of look forward to, that is bolted onto your wedding as just an additional celebration.

Aleks: Yeah. And also coming on our podcast to relive your day six months later.

Eddy: Oh, yeah, we did that.

Mel & Amy: Exactly. We’re just helping. You guys are just curing those post wedding blues. It’s wonderful.

Aleks: Correct. It’s a real thing. It’s a real thing. I do feel it is a real thing.

Mel & Amy: Yes.

Aleks: Ed, would you like to ask your favourite question, which we didn’t put on the list that we sent?

Aleks: It’s gonna really throw you off if you haven’t listened to this podcast.

Eddy: That’s true. So you have to answer individually. The question is, what song will get you onto the dance floor?

Mel & Amy: Who wants to jump Richie Valens Lubumba.

Eddy: Oh, love it.

Mel & Amy: It’s so easy. So easy. Yeah. For me. For me, it’s grooves in the heart by d lite.

Mel & Amy: I feel like classic. Just always a goodie.

Aleks: Beautiful.

Eddy: That’s the song that keeps on giving.

Aleks: Because it’s like, what?

Eddy: And then it goes into that cool outro.

Mel & Amy: I love that.

Eddy: Yeah. Like, as a dj, like, I’m just gonna play this whole thing. I’m not mixing out of this.

Mel & Amy: This is an adventure.

Aleks: It is an adventure.

Mel & Amy: Amy and I went to the Flight Facilities decades tour on Sunday. Slight plug for that. It was. Oh, it was awesome. It was so, so good.

Aleks: We went as well.

Eddy: We went as well.

Aleks: Yes.

Eddy: Unfortunately, it was a school night for us. We had two big, big weddings on, so we can only stay to just.

Aleks: After the 19 finished.

Eddy: And then we had the bow, which was sad. We wish we could split ourselves in two sometimes. And we can stay there, but also be not tired for the next day.

Aleks: It was.

Mel & Amy: You were there for the best eras there.

Eddy: Yeah, we figured as much.

Aleks: We were saying we want to do some sort of, like, did I play.

Eddy: Ghostbusters for you guys as well? When they kicked off the eighties, was it just us?

Mel & Amy: No, it was Ghostbusters. Yeah.

Eddy: Awesome.

Aleks: It was so funny because, like, as D. As DJ, it’s so hard to go out and just enjoy, like, a gig without being, oh, yeah.

Eddy: I had to yell at analysing it. I told Alex off. I’m like, stop thinking about a wedding.

Aleks: That’s because you’re sober. Okay, lesson learned. You’re like, I always forget to play this song gonna put in my library. And you just like, it’s not ruined for you, but you just can’t help but think. But anyway, at one point, the sound completely just went, like, their equipment failed.

Mel & Amy: Oh, no.

Aleks: And it lasted a while. Like, I would say two minutes, three minutes, and others. I was just like, happens to everyone. I know that it’s happened to me, but I’m like, okay.

Eddy: Like, it’s cool.

Aleks: I mean, well, we’ve had a big.

Eddy: Drink the other day.

Aleks: Oh, let’s not talk about that.

Mel & Amy: Oh, I’m so sorry. We’ve been there. We’ve been there. But, um. That’s depressing.

Aleks: Yeah, it is. But, yeah, but it does happen. So it’s like. And even for the end that they took it in their stride and just sang and just went on, and people.

Eddy: Were just like, yeah, you know, it happens.

Aleks: Yeah, go to the bar, have a drink, whatever. So it was a good.

Mel & Amy: Oh, I think I saw that on TikTok. Did they do, like, a start a big math sing along?

Eddy: Yeah, I think they did. The DJ otzi. Hey.

Aleks: Yeah, that’s right. Of course it was on TikTok.

Eddy: Yeah, of course.

Mel & Amy: I’m so young when I say that.

Aleks: I know you’re so young.

Mel & Amy: So young. I’m such a TikToker.

Aleks: It is a bit.

Mel & Amy: It’s.

Aleks: It’s, um. I only went on, like, a few months ago, and I thought, oh, might be one of those people who, like, goes on for hours. Unfortunately, I don’t have hours a day, so. Or fortunately. But once you do.

Aleks: So I open it very infrequently, but when I do, I can see it does. The algorithm.

Eddy: The algorithm is amazing.

Mel & Amy: Yeah, it is. It is so amazing and so scary about, like, what a vortex you go into. Yeah. Yeah. I’m the same.

Mel & Amy: I try and avoid it. I say that I go on there for business, but then, like, an hour passes and I haven’t posted anything, and you just feel terrible about yourself and your life, so it’s dangerous. So. This is so relatable.

Aleks: So many people with the, like, cleanest freaking houses and crazy shit in their drawer, like, for organizing stuff, I’m like, what am I doing in my life?

Mel & Amy: My soul, I love.

Aleks: I have a soul.

Mel & Amy: I love that. That’s your algorithm. Yeah, sure. I’m getting. I’m gonna start searching that because my.

Mel & Amy: My algorithm’s so cooked. It’s like. I think because my son wanted to look up, which is not good to have. Yeah. He wanted to look up sea creatures on it.

Mel & Amy: And so I’ve got, like, sea creatures and then just like. Yeah, anyway, it’s cool.

Aleks: You can just. You can just, you know, just do a hard press and do not interested. And it changes it pretty quickly, so.

Mel & Amy: Yeah. Okay. Yeah, no, I did not think about that. Yep. Now I sound young.

Eddy: I thought of you trolling through these, like, giant octopuses.

Mel & Amy: Like, just get rid of this octopi.

Eddy: Octopi isn’t octopuses.

Aleks: I don’t know, I’m just pretty sure it’s octopuses. Okay.

Mel & Amy: I mean, it is pretty cool. Let’s.

Aleks: Yeah, it is.

Mel & Amy: We might have. We might have to ask Amy’s son if it’s octopuses or octopi. Yes.

Aleks: Please report back now. We’ve got the book. Look, we’re going to put, obviously, a link to where everyone can purchase it.

Mel & Amy: Thank you.

Aleks: And we’re very excited for you. We hope it goes well. We know that it will.

Eddy: No doubt, no doubt.

Aleks: Thank you for joining us and offering so many amazing insights. We really appreciate it. And for starting our season off.

Eddy: So good.

Mel & Amy: Double FM, it’s all happening today.

Eddy: Yeah.

Mel & Amy: Oh, thanks so much for having us. Such a lovely time talking to you guys. Indeed. Thank you so much.

Aleks: Thanks, guys. We’ll chat to you soon.

Eddy: Cheers, guys.

Aleks: Bye. Thanks for tuning in. If you’re enjoying project engaged, please hit the subscribe button on your fave podcast app.

Eddy: You can also follow us on Instagram, @projectengaged, and @onemoresongdjs.

Aleks: We’ll see you next time. And until then, have fun out there.