In this episode of Mind Your Wedding Business, Kevin Dennis sits down with Ashley Ebert, founder of The Abundance Group, to discuss how wedding professionals can break free from the "hustle loop," build scalable businesses, and create more freedom without sacrificing success.

Ashley shares her journey from starting a wedding-planning business at 23 to growing it into a seven-location company with 35 team members before selling it for over $1 million. She opens up about the lessons she learned through burnout, difficult clients, leadership, and the mindset shifts that helped her become a true business owner.

The conversation covers the importance of boundaries, delegation, team building, confident pricing, and why building a business around your own strengths leads to greater profitability and a more sustainable career.

If you've ever felt stuck working every weekend, struggled to delegate, or wondered how to grow without burning out, this episode is filled with practical advice to help you build a business that supports both your goals and your life.

Ashley Ebert built a wedding planning business from the ground up, scaled it to 7 locations and 35 team members, and sold it for over a million dollars. Now, through The Abundance Group, a mastermind for ambitious wedding professionals, she helps them ditch the hustle loop and build businesses they actually love. Ashley is obsessed with pursuing passion, her community, and proving that wedding pros can have it all: the success, the freedom, and yes, have an absolute blast while building it!

Highlights:

• Breaking free from the "hustle loop"
• Setting boundaries that strengthen client relationships
• Building a team you can trust
• Why delegation creates freedom and growth
• Pricing with confidence and increasing profitability
• Creating a business that supports your life, not just your workload

Connect with Ashley:

Website

Instagram

Facebook

LinkedIn

Connect with Kevin:

Wedding IQ

Fantasy Sound

Instagram

YouTube

TikTok

LinkedIn

All right, folks, welcome to another episode of Mind Your Wedding Business. I'm your host, Kevin Dennis, and here today I am with Ashley Ebert of the Abundance Group. How are you, Ashley?

I'm fantastic. How are you?

I'm

great. Thank you for being here. All right. Ashley's going to be talking about how I stopped working weekends. I almost wanted to say weddings, but I didn't. And I'm going to do a little Freudian slip there. But ⁓ and built a six figure salary as a true owner. But before we do that, Ashley, can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Yes.

and how we got you here today.

Yes, ⁓ for those of you that aren't familiar with my work, I'm Ashley Ebert. I have been in the wedding industry for over 15 years. And I think like in dog years, I'm 100 probably, right? In the wedding world, you age for sure with all that we have to go through. spent over a decade owning a planning company. And, you know, there's just a special, I think, connection all wedding pros have. So I say you're in the family with me. If you're a wedding pro, we're in the wedding pro fam together.

No.

Um, and like I said, I, the planning company itself, uh, we grew up to seven markets, a team of 35. We did 1.2 million in sales. Um, I actually sold it last year in an acquisition for over a million dollars. And a lot of people go, Ash, how did you do that? And, uh, my response is let me show you, let me show you, give you all the goods. I don't gatekeep anything. I love to again, help out, uh, wedding pros in the world. And with that.

moved over to the abundance group because people asked me, how do I grow a business that ⁓ gives me freedom and feels light and enjoyable versus really heavy and kind of working every single weekend, having to say no to stuff that you want to do. So that's my mission, Kevin. I'm here to help the Wedding Pro family get out of the loop.

I love, I love, I love it. And if you're

a hundred in dog years, I'm not going to tell you how old I am in dog years then, because ⁓ I started in 89. So I am old. I'm, I'm, yeah. Well, no, I'll be really, I'm going to be when I don't know about winning. I just might be extinct is if we're using your math. So, all right.

Hahaha!

industry Kevin.

Okay, yeah, I mean you win, you win. You get more medals than I do, but...

You're You're funny.

So Ashley, give us a quick overview how you went from building the amazing wedding planning company to now helping wedding pros through the abundance group.

Yeah, ⁓ I did. just got asked, you know, how do you have so much joy and love for this industry when you're this far in? ⁓ And I think a lot of people, especially in the wedding world, it's it's soulpreneurship. It's kind of doing the grind by yourself. And they knew I had a really large team and they were curious about it. How are you doing this? And again, I'm like, literally, I'm more than happy to I don't think I'm

special, right? I work hard and love on people and that's the secret and you know, let me share everything I got with you. So probably about, I don't know, five, six, seven years into the business, I kind of organically just started kind of coaching and doing coffees and ⁓ teaching people a way to do it very strategically that didn't just suck the life out of them, right?

Hmm. Yeah.

I think a lot of the times in this beautiful industry of ours, the creativity allures you in and the serving of our customers and being a part of such an incredible day for couples. But we don't always have the business acumen that other entrepreneurship verticals have. So really, ⁓ I think the special sauce that I have is really building a business with strategy ⁓ so it feels seamless and sustainable.

