According to a report in The Guardian, a new survey indicates that almost one in four British couples who married in the past two years, headed out of the country to plight their troth, spending #1.8bn in the process. The figure suggests a sharp rise compared to the five years from 1996 to 2001, when just 9% of couples married abroad.

Around 300 000 British couples marry each year and, according to a report I read on www.moneyuk.msn, the wedding market in the UK is worth in the region of #4.2 billion! With the average wedding today in the UK costing between #15 000 and #20 000, it is easy to see how they arrive at this enormous sum!

SA is amongst the top favourite wedding locations

Prime overseas locations (with a guarantee of both sun and romance) were listed in The Guardian as South Africa, St Lucia, Mauritius, Las Vegas and Antigua. And I fully agree with their reasoning, namely that ??you can see any of these would be more appealing than Catford or Carlisle on a wet November day!?

It was also interesting to note that more than a quarter admitted that they had fled to escape relatives who drove them round the bend ? unfortunately for them, however, another report I read stated that if invited to a wedding abroad, 70% of the British population would attend!

A spokesman for Direct Line Home Insurance, which carried out the survey, was quoted as saying: ?Affordable airfares, a sense of adventure and the drudgery of British weather mean that overseas weddings are more popular than they have ever been.?

If you throw in the added bonuses of first-class service providers, plus beautiful weather (we have almost 3000 hours of sunshine per annum, compared to London?s measly 1480hrs), and an exchange rate so much in their favour that they can have the wedding of their dreams at a fraction of the cost, you don?t, as they say, need to be a rocket scientist to understand what makes South Africa such an irresistible choice!

It was exciting to see that according to this survey, the Top 10 Destinations were:

1 South Africa 6% 2 St Lucia 5% 3 Mauritius 4% 4 Las Vegas 4% 5 Antigua 4% 6 Republic of Ireland 4% 7 Jamaica 4% 8 Greek islands 3% 9 Hawaii 3% 10 Barbados 2%

Celebration House has, for more than 10 years, showcased over 130 of the top service providers in the Cape Town wedding industry ? and in recent years, many of our venues and other exhibitors have reported that up to 50% of their wedding business is now coming from the overseas market.

Since September 2002, when we first noticed this trend, Celebration House has exhibited annually at wedding shows in London, and at the end of September this year we jetted off to London for the fifth time, to take part in the The National Wedding Show held at Earls Court. This prestigious event, which attracts over 16 000 visitors, is held over a three-day period.

Taking part in a show overseas always requires a certain amount of ingenuity, as due to the distance and luggage constraints, one is severely limited with regard to material for the stand. Weeks before the event, we mapped out the size of our stand in my office and carefully strategized as to how best to use the tools at our disposal, to ensure that our display at the Show would look both professional and appealing.

Our hard work certainly paid off, as our stand with its Table Mountain backdrop and stunning wedding photographs on pull-up posters, received many compliments. Our beautiful, hand-beaded, bright red proteas also attracted a lot of attention.

The Show was spectacular

From the minute the Show opened at 10am on the Friday morning, until it closed on the Sunday, there was hardly a let-up in the number of people pouring through the doors. At our stand we handed out free copies of our 64-page full colour publication, Under African Skies ? a guide to getting married in South Africa (now in its 5th edition), which is filled with accurate and up-to-date information about marrying on our shores.

We were delighted by the response it received from interested parties, as we have often found that visitors attending these shows are choosey about accepting publications they are given. It was interesting to discover that one of the main reasons for this is that, unlike those attending shows in South Africa, who usually arrive by car, in London most of the visitors rely on public transport and one can?t blame them for not wanting to be lumbered with heavy parcels.

We have even noticed that some arrive at the shows sporting pull-along suitcases, or accompanied by a younger sibling brought along to carry the goods! The hundreds of exhibits at the Show this year varied from those by dress designers and photographers, to venues, florists, cake decorators, wedding gifts, bonbonnieres, grooms? wear, ideas for stag nights and much more.

The strains of The Wedding March being played at the various stands belonging to string quartets, trumpeters etc. could be heard reverberating around the exhibition centre, as could the voices of gospel choirs ? fully illustrating the meaning of the word ?cacophony?!

We were entertained throughout the Show by the impromptu performances of the singers at ?The Tenors and Divas Incognito? stand, which was opposite ours. These three professional singers pose in ?disguise? at weddings, before launching into performances of opera or popular Italian medleys. All the exhibitors looked forward to the sound of the music that heralded the start of the fashion shows (held four times each day), since this usually provided some relief and a chance to draw breath, as many visitors headed to the back of the exhibition centre where the vast fashion ramp was set up. Of course, the minute the fashion show was over, we would once again have a deluge of visitors to our stand!

Every year I come away from these shows convinced that all the service providers who exhibit at Celebration House could compete in this international arena with great ease, as in many instances I felt that what we had to offer couples was far better than what was on display. The level of professionalism in our wedding sector is high and we can be proud of the world-class service we offer.

For the duration of the Show we stood and smiled, answered questions and handed out thousands of copies of Under African Skies until our jaws ached and our feet throbbed, but at the end of the day we felt that it was definitely worth it to be able to promote our country to the thousands of couples who attended the event. We were overwhelmed by the amount of interest shown in South Africa and the number of couples who plan to celebrate their nuptials on our shores ? and it was also interesting to note just how many brides-to-be had been proposed to on top of Table Mountain!

For me, the most lasting impression was the fact that not once during the Show did we hear any negative comments about our country. In fact, just the opposite! Those who had already visited our shores were aglow with praise for the wonderful times they had had, and for how much we had to offer visitors. Although this has been the case each time we have exhibited here, this year we felt that there was even more interest in marrying in our country.

The cherry on the top for us, though, was the number of visitors who said they had visited our website,