The Wedding Owl

Name: The Wedding Owl
Address: 16 Laurel Close, Folkestone, CT203PP, GB
Telephone: +447957218340
Price range: $

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A helping achieve more.

06/10/2026

Attracting top talent to smaller wedding venues

How to Attract the Right Team When You’re Not Yet Playing in the Premier League

So the next time you are recruiting if your venue isn’t luxurious, don’t pretend it is. Instead, talk truefully:
“We’re growing.”
“We’re investing.”
“We’re ambitious.”
“We’re building something special.”

Those words will attract candidated who enjoy building, improving, creating and learning. Those are often exactly the people you need.

Create Silverware Before You Win It Football clubs celebrate promotion. Wedding venues often wait for awards before talking about success. Don’t, celebrate
- every five-star review.
- every successful wedding
- returning suppliers or suppliers who share their content at your venue.
- team and individual achievements.
- record enquiry numbers.
- the apprentice who has just mastered wedding planning.
- the gardener who transformed an overlooked corner into everyone’s favourite photograph.

Winning cultures are built long before the trophies arrive. The venues that consistently attract exceptional people aren’t always the biggest or the richest. They’re the ones with ambition.

Fleur Challis Photography
House of Mimi Fleur
Cobi & Coco Cakes
Bilsington Priory
Bilsington Priory
The Wedding Owl Business Consultant
E-Lope®️

29/09/2026

Some people will eventually leave your wedding venue, but I say celebrate that.

If your former team members are becoming venue managers, operations directors and business owners, your venue has become an academy of excellence.

Football clubs are proud when their academy graduates play for England.Wedding venues should feel exactly the same.

Leadership Is Your Greatest Competitive Advantage!!

Historic buildings can be bought.

Gardens can be redesigned.

Bedrooms can be refurbished.

Leadership cannot. People rarely leave beautiful buildings. They leave poor managers. Likewise, people will stay in modest surroundings for remarkably long periods if they feel respected, challenged and appreciated. Culture beats architecture every single time.

So next time you are recruiting don’t pretend to be something you’re not Today’s workforce spots empty promises immediately.

With kind thanks to
Wadhurst Castle
Rebecca Carpenter | Wedding Photographer & Content Creator

22/09/2026

Invest in you.

As the 2026 wedding season draws to a close, this is the time to invest not just in your venue, but in yourself and the future of your business.

We understand that as venue owners you and your teams still love weddings. The couples. The anticipation. The planning. The atmosphere. The moment months of work finally come together.

That is not changing. But the business around weddings is.

Staff need to be paid and retained. Buildings need maintaining, heating and insuring. Gardens need caring for. Marketing needs funding. Costs are rising and competition across Kent is fierce.

So the questions are not:

What can we do to get more weddings or instead of weddings? It is:

How can we make the business around the weddings we love stronger?

Could the spaces, skills, team and infrastructure you already have generate additional revenue?

Could that extra income improve cash flow, retain good people and protect the business you have worked so hard to build?

That is why I think Untapped matters.

Created by wedding venue consultant Kelly Chandler, Untapped is a private forum for venue owners and senior event leaders looking at additional revenue, diversification and opportunities they may not yet have considered.

Not diversification for the sake of it.

Not turning your beautiful wedding venue into something it was never meant to be. But finding revenue that fits your venue, your people and your brand.

📍 Moxhull Hall, near Birmingham
📅 Monday 16 & Tuesday 17 November 2026

Quote TheWeddingOwlUntapped when booking to receive £60 off your ticket.

Sometimes the next revenue stream is not another building, another bedroom or another huge investment, it just needs tapping into!

Link in bio.

14/09/2026

Wedding venues often advertise for experienced coordinators. Sometimes that’s exactly what’s needed. But some of the industry’s greatest stars arrived with no wedding experience at all, me included!

Cabin crew.
Luxury retail.
Restaurant managers.
Retail managers.

What we shared wasn’t a wedding CV. It was emotional intelligence, curiosity, resilience and an obsession with looking after people.

Skills can be taught. Attitude rarely can.

So why not build a reputation as the venue that develops talent. Imagine becoming known as the venue where careers begin.

The place where:
- young coordinators receive exceptional mentoring.
-chefs are encouraged to innovate.
- gardeners are trusted to experiment.
- marketing teams learn commercial thinking rather than simply posting on Instagram.

Fleur Challis
House of Mimi Fleur
Trafalgar Tavern Events
The Wedding Owl Business Consultant

08/09/2026

Attracting top talent to a smaller wedding venue isn’t always about competing on salary or prestige.

People rarely remember the salary that first attracted them. They remember the manager who believed in them. The responsibility they were trusted with. The skills they learned. The confidence they gained.And the pride of realising just how capable they had become.

So perhaps the question isn’t:

“Why would someone want to work here?”