And so kind of once I started to get asked, you know, those questions by so many, I'm like, maybe there's something here that maybe the community needs this. So again, we started the abundance group almost 10 years ago and we're going strong. Now we do it through a mastermind community. So I coach one on one every single day with all of my members. They get in-person experiences, all my courses, it's a very deep.

integrated program. It's, I think, different than anything that's out there. Again, you can come and talk to me every single day, which I just have such a deep relationship with all those that are in the community. So that's kind of how I move from the wedding world to what I do now.

Mm-hmm.

I love it. All right. Well, you built a business with seven locations and 35 team members while, you know, stepping away from constantly working weekends. What was the was there like a turning point or this? Was it a wedding that you went, I'm done. You like drop the mic or, know, what happened? oh my God, it's real.

Yes, her name was Gretchen, was the mother of the bride that

I... We could go deep into that. But I think what I realized in this moment, i think, you know, unfortunately, so many wedding professionals have a moment like this, where they're just like, what am I, how am I doing this? Why am I giving my time, my energy, and sometimes feeling undervalued and underappreciated? And...

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Literally her name was Gretchen. She was a drunk mother of the bride, blackout drunk by 6.30 p.m. Yep, and she physically put her hands on me and was screaming profanity in my face in the middle of the ballroom in front of everybody. And I just kept saying to her, Gretchen, you're gonna have to take your hands off me though. Gretchen, you're gonna have to take your hands off me though.

⁓ my gosh.

Yeah

And so I broke away and got my second assist and the photographer, they're all just mouth open looking at what's happening. I get them into, you know, safety feeling like, you know, they're okay. And I go, I need a minute. I walked up to my car and I proceeded to absolutely lose it and bawl. And I was like, what is, how, how is this? This is not what I was, you know, what I bought into when I left the corporate world to come into weddings and.

Yeah.

course.

⁓ I share that story and there's so many people that have a Gretchen and there's so many wedding pros that they're like, why am I doing this? And I really started to give a name to what I think so many people call burnout and why it's happening. So I call it the hustle loop. Like we're stuck in this loop together ⁓ where we're over delivering for our clients because we want them to be, you know, taking care of.

you're immediately responding to everything again, nights, weekends, whatever. We kind of feel like we're always on call no matter what. and they're doing it all themselves because they haven't necessarily built a team. So this is what I call that hustle loop. And that was what was happening in that moment, kind of literally personified as a person of like, I am giving this everything I've got. And this has got to stop. I've got to get out of this belief of, I have to over function and over serve and do all of this. And so,

Mm-hmm.

A lot of the times when wedding pros come to me, they're like, Ashley, I'm in the hustle loop. I need a way out. And again, that is absolutely what I want to be helpful with on how to put on guardrails, how to build a business strategically and think like a business owner and not just a creative that's trying to, to over-serve, right?

Yeah.

Yeah, and I say that a lot and I say it on the podcast a lot is a lot of us are really good at the creative the art part of the weddings But we are very bad at the business side of it. So yeah, well

It is. And I

think it's not even necessarily like, again, I'm protective of, I know the self-talk of our community. It's not even that people are bad at it. It's just like you haven't even been introduced to it because you get in the throes of the work and you create the art and you're in it, right? And so you don't even have time to orient yourself on what should I be doing that can buy my time back and how can I do this in a way that

Yeah.

builds sustainability and isn't just serving the one client and then onto the next and onto the next, right? So I always say like, just, there's not a lot of resources out there for the wedding community to really speak our language and make this in a way where we can still have the level of excellence that we expect with our service delivery, ⁓ but also just have kind of that backbone of the sustainable business. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, I know that makes a lot of sense.

So and I just recently I didn't have anything as a lot as crazy as you but I had a mom named Lonnie that I just still to this day. Yeah, I have a Lonnie story, but it just every time I could it just it just I get infuriated every time I hear that name. So anyway Yeah, yeah, I can imagine I can imagine when you hear Gretchen out in the wild you're just you cringe

You got a lot of stuff!

It is! Yeah!

100 % I'm like no more Gretchen's babe like we don't have anything in our lives

It's a little like,

yeah, you're like, oh, where, It's ready, ready for anything.

Exactly.

You're coming out, you're ready on all sides like a ninja. right. All right, Ashley, why do you so many wedding pros believe, you think, believe working nonstop is just part of the job?

I don't like that.

I think because they, they, they equate, you know, having boundaries with, I'm going to lose the relationship with the client and actually the opposite is true. Right? So if we hold ourselves to, um, you know, emailing, you know, certain hours of the day, you're not going to text me. Like if we hold those boundaries, what actually happens is the client respects you more and

Mm-hmm.

