Planning a wedding, even with the help of a professional planner, tends to involve a lot of toing and froing from one place to another, chasing quotes and hunting for availability. Invariably, this is one of the biggest headaches in the run-up to any wedding.

Only, in this digital age, is all this hassle really necessary? Ben Vincenti, co-founder of recently-launched online portal Get Hitched, thinks not. Vincenti describes Get Hitched as a user-friendly wedding service finder that offers a pleasant, hassle-free experience to couples planning their wedding.

“It all happens online, nowadays, and there is no reason why couples should not take advantage of that. The months leading to a wedding tend to be extremely stressful, and one way of reducing the stress is by avoiding on-site visits and multiple phone calls. The internet does all this for you,” Vincenti said.

Of course, the internet cannot do all this without a dedicated platform that brings it all together, and this is where Get Hitched comes in.

“Basically, it’s an online tool that is able to find the right vendor, for the right price, on the date that one needs them. The platform also gives couples the option to choose from various options from the comfort of their own home, or from wherever, really, including smartphone or tablet.”

The concept was finalised after an in-depth research exercise to source out similar concepts revealed that there wasn’t anything that ticked all the boxes.

“It’s literally a matchmaker between the couple and wedding service providers. Moreover, it is intended to create a level playing field for all wedding vendors where even the smallest vendor is at par and receives the same requests as large organisations,” Vincenti explained.

Literally a matchmaker between the couple and wedding service providers

The platform, he added, saves time both for the couple and for service suppliers. How easy is it to use?

“Very easy,” Vincenti replies. “All you need to do is type in the URL in a browser and answer a few simple questions, such as when the wedding is going to be held and what the anticipated number of guests is.”

Depending on the categories chosen, the user is then presented with a series of short and simple questions related to the particular service in a simple and user-friendly manner.

“Based on these replies, a list of wedding services is then called up by our database. The list includes venues, transport, catering, music and entertainment, invitations & souvenirs, photography, videography, wedding attire hire, florists, hair stylists, photo booths, jewellery, wedding planning and many other category related to weddings.”

The process takes less than 10 minutes, with the average time spent on the platform being five minutes.

“In today’s world, time is limited and the products or services that save time have a better chance of winning. Until today, couples who organise a wedding either have to look up various services and products themselves through different websites or rely on Facebook pages such as The Salott to ask for recommendations about a particular service or product.

“We officially launched Get Hitched at this year’s edition of the MFCC Wedding Fair and the response we got was extremely encouraging. We had literally hundreds of people submitting requests which, in turn, piqued the interest of various wedding vendors who continue to subscribe with Get Hitched on a daily basis.”

The team is now keen on starting to commercially market the product, after some very intense months of brainstorming, trials, pilots and many hours of hard work.

“We believe in this product and have the ability to make it work and become a successful enterprise in its own right. Our goal is to create value for our users by improving the service level in Malta. Moreover, through our internationalisation strategy, we aim to make Get Hitched a Malta-grown international success story,” Vincenti concluded.

www.gethitched.com.mt