New destination management company, Royal Weddings International (RWI), hopes to tap an unfulfilled need in the high-end destination weddings market.

 

Event management executives Zachariah Thanaraj and Vinod Sivapillai from VZ Solutionz are joining hands with Jothi Store and Flower Shop’s Rajakumar Chandra to offer destination wedding planning services to India’s “super-rich”. 

 

There isn’t a one stop shop where they could source for everything and execute a wedding.”

 

 

 

CEO of RWI, Zachariah Thanaraj said: “When event planners in India come here, they realize that they need to go to many different people. There isn’t a one stop shop where they could source for everything and execute a wedding. Under these circumstances, for planners to execute a wedding within a short timeframe of six months or two months is very challenging.” 

 

For more than six decades, Jothi Store & Flower Shop has been serving the needs of local Indian weddings. Founding Advisor with RWI, Rajakumar, who is a partner with Jothi Store, said: “In the last few years we have been receiving quite a number of inquiries on destination weddings, mostly from India. But this is a very different kind of market from the customers we have been serving. These are very rich clients who wish to spend a lot and can be very demanding.”

 

Rajakumar highlighted this as a market segment that will have very niche requirements: “Wedding planners may only want vegetarian food and they may want to bring their own handpicked chef to do that. This is not something that the hotel will typically allow. But as a destination management company, we are here to accommodate and facilitate such requirements.”

 

 

Rajakumar Chandra, Founding Advisor, Royal Weddings International

 

These are very rich clients who wish to spend a lot and can be very demanding.”

 

 

 

 

 

He added that due to the absence of a destination management company in Singapore, a lot of weddings are moved to other locations such as Thailand, Dubai and even as far as Europe and America. He also highlighted destination weddings as a trend that has been growing over the years.

 

He said: “The people who come here, they may decide to go for a cruise for a few days; spend their time here shopping all over Singapore and visit all the tourist attractions; or they may want to plan their engagement ceremony in Bali, their wedding in Singapore, and their dinners in Thailand. There isn’t a company to coordinate a requirement like this.”

 

COO of RWI, Vinod Sivapillai described his new company as a B2B service provider. “We are creating the business for everyone – florists, photographers, videographers, makeup artists and others. Let’s suppose we have 300 wedding guests, half of whom are women. That means 150 ladies that will need makeup services, as well as sari tying and other high-end services. It’s not a one company show.”

 

RWI is targetting weddings with estimated budgets of S$1 to 2 million. While the primary market is India, specifically North India, they also highlighted Indonesia as a potential market.

 

 

 

We are creating the business for everyone – florists, photographers, videographers, makeup artists and others.”

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