That's, think, if we can get out of that belief of like, I'm just going to be there. I'm going to add value however I can, like this over serving heart that I think, again, so many have, but realizing that it's creating burnout, it's creating the hustle loop, it's creating all of these ancillary effects that I don't think we always justify. Like what I always, when I'm coaching in my community, I always say, and at what cost?

you're doing something and there is always a cost. And so when we're over delivering and we're, you know, answering emails at one in the morning, if we're not taking a day to recover from the weekend, there is a cost to that. And a lot of the times we think it is, you know, I'm just building the relationship. I'm just taking care of them. But actually you're not because you're running yourself into the ground and now you can't actually show up for them. Right.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So that's what I would say is really making sure that you're setting boundaries. And again, it's not like you're not kind and approachable and have a great relationship with them. Both of those things can exist. And I think a lot of the times wedding pros think, and sometimes I feel like if I can be real honest, Kevin, with your audience, sometimes this comes from a place of confidence of that you don't necessarily have that confidence in your skillset. So you over deliver.

Of course.

because you want to make sure that they're not going to write a one-star review or they're going to be really happy. And the industry is so relationship-based that it's like, have to make sure that everyone loves me 100 out of 100 on scale, But really, again, at what cost? At what cost are we doing? Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, no, that's a good

point. I mean, the biggest change like I ever did in my business was set boundaries with clients and at first they were like minimal, you know, and they are to where they are today. You know, like I only do like new client meetings on Thursday, Friday, Tuesday is an internal day for the company. Wednesday is like another, like I do a lot of podcasting and work out in the warehouse with the guy, you know, like I have my, and once I kind of segmented it out and really

got there, life became a little clearer and a little easier and you know things got better. So boundaries, I'm a big believer you have to have the boundaries.

When I think you said

something really important, you said in the beginning they were minimal, right? You kind of step into creating boundaries ⁓ because again, that does grow your confidence. Like, actually that did end up okay. And the client did understand that that was important. And you kind of grow these systems and these boundaries over time. And you realize that in your business ecosystem, it actually allows you to better serve your.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

But again,

you don't start with, you know, creating a policy across the board and all of these different things. You know, you're not, you're not changing everything. Yeah. Right. 100%. Yeah. You're spot on.

Yeah. Drop the iron fist. Yeah, you're not dropping it. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, and I think too, in today's world of business, having the tech that's available, it's a little bit easier to set boundaries too, I think. Yeah, I know. Well, or even like just

Back in the day, Kevin, when we didn't have CRMs and stuff, or AI or

anything. Yeah.

An appointment scheduler or any, you know, like now a day,

like remember making an appointment. Are you available this day? And then you don't hear from them. And then someone else takes that time. And it's that you had that back and forth. And nowadays it's like, here's the link and pick it when you're ready. When you're ready to make an appointment, here it is, you know, and, go. So, all right. So Ashley, what do you think the difference between operating the business and actually becoming the business owner is like, what's the difference?

Yeah, 100%.

This is a great question. So there's a lot of conversation out there about becoming the CEO of your business. And I have a very, shall we say, different perspective. I think being the CEO of your business is the hardest job ever. I want to be an owner of the business. I want to build a business where I hire a CEO. I hire a managing director.

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

they're taking on basically all of that, you know, leadership issues, ⁓ systems, like all the things that a CEO does. I want to sit in the owner's seat. So that's, that's kind of a differentiator and a mindset shift that I talk about with my community. Like I want there to be an org chart where you have a buffer from all of those issues. Like that's the dream life. A lot of people would look at me and I, you know, I, I always say bigger businesses. A lot of people think are,

more difficult to run. why I hear a lot of tension about building teams and all of this. I'm like, a million dollar business was 10 times easier to run than a hundred thousand dollar business. It was right. And so yeah, you have other people in a shared mission and, and they're giving their time, their talent, their skills to your dream. How rad is that? Like how cool is that?

Yeah. Well, you got the help. You got the support. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, for sure.

100%.

And

we get all gnarled up because maybe we've had a bad boss in the past and we don't want to be that. Again, because I love our community and I love the heart and soul of who this community is, a lot of the times they don't want to build a bigger business because it's going to be more challenging and people are messy and all of these hard things. I'm like, like I say, I can tell you, I used to work ⁓ before I sold Simply Elegant. I would work five hours a week. I made a six figure salary.

my managing director dealt with all the stuff in the middle. I was the one sitting as the visionary. I was the one getting the team excited because that's one of my strengths is getting the team bought in and really excited about something. And I leverage those things. But again, I had built a business where I had a person that was a buffer between me and that.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

And

I took care of her well. Like we are, are dear, dear friends to this day, even after I've sold the business, she worked for me for over 10 years. and again, what a gift, what a gift that is to have someone of that caliber run behind your vision. And so I think a lot of the times people think bigger businesses just mean all this gnarled complexity and it doesn't have to be that way. So again, ownership for me is the goal.

I'm a big Disney nerd, so I want to be at Disney like once a quarter with my family completely checked out. I don't care what's happening in the business. I don't care if it's sales season. I don't care, you know. And ownership, the lens of ownership, I think really solidifies a posture of decision-making for wedding pros to have that freedom that I think they're really seeking.

