It will be hard to forget … we were in the car driving north to my grandfather’s funeral when I got the first email from a 2020 couple letting us know they were planning to postpone their wedding to 2021. News of COVID-19 was becoming more prevalent each day and yet we had absolutely no idea what was coming. I remember saying to Caleb after reading that first email, “Oh my gosh. This could seriously affect us if people aren’t able to have large gatherings.” It sounds ridiculous now but at that point, I hadn’t even considered how this virus would directly affect our business.
Slowly but surely, 10 of our 15 weddings postponed to next year and we found ourselves with a summer calendar that was … wide open. We experienced a lot of different emotions in those beginning weeks but truthfully, we were really scared about what was going to happen. We knew we needed to plan and so we had several “meetings” about how to proceed for the remainder of 2020.
In the past, we have not been able to take on new clients for family sessions as “photo season” in general for Wisconsin is during our beautiful, warm, summer months … when we are also shooting weddings! We would get tons of inquiries for family sessions but always had to pass on them as we simply did not have time to do it all. This year, however, we DID have time! We posted that we were opening up to new families for 2020 and the response was overwhelming. I was able to photograph 25 families this year, including a few additional portrait sessions for businesses, seniors, and anniversaries.
We could NEVER say THANK YOU enough to everyone who hired us this year. Your business has kept our business alive and this means more to our family than we could ever adequately express. It has been so fun and SPECIAL to meet and get to know you. Again, from the bottom of our hearts, thank you.
Thank you also to everyone who has referred us to their friends or family, shared our business and social media posts, bought prints, and sent words of love, support, and encouragement. We are so, so, SO grateful for you. I know I already said it but it has been truly overwhelming.
To conclude, we shared in that initial post many months ago that we would be donating 10% of all portrait session sales in 2020 to organizations serving those most affected by COVID-19. We specifically chose to give to REAP Food Group’s ‘Farm to Families’ Fund, Middleton Outreach Ministry, and Blue Plate Catering’s ‘Feed the Frontlines’ Initiative. In October we were able to donate $510 to these organizations and overall, we have donated $1500. THANK YOU.
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