I was asked yesterday about the purpose of the wedding keepsake, a bridal horseshoe. My customers were a young Chinese woman and her mother. I stumbled through, saying it represented a wish of luck for the bride on her wedding day – to be given after the ceromony. The giving of a horseshoe is something they had not heard of before. They loved the idea of it bringing luck for the bride and bought one. Judging by the animation of the conversation between them, I expect to sell more to other guests before the wedding.
The encounter made me realise I didn’t know enough about the history of the bridal horseshoe or wedding keepsakes generally. Check out The Brides Diary for one example of more on this subject.
Product knowledge is very important and maybe I am not as advanced as others on this. I know that for our Sophie Randall business we have a booklet we have put together explaining religious occasions and the difference between baptism, confirmation and other similar religious occasions. The wedding horseshoe encounter has convinced me to expand this to add wedding tradition information along with details of traditions for other occasions for which we sell products – graduation, twenty-first birthdays and the like.
The ultimate booklet I see for our newsagencies is something which we can have behind the counter to answer questions, help with card choice and help with gift selection. Then I will be ready if I’m asked about a tradition like bridal horseshoes.
Thank you for having something straight-forward about the giving of the horseshoe keepsake at a wedding… i had been hunting for the timing of giving this gift and your site had it simply as AFTER the ceremony. My daughter gets married next week and I have bought a bell (my nickname for her is bel (belinda)) and the traditional horseshoe with a gold butterfly on it (her theme is the butterfly) I am most grateful to say THANK YOU THANK YOU….Beverley – Yarrawonga Vic.