Meet Ashley McElroy of Something Fabulous Weddings & Events

Today we’d like to introduce you to Ashley McElroy and Trent Crumpler, Co-founders of Something Fabulous Weddings and Events.

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
Trent and I met in high school while working at Old Navy!

Our friendship blossomed over late nights folding clothes and working through Black Fridays. We constantly talked of opening a business together in the future and we always said it would be “something fabulous.” We both attended UNCW (Go Seahawks!) after high school and were roommates after college. After planning my own wedding, we knew that planning weddings were our new passion.

We opened our small business a few months later and named it Something Fabulous! We’ve been going strong ever since and have steadily grown our business since 2017. We have put our heart and soul into our business and have grown it from doing six weddings a year to sixty weddings a year!

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Our first hurdle was really learning how to market ourselves and sell to potential clients. After we got our first few positive reviews, business was really able to take off. We were added to the preferred vendor list of many local wedding venues and that really gave us the confidence to grow our business.

Our largest struggle to date though would be surviving the COVID-19 pandemic when your business relies on events taking place! We lost approximately 80% of our planned business in 2020 due to the pandemic. Thankfully, most of our couples rescheduled their weddings and didn’t cancel them, however, that certainly had an effect on our bottom line.

COVID also put a damper on the enthusiasm and excitement surrounding large events. It was a hard time to stay positive while adjusting to smaller guest counts and continuous COVID setbacks.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
Something Fabulous Weddings & Events plans weddings and other special events across North Carolina. We are a team of seven that represents our brand and we pride ourselves on being authentic while creating events. We offer event management, partial planning, and full planning services.

We specialize in creating fun, personalized events for our couples. We want each wedding to be unique and to be a representation of our couple. We spend a great deal of time getting to know our clients and welcoming them to the Something Fabulous family. We want to create a relationship with them that lasts long after their wedding day is over.

Being inclusive and open to serving all couples is one of our brand trademarks. Love is love and we want everyone to feel welcomed and accepted.

Let’s talk about our city – what do you love? What do you not love?
We love the Raleigh area! We love that the city is becoming more diverse while growing exponentially!

There truly is something for everyone in Raleigh. Some of our favorite aspects include the various downtown restaurants and bars, the museums, and the shop local culture that abounds in the area.

We would love for Raleigh to continue to grow and incorporate various cultures throughout the city!

Pricing:

• $2000- Event Management Package
• $3,500- Partial Planning Package
• $4,500- Full-Service Planning Package

Contact Info:

• Email: somethingfabulousweddings@gmail.com
• Website: https://www.somethingfabulousweddings.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somethingfabulousweddings/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somethingfabulousweddings

Image Credits
Sarah Reaves Photography