Wedding Business Solutions

Should you tie in charitable causes with your business?

• Alan Berg, CSP, Global Speaking Fellow

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Is supporting a cause part of who you are, or just something you hope will attract more couples? Could promoting certain charities help your business, or might it turn some clients away? In this episode, I talk about the right and wrong reasons to connect charitable giving to your company, and how to decide whether it's something you want to make part of your brand or keep personal. Think about whether your giving is core to your business, or just another great thing you do.

Listen to this new 7-minute episode for guidance on integrating charitable causes authentically and what it really means for your wedding business.

If you have any questions about anything in this, or any of my podcasts, or have a suggestion for a topic or guest, please reach out directly to me at Alan@WeddingBusinessSolutions.com or visit my website Podcast.AlanBerg.com 

Please be sure to subscribe to this podcast and leave a review (thanks, it really does make a difference). If you want to get notifications of new episodes and upcoming workshops and webinars, you can sign up at www.ConnectWithAlanBerg.com  

View the full transcript on Alan’s site: https://alanberg.com/blog/


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I'm Alan Berg. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions about this or if you'd like to suggest other topics for "The Wedding Business Solutions Podcast" please let me know. My email is Alan@WeddingBusinessSolutions.com. Look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks.

Listen to this and all episodes on Apple Podcast, YouTube or your favorite app/site:

©2025 Wedding Business Solutions LLC & AlanBerg.com

Should you tie in charitable causes with your business? Listen to this episode, find out. Hi, it's Alan Berg. Welcome back to another episode of the Wedding Business Solutions podcast. This is a listener suggestion from Troy up in Canada asking, should you is it okay to tie in charitable causes to your business? And the answer is, yes, of course. But you have to do it for the right reasons. Right? So if you're tying in charitable causes because you think, oh, if I say I like this or I'm giving money to this, it might attract these people, it's not bad because the cause still gets money. But is it disingenuous to you and who you are? The other side of it is you could be tying in a cause that could attract some people and also return repel other people. Right.

Have other people say, no, I'm not going to do business with you because of that. And I think we've all found that, you know, over the. Well, I'm sure it's always been the case, but certainly found that over the years, certainly in the last years with COVID and all, there's been just way too much divisiveness in this country. You know, because you're for something doesn't mean you have. You're against something else. Right. We have to accept that as people. But you also have people that are very, you know, not blatantly.

That's the wrong word. Very overtly showing that they are supporting certain causes. For instance, if you go to my website, Alan Berg.com my logo, my Allenberg logo for the longest time. Well, it actually started out blue, then it became orange. It was that for years. And then a couple of years ago on Pride Month, I changed it to a rainbow, right? In the same logo, but in a rainbow. And I had taken it off at the end of the month. And then the, the next year I changed it and I said, why am I putting it back? I like it.

Let's leave it like that. Now, it's certainly sending certain messages and in the wedding and event industry to say that you support equal rights for everyone, regardless of who they are and who they love or whatever is certainly a common thing, but it's also not a universal thing. So could that have somebody look at that and say, I'm not going to do business with you because you support gay rights and trans rights or whatever, lgbtq, AI plus. Did I miss anything there? I don't think so. Right. Well, if you don't want to do business with me because of that, okay. My calendar is still full and I don't want to do business with you either. If that's the way you feel, that's fine.

But you have to understand that yourself as well. You have to understand that are you sending that message with whatever you do. So if you believe in something strongly, that's great. Is it part of your business? Is something else, Right? That's what you have to say. Is it part of my business? You can believe in it. You can support the cause and all that. The question that came from Troy is, do you put that in as part of your business? There are lots of causes that I do and that we support that aren't there with my business. Right.

If you go to my social media, you'll see me supporting food banks a lot. It's important thing to me to do that. When the invasion of Ukraine happened, I put that up. That was important to me. My great. His great great grandfather, I think my great great grandfather was from Kiev. Right. So again, important.

And I'm okay with that. I'm okay with putting that stuff out there. But there's other things where I like, you know what? That's. That's not connected to my business, right. When I put my piano videos up and there was a quote unquote tip jar that was going to a food bank, right? That was okay. And if you don't want to contribute, that's fine. I put up one time, friend's dog had passed and I put up, you know, aspca, Right. If you're a cat person, not a dog person, you don't want to contribute, that's fine.

It's okay. I don't mind putting that out there. But there's other things I keep private. So the question for you would be, for your charitable cause, is it part of your business saying, in other words, I contribute or we contribute X to this or we support this. Right. And there's different ways to do that. I've seen many people putting out where they, as a team go and then do something. They might go to a food pantry, they might go to a soup kitchen, they might do a cleanup in an area.

My friend, David Rothstein. David, I know you're listening, so thank you, David. If the couple will allow them, he will take the flowers at the end of the wedding and he will bring them to a shelter, to a nursing home, to something like that. Great. That's part of his business. It's on his website. There it is.

It's great. If that turns you off, I'm sure David's okay with not doing business with You. I don't know how that would turn you off, but if it did that, you could do that. So think about that. Is what you're doing connected to your business in a way that it is core to what you do and that you want to make it part of your business as opposed to part of your personal giving? Right. Like, I'm sure a lot of people tithe to their church, but they don't put it on their website or they give to their house of worship or whatever cause it is, but they don't put it on their website. Is it part of your business is really the question. So when Troy said, you know, tying in charitable causes, I think it's, it's a great thing, but it has to be connected to you.

And understand if you're doing something that could be controversial in a way that some people could be for it, some people against it, I mean, actually against it, you could be losing out on those people and you might be fine with that. And that is okay. I'm okay with that too. So is it okay to tie in a cause? Yes. Will someone choose you because you've tied into that cause? That's hard to say. Because remember, at the end of the day, if you're doing weddings and events, what they care about is the success of their wedding or event. I remember a client of mine was the first zero food waste catering facility in the country and they asked me, do you think people would do business with us because of that or choose us because of that? And I said, no, I don't think they'll choose you because of that. I think it could be a deciding factor between you and another venue.

But if you don't provide great food, great service in a beautiful venue that's maintained well and beautiful picture opportunities and things, they're not going to choose you because you compost the food that doesn't get eaten. Right. You think about they're not going to choose you because of the composting. They're going to choose you because it's a beautiful venue, great food, great service, etc. So think about that as well. Are they going to choose you because of the. The cause that you're supporting, or is that just another reason to choose you on top of all the other great reasons that you're going to provide them with great results for their event? So that's kind of a long way of me getting around to that, but I think that's the most important thing. Still put forward the results that they're going to get and then, by the way, we support this cause.

And if this is important to, you know, that we contribute to them. This is how we do, whether it's a percentage or whether we as a team, go and do things for them. You know, we go to the, to the animal shelter and we, you know, we help support them, whatever. Again, you still have to provide them with great results for their event, because if you don't, they shouldn't choose you at all, and certainly not because you're tying at a charitable cost. So thanks, Troy, for the suggestion. Go to podcast.Alan Berg.com Click on the Ask me Anything button and put in your suggestion there. Love to have them hit subscribe if you haven't done that already. Review us if you can, and let me know how I can help you.

Thanks.

I’m Alan Berg. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions about this or if you’d like to suggest other topics for “The Wedding Business Solutions Podcast” please let me know. My email is Alan@WeddingBusinessSolutions.com or you can  text, use the short form on this page, or call +1.732.422.6362, international 001 732 422 6362. I look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks.

Listen to this and all episodes on Apple Podcast, YouTube or your favorite app/site:

©2025 Wedding Business Solutions LLC & AlanBerg.com



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Alan Berg, CSP, Global Speaking Fellow

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