It’s:

“What could they become because they worked here?”

For smaller wedding venues, that can be an incredibly powerful proposition.

Recruit for character before experience.
You can teach systems, processes and service standards.

It is much harder to teach warmth, curiosity, resilience, initiative and genuine hospitality.

With kind thanks to
Emma Migden
Food The Curious Eatery

31/08/2026

Attracting top talent to smaller wedding venues

The best employees don’t simply choose the most beautiful venue. They choose the place where they believe they can become the best version of themselves.

Think Like a Football Manager
Every young footballer dreams of playing in the Premier League.
Very few start there.
The smartest clubs don’t compete on history or trophies. They compete on opportunity. They offer first-team football, excellent coaching, a clear pathway and the chance to be noticed.
Wedding venues should think exactly the same way.

If you cannot compete on prestige today, compete on potential. Sell the Journey, Not Just the Job.

The Dorchester
Fleur Challis
The Wedding Owl Business Consultant

25/08/2026

Every wedding venue owner dreams of building a team that delivers unforgettable hospitality. Yet many quietly ask themselves the same question:
“Why would the best people come to us when they could work for one of the country’s most prestigious venues?”

It’s a fair question.

If you’re a new wedding venue, an independent family business or a venue finding its place in the marketplace, or perhaps it's been a failing business for a while, you probably don’t have the reputation or the pull of a five-star country house, the grandeur of a castle or the social media following that makes people queue for vacancies.

But here’s the good news….

Read next weeks installment.

18/08/2026

Couples who feel genuinely valued become advocates.

They recommend you. They leave thoughtful reviews. They talk about the experience of working with your team, not simply how beautiful your venue looked.

And that kind of recommendation is impossible to buy.

As the wedding industry becomes increasingly competitive, venues will continue investing heavily in attracting new enquiries.

But the strongest businesses will also invest in the relationships they already have. Because every delighted couple has the potential to become part of your marketing team.

So perhaps the most important question isn’t:

“How do we generate more enquiries?”

It’s:

“How memorable do we make the couples who have already chosen us feel?”

Because when previous couples continue telling your story for you, retention becomes reputation — and reputation becomes acquisition.

With knd thanks to
Matt | Film Photographer 🎞️
Chapel House Estate Weddings & Events Venue
The Wedding Owl Business Consultant

12/08/2026

The Most Undervalued Marketing Strategy Is about Making your couples feel genuinely appreciated.

Appreciation is rarely found in expensive wedding venue gifts or elaborate gestures. It is demonstrated in consistency in service. It is replying when you said you would. It is remembering the details that matter to your couples.
It is welcoming them back for a planning meeting as though they are familiar faces rather than another appointment in the diary.
It is recognising that, whilst you may host fifty plus weddings a year, they will only experience one.
The strongest venues understand that appreciation doesn’t finish when the final invoice is paid and the damages deposit had been returned.
A handwritten congratulations card. A thoughtful follow-up after the wedding. Liking the couple and their suppliers social media posts,remembering their first anniversary. Inviting former couples to launches. Small gestures like these reinforce that they were never just another booking reference.

Venue: Chapel House Estate Weddings & Events Venue
Organiser and Cake, desserts, favours 𝐻𝒶𝓃𝓃𝒶𝓈 𝒸𝒶𝓀𝑒 𝒸𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓉𝒾𝑜𝓃𝓈 &
Photography@Tomjeavons
Stylist, florist & props

Hand Tied bouquets;
&
Multi Award Winning Wedding Styling & Floristry
Tables and dresser Village Vintage
Stationery:
Consultant: The Wedding Owl Business Consultant
Couple models: Dawn Springate
Bride model: Lᴇɪɢʜ Sɪɴᴅᴇɴ
Model dachshund
Dresses and Vail: VICKI’S BRIDAL BOUTIQUE | KENT BRIDAL SHOP
Makeup: Sarah Bennett | BRIDAL MAKEUP SPECIALIST
Hair: Versastyle by Laura
Celebrant: Simply Ceremonies uk
Ice cream bike: Ice Cream Bikes
Jewellery:Arian Hare Jewellery
Canapés; Full plate catering

05/08/2026

The Most Undervalued Marketing Strategy Is about Making your Couples Feel Genuinely Appreciated.

The relationship between a venue team and its couples is unlike almost any other business transaction.

Couples aren’t simply booking a building. They are placing one of the most important days of their lives into your hands.

How you make them feel throughout that journey will often have a greater impact on your reputation than the beauty of your venue itself.

Fleur Challis Photography
House of Mimi Fleur
Cobi & Coco Cakes
Allington Castle | Kent Venue

VITTLE AND SWIG

Address

16 Laurel Close
Folkestone
CT203PP

Telephone

+447957218340

Website

https://linktr.ee/TheWeddingOwl

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