This week we’d like to share with you some ideas on when and how to reschedule events, trips, and more due to the pandemic since 80% of Americans are under Stay at Home orders! We were planning on sharing this blog post and information next week, but it seemed important as everyone is dealing with uncertainty during the Stay at Home quarantine for this pandemic. Let’s start with the obvious in this infographic that we made ourselves with a saying that’s been going around with photographers for weeks (and the wording originated before March 19th from a Professional Photographer somewhere outside of the Midwest):
A Party is Not More Important Than the Lives of your Loved Ones
If you had an event planned for March, April, or even May, you need to look into rescheduling your event. Your event is not more important than the LIVES of anyone in attendance or the lives that those in attendance effect. Obviously we as Professional Full-Time Wedding Photographers are very stressed as we watch our clients struggle and stress even more about their upcoming 2020 weddings. We hate to see them suffer. For the FIRST ever time in our 10 years in business we had to tell a couple that we couldn’t photograph their event (a small legal pre-wedding in Chicago prior to their big August wedding). It was the literal toughest decision of our careers, but was apparently correct since the night before the small event, Illinois/ Chicago instated a Stay at Home for the entire STATE (since the Mayor of Chicago had failed to do so just 2 evenings prior during that Wednesday’s televised talk).
We would NEVER want to disappoint any couples/ clients OR have anything momentous go unphotographed, SO at this time we HIGHLY recommend that ANY April 2020 wedding or event 100% CHANGE DATES to later in 2020 or even 2021. The PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES along with our U.S. government has extended the Stay at Home urging folks to STAY HOME until the start of MAY! This means that even hundreds of person weddings that have been planned for over a year or two need to be pushed back. It’s about patience. Most of our couples have been together a whopping 5 to 8 years before getting married, so they more than most would understand the virtues of patience & wisdom. This virus stays in the air for hours, on metal surfaces for 3 days, on paper products for 1 full day, on cold/ frozen things for 14 days, and in urine for 17 days-!! Per “Lydia Bourouiba, an associate professor at MIT, has researched the dynamics of exhalations (coughs and sneezes, for instance) for years at The Fluid Dynamics of Disease Transmission Laboratory and found exhalations cause gaseous clouds that can travel up to 27 feet.” This means that even if we take crappy photos from a far distance with our longer lenses while shouting to direct our clients who we’re facing within a large group of people, we’re still being unethical directing people (and watching people) be within 27 feet of one another with NO ONE in the room having been tested for the Corona Virus (since there aren’t enough tests to go around right now as of April 2020).
How our 2020 Wedding Couples are Rescheduling
We’re going to share with you what some of our 2020 wedding couples have been battling with. We already mentioned, but we’ll share more about a few more here: Even though one of our 11 hour wedding day May couples was working with us on their wedding day schedule in the first days of March, it soon became quiet across the board with all of our clients. In mid-March we shot an email to ALL of our 2020 wedding couples, Portrait Session clients, and Engagement Session clients to let them know that we’re ready to reschedule anything that needs to be rescheduled, we hope that they’re healthy, we sent the CDC website on Covid-19 (physical and mental health info), and tried to make them laugh. Some answered and some did not.
We 100% believe that you should reschedule April 2020 weddings. May 2020 may need to be rescheduled as well, so all Spring weddings need to reach out to their venues AND wedding photographers to find out about potential DATES that weddings can be pushed to. If you have a popular venue, you can consider Friday or weekdays for the full wedding day OR be prepared for 2021 to host your new wedding date. No matter what, it’s most important to be patient and SAFE!
For help and guidance on when to re-schedule for, here are some projections of the stats on the virus per state for the main states that we have weddings scheduled in for 2020:
**As you can see here in Indiana our numbers are MUCH lower than Illinois & Michigan. We live on the border of Michigan (10 minutes away) and are an hour from Illinois/ Chicago! That may impact our area, but for now we’re glad that our worst numbers look to slow down at the start of JUNE!
**As you can see here, Illinois (where Chicago is) a little over an hour away from us is projecting MUCH higher numbers for the projections. Illinois has dropped from the 4th worst state to the 7th most infected due to their aggressive Stay at Home action! Their curve looks to be much more spread out than Michigan’s (below) which is a good thing. Because of this, cases will hopefully start to peter out more so by June 1st.
**Sadly just 10 minutes over the border in Michigan numbers have risen! This means that they will hit their highest number of deaths in one day first out of our 3 states. Because of that, numbers should drop by May 1st when is the 1st day Trump projects that we may be able to leave the house. They are now the 4th worst in the nation. A lot of this can be due to Detroit and other busy cities, but we also noticed that businesses closed MUCH later than Indiana’s due to a belated Stay at Home on Michigan’s part.
