The rise of creators making weddings Insta-worthy

From the venue and the flowers to the DJ to the cake - there's so much to organise when planning a wedding.

Now a growing number of couples are adding something else to their unwieldy to-do lists - book a content creator.

Using a smartphone, wedding content creators gather videos and photos, transforming them into Instagram-worthy reels and short videos ready to share on social media the next day.

Tiffany Sciarrillo, 28, from Mold, Flintshire, has been doing just that since July 2023 and said business was booming.

She said while working she gets people asking "who are you? And what do you do?"

"When I say 'I'm a wedding content creator' they’re a bit like, 'oh, and what is that?'

"But wedding content creation is big and it's going to grow... it will go global."

It was Tiffany's own wedding in April 2023 that inspired her new business.

She hired a photographer and a videographer, but knowing she would have to wait weeks to see the results, asked guests to share anything they had taken straight away.

But she was disappointed to find the photos were mostly blurred and of other guests.

"I thought 'there's something missing in the industry' - but it turns out it was already taking off and I knew nothing about it," she said.

"I asked a group on Facebook if anyone would consider hiring a wedding content creator and overnight it took off."

One of Tiffany's recent clients was Sophie Wedge, 34, who married her husband Marc, 37, at Tyn Dwr Hall in Llangollen, Denbighshire, in June.

The couple met Tiffany at a wedding fayre and booked her there and then, paying her £400 to spend eight hours at their wedding.

"I liked that it was all very free-flow, that we'd have our content within 24 hours, that we'd get a highlight reel of 60 seconds, a 'getting ready' reel of 50 seconds and then a five-minute reel," said Sophie, who also paid £2,000 for a photographer.

She said she loved having photos of her wedding she could see the morning after.

"I woke up the next day, I checked my emails and I had an email off Tiffany saying 'good morning newlyweds, here are a few snippets, just getting them all ready for you and everything will be with you by tomorrow'," she said.

She felt having a content creator added something very different to the professional photos.

"You got to see behind the scenes and the unpolished photos - what you don't get to see as a bride and groom that everyone else sees and I love that," she said.

"It's something that you can constantly look at because it is on your phone, you can share it on social media and friends and family can share it as well."

Tiffany said, in the short time she had been running her business thesocialwedit alongside her day job in the travel industry, she had been shocked by how quickly the industry had grown.

She guessed there were potentially thousands of wedding content creators in the UK and said she was in an industry Facebook group with more than 200 of them.

Zoe Burke, editor of Hitched.co.uk, said their most recent trends report showed search demand for content creators was up 586% on the previous year.

But does content creation have longevity?

"If you'd have asked me a year ago I'd have said no," she said.

"But I think whilst we are all so obsessed with short-form video content and instant uploads on social media, there is definitely going to be a place for this kind of role at a wedding."

Tiffany isn't the only wedding content creator in Flintshire. Jessica Shone from Penyffordd runs Content the Event as well as working at a veterinary practice.

The 29-year-old believes the trend is being fuelled by celebrities, such as influencer Zoe Hague who recently shared content creator-generated content on her socials.

"Everyone looks up to celebrities and wants the same as them," she said.

She did her first wedding for her friend and colleague Leeann Davidson two years ago.

Leeanne, 34, said after being inspired by other weddings she had seen on social media she was keen to share her special day too.

"When you're planning your wedding you're not doing it 'for the ‘gram', but it’s also a bonus that it looks good on Instagram because you want to get the like or you want to get into [wedding planning websites] or get on a blog or something like that," she said.

"I could see other weddings trending and I thought ‘I want to do that' but I didn't know how - that’s where Jess came in."

Despite the industry's seemingly speedy growth there are challenges, including "stigma towards wedding content creators," said Tiffany.

She said some videographers and photographers felt they were "stepping on their toes".

"But we're offering a completely different angle to what they’re offering and if you put all three together you've got the perfect media team - we complement what the others are doing," she said.

"Luckily for me I've had no issues with any photographer or videographer that I've worked with and they've all been great, but it can be nerve-racking bringing a new concept into an industry that's been developed for many years."

So where next for the content creation industry?

Hen dos and christenings are already getting in on the action, said Tiffany.

Could this one day be something people consider booking for funerals or is that a step too far?

"I don't know, in this day and age I wouldn't put it past anyone," she said.