The year 2020 will easily go down as one of the worst ever for wedding card printers.
Never would they have thought that they would be staring at mounting losses just halfway through the year. The COVID-19 pandemic has dealt such a blow to their businesses that it will be difficult to recover, they say.
The season of March to June is crucial for wedding card printers. The COVID-19 lockdown, restrictions in containment zones and the government’s bar on marriage attendance has taken a severe toll on their finances. A number of workers involved in the business for a long time are now out of work due to a lack of orders.
Six months after the COVID-19 outbreak, things are now totally different for the printers. People who used to come with orders of 500 to 1,000 cards are now giving orders only for a maximum of 20 cards due to the restrictions imposed by the government on the number of guests who can attend a wedding.
“During the marriage season, we used to see 15 customers daily with print orders of 300 to 1,000 wedding cards. Now, we are getting only two to five customers a day, and they ask us to print not more than 30 cards. We were closed from March 21 to June 17. I fear that my total losses will amount to at least ₹8 to 9 lakh. We used to have 21 staff, but now, there are only nine,” said A.V.S Nani of Vaibhav Wedding Cards near Rama Talkies.
Mr. Nani said that from October, the marriage season resumes. “We expected that there will be a decent footfall of customers from August. But the COVID-19 pandemic shows no signs of stopping, and as a result, we just had five customers from August 5 to 11,” he said.
Mr. Naga Ratnam, who runs another medium-scale wedding card printing business in Gajuwaka, said that generally they refuse to print fewer than 50 cards. But due to the present situation, they are ready to print even 15 cards.
“Generally, we take orders in 50s, 100s, or 150s, but things are different now. Customers are few and far in between and printing has also gone down, so has the turnover. We are not able to pay salaries to our employees,” he said.
Another wedding card printer named Suresh said that people have now switched over to using social media to invite people due to the COVID-19 situation.
“Not just for weddings, people used to order cards for birthdays, anniversaries and other functions. But thanks to COVID-19, invitations are going fully digital now,” he said, adding that he has incurred a loss of over ₹2 lakh.
G. Arjun, a resident of Sheela Nagar, said that he used a few portals on the internet to prepare a wedding card of his own, which he shared with his family and friends. Wedding cards were given only to 40 close relatives, he said.
