Step aside drive-thru weddings and social media trading groups, corporate sponsorship may just be the latest in unique wedding trends.
Jason Mielke and Rebecca Hansen, a couple in Moose Jaw, Sask., have set up a website to crowdfund their wedding by asking for corporate sponsors. Since launching two days ago, they’ve managed to secure a number of donations, including the bride’s and maid of honour’s dresses, flowers, and a gluten-free wedding cake.
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“We’re promoters of change,” Hansen tells Global News. “There’s a lot of stress on young couples today and high costs incurred in organizing a wedding. This is an idea we launched to say, ‘hey, you don’t have to do it all alone.’ There is so much care out there and people love to get involved in peoples’ lives.”
In return for the items and services donated, Mielke and Hansen will offer the companies a speaking engagement where they’ll share their story of “hope and transformation, and illumination of identity,” Hansen says. “That’s the transaction of life.”
Both Mielke and Hansen have a history of upheaval — he escaped an abusive home growing up and she survived domestic violence at the hands of her ex-husband. In addition, Mielke lost his job in January. But he wasn’t going to let that prevent him from marrying Hansen in a fashion they both feel is necessary for an occasion like this.
That’s when he came up with the idea of getting corporate sponsors to fund their wedding.
Their dream wedding comes with a long list of dreamy wants, too. They include makeup, hair and nail services for the bride and maid of honour, wedding rings, cigars for the groom, limousine transportation for the day of the wedding, and a honeymoon at the Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise complete with spa services.
No one would be faulted for thinking that some of the wish list items are extravagant, but Hansen says it’s all about perspective.
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“This is an opportunity for growth and new ways of thinking. We each carry our own ideas of what a celebration should look like. Ours is bringing all the elements together to create a picturesque wedding like in a movie.”
And the way Mielke sees it, it’s a win-win for all involved.
“We’re still looking for a major sponsor and I’m offering to put their corporate logo on the back of my suit jacket. It’ll bring them global recognition,” he says. “It’s a chance to get on board a viral story and get publicity.”
Right now, he says the offers are coming in “faster than we can jot them down,” and the couple has received donations from companies across Canada, as well as in the U.S. and the U.K. Their wedding is scheduled for Nov. 25 in Moose Jaw, and although they don’t have a headcount yet, they’re hoping to keep it to 100 guests, which means corporate sponsorships are welcome but the members of the companies are not.
“We want to concentrate on the power of partnership,” Hansen says. “A sponsorship is a gift that opens the door to create new relationships and deepen the quality of those relationships. It’s a reciprocal reward.”
No word yet on whether they’ll create their own loyalty card in lieu of a wedding hashtag.
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