What May 2020 Couples are Dealing with
During one of the daily Covid-19 televised government updates Trump had mentioned that a Stay at Home may last up to 8 weeks. We quickly calculated and the one couple we’d been chatting with a couple weeks earlier was spared of this potential deadline. His statement meant that it could last until mid-May and their wedding is on May 25th. We waited to hear back from them because we know that they in particular were probably under immense stress as we’ve been working with them on their wedding plans for ALMOST TWO YEARS since August 2018. Both are in their last couple months of their college education at 2 universities outside of their hometown (here- South Bend, IN), AND have an upcoming HUGE move from Indiana to the East Coast to their new life coming up in July (for their new jobs there). We finally heard from them. One of them studies art, so it was particularly hard for them to pack up their art studio and head to learn from home. Both are together though, luckily, so they’ve been able to discuss their new plans.
Though it was 10 weeks from their wedding rather than Trump’s “maybe 8 weeks” decree, these two acted quickly and cancelled their reception portion of their wedding which was set to be at The Brick= a gorgeous industrial chic venue in South Bend. They told friends that they’ll be having a celebration/ reception likely in the summer of 2021, but that they’ll only be having a small ceremony on their original May date at the ceremony spot- the gorgeous plant conservatory- with a small amount of their family. We’re still waiting to help plan with them, but want to give them space to let them finish up their classes. They said that they do want us to still photograph their ceremony at the conservatory, but it’s still up in the air on whether it will still happen in May depending on how the virus is spreading. They may have to push the entire wedding day back to later in 2020 or 2021 at the latest. Only time will tell, but we 100% plan on still photographing their ENTIRE amount of hours whether that be spread out on 2 different days OR whether that be on a later date full day!
June 2020 Couples Preparing for Back-Up Plans Just in Case
Luckily all of our couples and clients are very intelligent, wise, and caring. Because of this, all of our May and June wedding couples have been trouble-shooting to potentially plan for the worst. They aren’t changing their plans at all yet, but know that things may need to change depending on how the Pandemic goes in the United States, so they’ve already reached out to their wedding ceremony and wedding reception locations-! The Basilica of the Sacred Heart for example told our couples that they’re still allowed to have small wedding ceremonies on their pre-planned wedding date. The reception venues are also flexible, so if need be their wedding receptions can be on a completely different (safer) later date! Some couples are debating whether this is their ideal plan or whether they want to reschedule the entire day to another date so that EVERYONE can be there and safe for both their ceremony and reception.
We totally feel for everyone who is nervous and think that reaching out FIRST to your VENUES and PROFESSIONAL PHOTOGRAPHERS are key! Knowing the availability of those is immensely important in finding your ideal back-up plan. Many retainer fees are non-refundable, so trying to coordinate the 2 venues and 1 photographer is important in keeping those fees. The service industry is here to SERVE you, so flexibility on all our parts is of the utmost importance to us! One reminder: You can do a LEGAL wedding with the two of you (and a few others) like our March 21st couple did and LATER have your full church & reception venue wedding day later in the year or next year if you absolutely need or want to be wed on your original wedding date-! We know that for religious reasons this may not be ideal for you, but this is a literal unprecedented pandemic.
What this Means for Small Businesses (LLCs)
Obviously we’re a small business. We’ve been in business and capturing weddings as professional photographers for over 10 years and upon moving back to the Midwest re-branded our business almost 5 years ago (along with the new business bank account, business checks, business debit cards, business LLC registration with a new name, etc). We’ve weathered many storms in Professional Photograph in the past 10 years in 4 states (Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, California). To us as small business owners obviously it’s a scary time. The government sending out checks is extremely important to us especially after the wedding Low Season and our Spring clients needing to change wedding dates back (thus likely not paying the remainder 50% of our fees for more months/ maybe a full year). This is normally when things ramp up for us for Wedding Season. Our clients scheduled us for their weddings back in 2019 paying their 50% retainer fees up front with their contracts, so we’ve been impatiently waiting to fulfill our job as their wedding photographer since then. We also help plan the wedding day schedule, but for many this has come to a screeching HALT. Since they don’t know whether to reschedule their May & June weddings, they don’t know whether we can even plan a full day schedule for them!
