The wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton on April 29 will give a boost of £600-700 million to the British economy limping its way out of recession
When the sun sets on April 29, most of the guests will have gone home and the streets cleared of all the flags and other throwaway memorabilia littered earlier that day along the path the couple took to reach Westminster Abbey. Most will feel the ennui that sets in after a grand wedding.
One section of the country however will have a broad smile on their face, because they will be richer by a few hundred million pounds. The business generated by the wedding of Prince William, second in line to the English throne, and Kate Middleton is expected to generate business in the region of £600-700 million. Neil Saunders, consulting director with retail research firm Verdict, says: “While that may sound like a lot, it should be remembered that this is a massive event which will command not just the attention of Britons, but potentially most of the world.”
A good part of Britain has been upbeat about the prospect of the royal wedding since the couple announced their engagement in November last year and the wedding date was confirmed in February this year. In the frenzy of media reports covering every minute and bizarre detail of the royal wedding (including invitations sent to the couple's former girlfriends and boyfriends!), surprisingly the least has been about the economic impact of this event. It could be the peculiar English sense of decency and politeness, but the fact remains that this is going to be big business.
And it will be big not just in the United Kingdom but even in other parts of the world like China. Within days of the engagement being announced, one Chinese crockery maker released tea cups and saucers with the couple’s faces on them. Not to be left out, an overzealous competitor too released a cup but got the groom's picture wrong — it had the face of Prince Harry, the groom’s younger brother. In one way, that could be the real collector’s piece among all others.
Saunders breaks up his estimates thus: “We believe in merchandise sales alone the engagement could be worth between £12 million and £18 million. We think wedding-related merchandise sales could easily top £26 million in the UK, food and grocery retailers could cash in to the tune of £360 million as consumers buy extra treats to celebrate the occasion as well as champagne and wine to toast the happy couple. All of this is before the benefits of travel and tourism are factored in; these could well be an estimated additional £216 million. In total, we are looking at a £620-million boost in consumer spending.”
While smaller manufacturers are rushing to the market with smaller items like tea pots, linen and bed cushions bearing the couple’s picture or replicas of the engagement ring, the bigger ones want a piece of the actions as well. Strangely, the usually all too serious German car maker decided to pull a fast one on All Fools’ Day day by releasing an advertisement in the UK claiming to have issued a special edition of the M3 coupe with a creative twist — the difficult-to-miss logo of this popular series has been restyled to read as WiLL (for the Prince). Luckily, the truth came out when this reporter called a dealer in London to find the price of this non-existent car..
Tesco Calling Card is giving away tens of thousands of free phone calls to anywhere in the world during the wedding, allowing friends and family to share up-to-the-minute “bridal gossip” wherever they are. Graham Harris, the CEO of Tesco Telecoms and Tesco Mobile, says: “Christmas Day is usually the peak day for calls abroad but this year we are expecting to see an even greater surge on the day of the royal wedding.”
One of the most popular memorabilia is likely to be the commemorative coins issued by The Royal Mint, the official coin maker of the UK. The South Wales facility of The Royal Mint, which can produce 5 billion coins and blanks a year, has already issued more than a dozen special coins in gold, sliver and platinum in the price range of £9.99 to £5,450. The Canadian counterpart of The Royal Mint too has released a 25-cent coin with the picture of the royal couple on one side and a sapphire-coloured crystal inlay resembling the engagement ring worn by the bride on the other. Beyond all the business and economic boost, the royal couple has appealed to the public who wish to send gifts to send them to 26 charity groups that have been shortlisted to benefit from the wedding.
The most interesting incident, however, was something that happened a month before the wedding, when the see-through dress worn by Kate at a charity show in 2002 was auctioned for £78,000, to a person only identified as ‘Nick from Jersey’. The designer and the owner of the dress is Charlotte Todd, 31, who is now contemplating buying a house or probably a change in career with this newfound windfall. It is generally believed that the prince fell in love with Kate after he saw her in this dress for the first time at St Andrews University.
Visitors from around the world are expected to throng central London to get a view of the royal procession. Reports suggest that hotels along the road to Buckingham Palace that the couple will take in an open carriage are still available. Rooms overlooking the road are available at between £200 and £600 at The Grosvenor and 51 Buckingham Gate.
For most, the real excitement seems to be the fact that the wedding day, a Friday, has been declared a bank holiday that will extend into a long weekend. Prior to that a four-day Easter break comes up between 22 May and 25 May, which capped with the May 2 bank holiday takes the total number of days off from work to eight around the wedding day. The question the polite English aren’t asking is: “Who needs a royal wedding to celebrate eight days away from work?”