Yeah.

Yeah, well, and I 100 % agree with you, but I also think you probably built a good culture somewhere along the way too. Yeah, you know, so that's where, like you said, it made me think of it when you said, come in and I rally up the team, you know, that's part of building that great culture and then that gets them excited to come to work every day.

Yeah, absolutely.

Well, again, they're giving me their most valuable resource. Yeah, and their time and their energy and who they are. Right. Like, I want to honor that. want to create a place where they don't want to leave it. That's like the whole ballgame. Right. And again, I was just so blessed over the years and continue to be at the abundance group. have a killer team there, too. And the culture of even the mastermind feels like

Yeah, them. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I think the biggest skill we can learn to have an impact is leadership and building the culture of your community, whether that's, you know, again, me serving the mastermind now or leading the team. It's the same exact skill set, which is lucky because, you know, I don't need to learn a thousand things if I can be good at one, right?

Yeah, so

true. Well, it's just like you know, there's things in my business that I don't know how to do, but I have people that know how to do it. And yeah, as long as they know how to do it great. And that's where I think a lot of business owners, you don't have to be everything, you know, you can hire good people to take care of, you know, the x y and the z part of it and things will be strong and succeed. So yeah.

And again, that speaks to trust, right? You

trust them, they trust you. If you're really thinking about what it's like to sit in their seat, how are you creating, ⁓ you know, the autonomy that you're obviously giving them if it's like, don't even know how to do that thing, which there's many things I don't know how to do. But but trusting them, like there's a there's a feeling that they almost have ownership of that. And there's a pride of their work that they do when they're not being micromanaged. And you do now again, you have to hire humans that have character.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

which is part of

the recruitment and interviewing process, right? We hire with intention. But when you do and you have people that are just immensely talented, it's like, let them run, let them run and do their thing. Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah.

for sure.

All right, so Ashley, what were some of the first changes that you made that helped you stop being involved in everything?

I think anybody who knows me, and the pink hair is a little bit of a giveaway, but I'm a risk taker. I'm cool to kind of think out of the box and do things and figure it out on the way. And so I think really leaning into who I was, that helped create a culture that was in alignment. And not everyone is super risk tolerant. ⁓ And I think, let's say, for someone who is risk averse.

Mm-hmm.

One of the benefits of that is typically what I see a lot is the team culture is one of the highest values is excellence. And that's great. Like both of those things are great. Like we can move real fast under Ashley's leadership. We're gonna make some mistakes and we're gonna have a good time doing it. But for someone on the other side of the equation, again, being more risk averse, you're gonna have...

Hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah.

brilliantly built SOP is that the team feels supported in that way and you're going to hire people that really are attracted to that. And both businesses are beautiful. Both businesses are successful. And so I think that the number one thing when someone's kind of, in that like season of do I build, maybe you're hitting about a hundred thousand dollars. You're like, do I scale it? This, this feels like a lot. How do I really break to the next level?

It's trust who you are and build a business around that and you're going to find the talent that is attracted to that. So I would say that's the first thing that I did. again, I started my business at 23. I was a baby. didn't have, Kevin, had no idea what I was doing. I made every mistake in the book, right? But I just trusted that we were going to figure it out. And I was going to use my strengths to...

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, same. I had no idea what I was doing. Yeah.

to move the business forward. I think again, when I coach inside my community, I don't have a, this is the way to build your business. This is how I did it. This is how you should do it. That's not how we do things. We have, you know, principles and you know, we build what I call the six owner assets. Everybody does that, but everybody builds it in their nuanced way. And again, when you go, ⁓ I'm, I'm leading the ship. I can build whatever I darn well please. ⁓

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

and leverage the things in your gifts and the things you're good at, like that's when magic really happens. And again, that looks different for everybody. And every version of this is really beautiful.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, that's great. All right. You were talking about trust earlier. So how did you build a team you could actually trust to represent your brand well?

Yeah, I think we alluded to it a little bit of like understanding what you care about, like understanding for me, one of the things I really as a leader, I need my team to be able to work autonomously. Like you can screw up and I'll give you full rein and like I'll back you like, but I need you to like, I can't micromanage you. If I get lost in the weeds, like it is not a happy place. It's not a happy place for me.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Okay.

But I have business owners, again, that I coach and work with, that that autonomous work is not ⁓ a value that they have. They want you to follow the procedure because that's how they build trust, right? That's how uniquely as a business owner, when they know someone's executing the 78 point plan and they're doing it perfectly, right? That makes them happy and that gives them that feeling of trust. So it's really, I think, embracing that you can build a business however you want.

Mmm.

Yeah.

and you're going to, I'm a very trustworthy person. My husband's like, what are we doing now? We're giving our social security number away? I don't think we should do that. but so and I also just know that about myself and I know that that's going to cause and I have, I got the receipts of some bad stories and things that happened to me, but I also value that in who I am. I get so much more out of building relationships and getting to meet, you know, awesome new people.

