Love in the Time of Coronavirus

We know that the stock market is crashing, and Japan has just about shut down, but other fall-out from the pandemic has resulted in chaos as Chinese products slow down and markets close. Just think about how this global shut down has impacted the wedding industry.

According to a recent CNN business report, rock lobsters along the western Australian coast are waiting in their tanks for consumers, as their main market remains all but closed.

Since China is the leading supplier of wedding gowns, many brides throughout the world may find they cannot get the dress of their dreams for their summer wedding as Chinese factories have been closed for most of this month, and wedding gowns are already a month delayed. Here’s hoping their mothers and aunts saved their wedding dresses, or the brides can forage for a fortuitous thrift store find!

China is also the maker of most prom dresses, so let’s hope America’s high school students (or their parents) can sew or thrift. If you are feeling particularly generous, this might be the perfect time to dig out that gown that’s two sizes too small and two decades out of fashion and take it to the local Salvation Army.

The honeymoon and wedding travel market has already been hit hard as a result of the virus. In a February 24th Fox Business News article, Jack Ezon, founder and managing partner at Embark Beyond, a luxury travel company, reported that 98% of couples who planned on going to China had canceled their trips in January and February, and 60% had canceled for March. He added that nearly 80 % of his company’s newlyweds who had planned to travel during the month of March to Southeast Asian destinations like Chiang Mai, Phuket and Bangkok in Thailand and Siem Reap, Cambodia, have decided to rebook to another destination.