In this stressful time though, we’re SO glad that we own our home & that we made our newest Homeowners Insurance monthly payments (as we’d literally just moved to a different insurance company with a new policy in early March). We’re SO glad that everyone is prioritizing the HEALTH of the people in this nation, their families, their friends, & strangers. We’re so happy that Jenny’s parents randomly gifted us food for our 3 pets and a grocery gift card weeks ago. The most important thing at hand in the world is that we keep as many as possible from literal DEATH from this awful virus. In order to do that, we have to be responsible. MONEY and IMPATIENCE are not more important than ANYONE’S LIFE. ANYONE. We take VERY seriously keeping our clients healthy. The point of these events, wedding day, etc is for people to be happy and to celebrate. How happy can we be if we know that the event being held in THAT moment will kill some of the guests…? These guests were invited because they’re LOVED by the bride & groom and their loved ones.
The last thing in the entire world that we want is for anyone who attends an event to get Covid-19 or to pass it on. For this reason, we’re holding our stress at bay and are here to HELP OTHERS. We are doing this by Staying at Home (haven’t gotten groceries in over 2 weeks because we stocked up well), being open to fully changing wedding dates OR photographing for our clients over 2 completely separate days (maybe months or a year apart) if the reception has to be a different day than the ceremony, and more. We’re here to help make things easier rather than harder, so as long as our couples communicate well with us giving us dates that their venues can reschedule to (making sure we aren’t already photographing another 11 hour wedding that day), then we’re good to go and can do everything in our power to make new wedding schedule details-!
We also made this little banner. If you’d like to use it too, please ask us first and credit our business at: @JennyandJasonPhoto on Instagram or Facebook. ((We used the wording itself from other photographers who have been sharing the words, so if you were the originator of the wording, let us know and we will credit you))!
Advice to other Small Businesses & Photographers
We think that our friend of 4 years Patty (a Michigan Professional Photographer who has hired us for a Portrait Session before) said it best when she posted this PSA below. This is a friendly reminder to photographers and everyone that what you do does make an impact AND that ETHICS are STILL IMPORTANT IN BUSINESS.
Personal Implications
Personally for us, this is also very stressful. We have both worked VERY hard to communicate well with one another and keep our pets thriving (easier said than done with a 7 month old rescue Border Collie puppy). Jason’s twin brother had our first ever niece 6.5 months ago (we’ll share more photos from that particular trip to California next Weekly Wednesday) making us an uncle & aunt for the first time AND Jenny’s only sibling (sister) is having their baby coming up in 3 months. It looks like we’ll have to push back her Arizona baby shower, cancel Jenny’s flights (free for one rescheduling THANKFULLY due to Covid-19), and try to re-schedule her baby shower. This may mean going to Arizona twice within mere WEEKS for a potential new Baby Shower in Arizona in early to mid-June, baby birth shortly after (end of June?), and visit to their baby (our newest 2nd niece or nephew within 9.5 months) maybe at the start of July. Amid that we hope to still be photographing grand 11 hour gorgeous wedding days for our couples who finally get to have a celebration after months of quarantine & stress!
We’re also very worried about Jason’s family- especially his 85 year old grandma. His mom, grandma, & uncle all live together in California with his mom still working full-time at a fire station (where 2 firefighters got Covid-19 weeks ago), so we’re stressed to say the least.with California having the 3rd most cases in our 50 states AND all 3 of them have underlying conditions! As we said, Jason’s twin brother has a 6.5 month old daughter and Jenny’s sister is 6 months pregnant. Well… 3 of the 4 of those parents work in healthcare. Jenny’s sister is an Occupational Therapist who works at a hospital and her husband is also an Occupational Therapist. Luckily Jason’s twin brother works for a corporation’s office and can work from home with his baby, but his wife also works in the medical field as a Speech Language Pathologist. We’re SO stressed for our siblings because they are raising babies and they also work in healthcare with NO great options to protect their faces/ bodies from the virus, so we’re worried. Here’s California’s chart on projected deaths during Covid-19 right now in California & Arizona WITH the current Shelter at Home regulations on 80% of the nation:
**You’ll notice that California (above) looks to have their virus spread out all the way to the end of June. California due to its population and 2nd biggest city in the country is the 3rd hardest hit by the virus with their numbers increasing.
**Below you’ll see Arizona. They are 22nd in the country for deaths so far, whereas we in Indiana are 14th. Arizona like the other Midwest states we’ve shown will hopefully start to trail off in deaths by the start of June.
While very stressed, we know that we can’t control everyone, so we’re giving good advice to our families, listening to friends’ worries, actually diagnosed a person with it a week ago, and are trying to be there for people while we Stay at Home. If you want to check your states’ projections, here’s a link to that (that Jenny’s dentist aunt sent us): https://covid19.healthdata.org/projections . We hope that you stay healthy & responsible as we all work through this. We don’t want you or any of your loved ones to die during this or get irreversible damage to their lungs, so we urge you to PLEASE be responsible and change event dates when need be. We’re so sorry for all of the stress that this virus has caused everyone and we’re here to help no matter what!