Yeah

Mm-hmm.

And that trust and that openness has gained me so much over my life that the losses of bringing someone who was untrustworthy into that, like it doesn't compare. So I'm okay with that. And some people that's not, is, they don't wanna do that. And again, you can just build it however you want to as the owner.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah.

I love it. All right. So were there like system structures or like tech that you had to bring in that were critical in helping the business run without you constantly being present?

Yeah, you know, people I brought the right, you know, I brought good people in. You'll see a trend here, Kevin. You'll see a trend. It's a pretty obvious one for me. But yeah, no, you bring in the right people that had, ⁓ you know, different skill sets than me. So one of the things, you know, as a full service wedding planning company, we did have a lot of detail work we had to do. That wasn't my jam. So I brought in, I think, one of the best planners in the country. And she helped when I

I'm seeing it.

Yeah.

you know, when we were building this over at Simply Elegant, we built this internal system that had all those details and had all that. ⁓ So, you know, the people, I think, ⁓ and finding those, the people that can surround you that have, you know, the skills if you're, if you don't necessarily have those. The other thing I'll say, and, you you talked a little bit, just the amount that is available to us right now from a technology perspective, AI, the tools that are out there.

Mm-hmm.

Like it is easier than ever to create whatever size business you want. And, you know, I look back and I'm like, man, I had to do that by hand. had to, everything like, you know, and now we have, you know, you can vibe code, claude cowork is just phenomenal. And I definitely go down rabbit holes and I enjoy AI quite a bit. And we built a lot of systems, but I think

Mm-hmm.

Yep.

that now if you can dream it, you can build it. And that's a pretty incredible thing, especially in the entrepreneur world where we are so creative and we're like, let me think of, I did something a couple of weeks ago where I was like, there's no way this is possible with AI. No way. And literally 12 hours later, me and AI had built it and I'm like, what is happening? Like, how is this possible? So it's just really fun. I think it's the most fun time to be in the wedding world as an entrepreneur.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

I agree. And my wife, she used an AI to buy more things. She wanted shutters in the front of the house and she took a photo of the front room and said, can you put shutters in there and let's see how it looks like? And she's been doing that's her new favorite thing. Let's see. So I it's just the possibilities are endless. And I don't like from us recording today to when the recording comes out to buy the end of this year, things are going to change. I mean, that's the thing with it. It's constantly, constantly changing, constantly getting better. So

I'll see you in a minute.

yeah.

I agree. I agree. It's exciting, right? It's overwhelming. Overwhelming and it's exciting.

It's crazy. It is. No. Yeah,

I agree. What are some of the biggest mistakes you think wedding pros make when they're trying to scale?

How long do we have on this podcast? I have a laundry list of ⁓ them. Biggest mistake I would say, I think first and foremost trying to look outside of your business and emulate what others are doing, which is probably everybody listening to some degree, right? I think we look at Instagram, we look to see what...

Well, you got... Let's hear it.

Yeah, very true.

Content is going viral, we look at websites, we're very visual as creatives, but we look around a lot. And for me, putting blinders on and laser focusing, again, those that are familiar with me, they know I'm a bit of a nerd, I like to research, I love data, I love that that can help us make really pointed decisions and intentional decisions in the business. But I think even worse than maybe not understanding your data is

getting caught up in whatever everybody else is doing. a lot of the times we're not even seeing the well, 100 % of the time we're not even seeing the full picture of what that business is. But the other thing is like, are you actually building the same life? Do you have the same beliefs? Do you have the same vision for your business? Do you have the same, freedom looks different to everybody. And so if we're trying to emulate someone and

Yeah, too.

their end result is completely different than what we want. It's kind of a complete waste of our time and energy. So I think not putting the blinders on is what I find to be. And again, I coach every single day ⁓ all of my mastermind. And that's the one thing where I kind of have to go, hey, like we're missing the point here. Because the point of taking such a jump outside of

the corporate structure and taking this big risk on this big jump is that you can do whatever you want. You can build whatever life you want. Why are we getting caught up in worrying about what anybody else is doing? Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's a good

point. think and that's I mean, you know social media probably is a big blame for a lot of that because we you know, like I'm not working this weekend, but my competitor is out and has these big jobs and Blasting it all over so, you know, so then you get all this Yeah

look where they got published, look at the new

award they got, look at, you know, they're hiring the team. How are they even doing that? And it, you know, it's just, it's not the full picture. It's never the full picture. And so you're, you're comparing your lows to their highs. And it's just, of course that's going to make everybody feel like crap. And then we're going to lose the motivation to push through and have the grit that we need because this work is hard. Being a business owner is hard.

Mm-hmm.

No.

Yeah.

Okay.

