Aiavish stage, designer lehengas, and massive baraats (wedding processions)—the big fat wedding, which was once fashionable, has now transitioned into close-knit affairs due to the pandemic. While we have made an upgrade from ‘Zoom Weddings’, the status quo is small-scale weddings that usually involve only immediate family. Notions including ‘the bigger, the better’, which Dellhiites have forever associated with the ‘ideal wedding’, is now a thing of the past.
However, as marriage nuptials ceremonies turn into personal affairs, the entire wedding industry—catering services, wedding couture, musical bands for hire, wedding card printers—that completely depend on weddings D-day ceremonies to keep going, are finding it hard to survive because of dwindling profits. A visit to a few wedding card makers in Delhi’s Chawri Bazar on Monday helped us map this change and gauge the latest trends. A digital affair
When Akshay Singla’s sister Neha Singla planned to tie the knot (the wedding took place earlier this month), their families decided to spread the good news via e-card invitations. “The process of distributing cards is very cumbersome. It takes a lot of time to go around and distribute those cards. Thus, we decided to only share an e-card for my sister’s wedding. Even though we did not reduce the number of people at our gathering, e-cards felt like a less complicated way of inviting people,” shares Singla.
Similar to Singla, several others in Delhi-NCR have now started sending virtual wedding invitations. “Customers from Delhi have made a shift to e-cards. They only buy fewer quantities like 5, 10, or 21 cards, as shagun [good omen] and use e-cards to invite other guests,” explains Devender Sharma, owner of Tushar Card and Papers, Chawri Bazar.
With a decline in the number of cards being printed, wedding card makers are incurring huge losses as well. “Even though people buy fewer cards, our production costs stay the same. We print a minimum of 100 cards, anything less than that costs us the same,” shares Anil Nagpal from Royal Card Products, Chawri Bazar.
No change in small cities
While metropolitan cities have made a shift to digital wedding cards, people in neighbouring cities continue distributing these in person that too in large numbers. “Sales are low in urban cities but everything is normal in Tier-2, Tier-3 cities. The demand from these places is still the same,” explains Vasu Gupta of Ram Nath Durga Prashad Co, Chawri Bazar.
Even though the demand remains the same, people usually seek cards that are cheaper, unlike those in Delhi who prefer extravagant options. “Earlier, people would buy extremely elaborate cards, but they now feel it is extra expenditure and hence prefer buying cheaper cards,” adds Gupta.