And we have to have the stamina. And so often, you if we're looking left and right, the stand, we're losing that energy and that stamina to keep on the course. So that's one of the things that I was very blessed. Like I just didn't, I was like, cool. I'm so glad that you're doing all those things. it's kind of the core of, know, the abundance mindset, the abundance group is built on that. So I was always very fortunate that that was.

innate in who I was, but I also learned that I could teach how to move into that mindset, which is, I think, key. But a lot of the times we get lost in the sauce because we're like, that's a pretty feed. And, you know, look at who they partnered with. And I can't believe they, they actually got that wedding that I tried, you know, that I also was talking to the client. And we just get all gnarled up. And it's like, why? Why? Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, there's no reason for it. Yeah.

I'm a big believer. Not every client, every wedding is for you. You know, like you got to learn that you can't do them all and they're not, you know, not everyone. And you learn that I think when you get a wedding that, you know, the Gretchen's of, yeah, yeah. You, when you get, When you get those weddings, you're like, yeah, I probably shouldn't have done that. Yeah. Yeah. No, I agree with you.

I was gonna say Gretchen. You're really Gretchen Melania. Oh my god, thank you.

You're right. I don't want this money. This ain't worth it. Yeah.

So, all right. You were talking about mine, uh, you know, mindsets and you know, what was the mind set shift?

Yep.

that did you personally have to make in order to like step into that true CEO role?

Yeah, I think again, I've been very lucky that I had the abundance mindset. I just kind of always am a very optimistic person. I'm very risk tolerant. So I'll just run through again. It's not always it's not for the faint of heart. Like I caused a lot of my problems. Like I also know this ⁓ and the belief that like future me is going to figure it out. I have confidence in her and she's going to be great. you know, we're going to we're going to create a wild journey on the way. And

not everything is going to be perfect, nor, I mean, what kind of progress do you make? If that's the bar, none, you're paralyzed. And I have to coach quite a bit of my clients through that of like, this wasn't the way we wanted it to go, but Hey, what did we learn from that? And that was the value that wasn't the loss, right? And the idea of failure only exists when you give up and you have full control of when and if you ever give up. That's pretty empowering. I think.

It really is.

So really thinking about that and going like, can never lose unless I stop. You know, it doesn't mean there aren't seasons where you have to slow down or, for whatever reason, but again, we live, I always say like entrepreneurship is it's like a technicolor world we get to live in. And it's so rad and it's so much fun. again, it's like, do I have hardships? I had an employee steal $20,000 from me. Like, was that fun?

Mm-hmm.

Yeah,

no.

No.

And would I trade anything for it? Absolutely not. Like I love all the ups and downs. know, it's cliche or whatever, but enjoy the journey because the journey is about to be wild. Like, yeah, you have to to some degree.

Yeah, I totally understand what you're saying. You got to learn. You just got to take it as like, wow, that was a great lesson I learned. know, like I had an employee once write a blog, put it on our about like, you know, because that was back is blog, blog, blog, blog, blog. It was about travel. And they took a photo that was free off the Internet on and put it on our blog and come to find out it was free if actually you wanted to put it on your personal.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

social media, but if a business wanted to do it, they didn't read all the way down. Yeah. It cost me $18,000 for, for, for a stupid photo that we had the views on the blog that had about maybe a 20 views, you know, like, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. You know what I'm saying? But it just, but you gotta take it as like that sucks, but you learn and you know, you take your, take your lumps and you move on and you don't make those mistakes ever again. You know,

Mmm.

Turn.

Yeah.

Yeah, you're 20, 20 view you pay what $1,200 a view? Yeah.

Yeah. And

it's creating you to be the business owner that's going to allow you to be the next level. Like the big losses, they build a grit in you and they build a perseverance in you that if you didn't have those things happen, that you wouldn't become the person you need to be. And so for me, I'm like, bring it on. That's why I kind of have this like, let's just go and figure it out. Cause there's gonna be a whole lot of wins that are way easier than I think they are. But there's more going to be losses. And I need that tension. I need that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

you know, a building of character and of knowledge, that is gonna make me, and that's why, you know, people would say, you have a business that does seven figures a year. I couldn't have done that at 25. I had to go, and the wins didn't teach me that. The wins didn't teach me. It was all the crap that I had to, you know, I bought a business that I shouldn't have bought.

No.

Luckily, we never had lawsuits against us now. We were very relational so we could work through those. Did I have clients that were unhappy with me? 1,000%. And there's Gretchen. But those are the moments that made it so that I could hold, my nervous system could hold that I could build a million dollar business. And had I not had any of that, I would never wish, and on my...

Yeah.

on my members in the mastermind, I'm like, I'm not here wishing that you have a perfectly easy route. Like that is a disservice to you. I'm here for you for all of the lows and we're gonna work through it together. You have someone by your side always, but I don't want you to have a completely easy path because that's never gonna up level you. That's not the point. And that should be thrown out that that's the goal.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, I agree. All right, so million dollar question right here. So how can wedding pros increase profitability without simply taking on more?

Yeah. Love it.

Charge more money. There we go. Nailed it. I have three words. No, but here's what comes with that. A lot of people, they'll raise rates. They're going to raise their base price of $1,000. And then all of a sudden, well, they're not closing the leads. They're like, ⁓ and then they're going to go to the luxury market, but then you hear crickets. And what's actually happening underneath is the business owner doesn't feel confident enough that that service or that deliverable is actually

All right. Mic drop.

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

it. So they're doing all these micro things in the sales process that tells the potential client like, I don't know that the value is there either. ⁓ And so a lot of the times it's what's underneath it is a belief and a mindset shift that you've built the SOPs, you've built up the client experience, you've built up the brand, all of those things. That's actually what gets you to be able to charge those rates, but it's actually all in here.

Hmm.

Like if you believed that the service, if you believed at a sole level that your services were worth that, you'd have no trouble selling it. So actually as a coach, a lot of my work is that mindset shift and what systems and things are we putting in place that now empowers you to believe that your services are worth a thousand dollars. So raise your rates and then a huge caveat of all this, of why that happens and how it actually, you know,

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah.

Hehehehehe

plays out that you can be more profitable.

Yeah, I went to a conference one time and the speaker was talking about that every 50 weddings they raise it. That's their mark. They raise, know, and I'm like, everyone has to have that mark, you know, like people do it, you know, every year, every, you know, every two years, you know, everyone has a different, different time, but I

Sure.

Well, I'm like,

you you think about that. How arbitrary is that? Right. Like 50 weddings a year or whatever. Twelve months on a calendar. But what is that doing? Psychologically, it's because they have more experience and they believe that with that experience deserves a higher rate. So again, if I can sit and work with you and we can do, you know, a couple of coaching calls back, back to back about mindset, all of a sudden you're raising your rates a thousand dollars in a couple of sessions and not in 12 months because we're we're we're

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

curing the roots of the problem. yeah, but absolutely. I like you say, just, I mean, it's just an arbitrary time, but what's actually happening on the surface is you believe the value's there. Yeah. And that's what matters.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, makes sense.

All right, so delegation. So what role does delegation play in creating both freedom and growth?

I think you can't have freedom without it. In the industry that we're in, I don't want to be shackled to working every single night and weekend. if my goal is to make a six figure take home pay, the amount of clients I would have to serve and the demand of that, of course you feel burnout. Because what you have probably, depending upon what you're charging for services, 10, 20, 30 clients you're working with, that's 30 weekends.

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

that you're not in control of. And so without a team, without delegating, you're trading time for money. And it's real snazzy and cool to say at multiple streams of income and just charge for a template and all that stuff and diversify. But at the end of the day, the easiest path is to build the team. The easiest path is to work on

Yeah.

Yeah.

how you can be a great leader, how you can build that team culture that you've talked about. Because building a template or building, you're potentially building a whole new audience in a whole new business. Like that's way harder. That's way harder. And I oftentimes coach my clients around doing that. I'm like, what's the why behind why we're doing this? Like for me, I deeply knew at a soul level, I'm here to help wedding professionals.

Mm-hmm.

It is.

I don't, I truly don't think I'll ever pivot out of this industry. There's a lot of coaches that do for whatever reason. I'm like, I'm here. I love it here. That's my why. But if you're, if you're trying to do all these different things and diversify whatever, because you want these multiple streams of income so that you don't have to work every single week. I'm like, that's the hardest way to do this delegation and bringing people on board and getting them behind your vision. That's the much simpler path.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

to freeing up your time. And now, I mean, I have so many messages from my clients of like the moment that they hired a team member and that team member served a client, they got a five star review and they made money while they sat at home on the weekend. And they're like, what is this? This is like the best thing. And I'm like, I know, this is what I've been trying to tell you. So I mean, delegation I think really unlocks freedom for a wedding professional.

Yeah.

Hmm.

Yeah, that's amazing. All right. What are some of the signs someone has built themselves a demanding job instead of a scalable business?

Yeah, that everything falls on their plate. They're in that hustle loop. They're doing it alone, right? They're over delivering. It's that. That is you have a very demanding job at that point. You have a job that I don't think anybody wants ⁓ because it really stops with you. You will always trade your time for money. You will be stuck in a, like I say, the loop of making sure all your clients are okay, plus taxes and your CRM and the marketing strategy and all the things.

Okay.

And so it's not even that you have a really demanding job. It's that you have a really demanding job and you own a business around it. You have to do all the things that a business owner has to do. And, you know, again, that's why people come to me and start working with us inside the mastermind of like, I want to get out of that. And I want to do everything I can to help people get out of that mentality. But, yeah, I think a lot of wedding professionals know it, right? They know when they they're just

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

They don't even really want to wake up and work today. They want to just sit in bed rot and they want to hide under their covers and watch Netflix or scroll, right? Like if that is where you're sitting, that to me is a huge indicator that you've built yourself a really tough job and I don't want you to be sitting in there doing.

Yeah, that's it. I like that. All right, we're getting to the end, but I wanted to ask you one more question. For someone listening, who feels trapped in the hustle loop right now? What's the first thing they should change?

Yeah.

call me, come find me on Instagram. I have tons of resources free. I want to give them away to people. But really, think the first thing to do is just acknowledging that you, and sometimes this, I say this in the best way. say, understanding your diamond shoes are too tight. And what I mean by that is you have diamond shoes. That's pretty rad. That's really valuable.

Ahahahaha!

Mm-hmm.

shoes that are too tight, that sucks still. That's not fun. And I think a lot of the times for those, those wedding pros that are in the hustle loop, they forget the five years ago version of themselves that would have like died for as many clients as they have. So I think acknowledging that you do have, you've created this beautiful demand for yourself and it is still hard. So there's, there's a gratitude practice that's

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

that's underlying there of going, man, I've worked so hard and I'm so grateful for all that I have, and I still have to find a solution to get out of this. And again, I joke, but like, I truly do have tons of resources up and in the game a long time as a coach, and I'd love to give them away to your community. So if that's ever helpful, come find me. But truly, like I say, I think there's this stopping, breathing, intentionality of going like,

Yeah.

The hustle is real and I'm only hustling because of the abundance of opportunity that I've created for myself. And sometimes that kicks us out a little bit enough to go, yeah, this is what I worked hard for. And I still wanna find a way out. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, should always

be a light at the end of the tunnel for everyone. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah.

Yeah. And there is, there is, there

always is. And I think, you know, there's so many educators in this space, yourself, so many of my friends that are here that really truly want to help and really truly want this community to thrive. I think we're so lucky right now with the amount of, of talent and wisdom and knowledge that gets poured back in. remember when I started like that, it was just a very different industry.

I agree.

Mm-hmm.

there

wasn't the resources, there wasn't the humans that had been in the trenches before and want to extend their hand back and just pull people up and get you into a better season in the business. And there's so many educators ⁓ that I get to have such great personal conversations with and the love that they have for this community I think is just so stellar. so making sure that you connect with people that are here to help.

Yeah.

Again, there absolutely is a light at the end of the tunnel and there's a lot of people that are here to help you figure it out.

Yeah,

I love it. That'll be our mic drop right there. All right, Ashley, where can listeners learn more about you and connect with you?

Yeah, best place is Instagram. I'm in the DMs all the time. So we're just @theabundancegroup over at Instagram. And yeah, connecting there. i love a voice. I love a voice note back and forth. ⁓ Who'd have thought, Kevin, who'd thought that I love to talk to my friends? Yeah, right. But again, just come to me, you know, with however I can be helpful. I'd love to connect, you know, like I say, y'all are my favorite. This wedding community is just

Okay.

Yeah, yeah, I was I have no clue that you would like to do that so

And again, I've had the blessing to be around a lot of different types of entrepreneurs in my years, and there's just something that this community has in my heart, and I love it. So if I can ever be helpful, come hang out with me on Instagram. I'd love to connect.

I love that. All right. We will have all of Ashley's information in the show notes as well as the email blast that goes out to everyone. then Ashley, you mentioned a few freebies. If you wanted to throw those in, we'll be happy to share those with everyone as well. Yep. So and then I guess the big burning question that I have to ask is what park is your favorite? Disney Park is your favorite.

Yeah, absolutely.

⁓ the nostalgically, of course, Magic Kingdom. Epcot, though, if I'm with my, you the adults, the adult park. Epcot, are you at Disney? I mean, I see them. I see them up there.

Okay.

So yeah, so I'm

California, so we're Disney. You know, I'm very partial to Disneyland and California adventure, but ⁓ we do, we've been to, you we just did a Disney cruise at Thanksgiving last year and we did Disney World After. And Epcot still is my favorite anytime I'm there. yeah. I love it.

sure, sure.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

I mean, especially during a festival. don't know, Kevin, I know we don't know each other super well, but you know, I have Olaf, Chip, have Pascal, I have

Pua on my arm. Like, is life. I love it. I get to meet a kid.

I love it. No, there's

so many people in the wedding industry that love Disney. I think a part of it is I go there and I get creative. I'm like, wow, that'd be fun to do at a wedding. oh God, look how they did that. You know, and just I'm more intrigued by the how they do it. and you know, like how the magic I love how the magic's made, you know, and so.

Yeah.

yeah!

It's the best marketing,

like research and development, how their guests experience, how they create such raving fans that will literally tattoo their bodies with. And you just get to like, for me in the Disney bubble, I just get to like be a kid and run around and, you know, be a goof and enjoy it. But yeah, I would say, you know, magic for sure, Epcot, but I have bucket lists to go to every Disney park in the world. So we'll see.

Mm-hmm.

I know, I know, I know.

Yeah, it's just fun. Yeah, yeah, no.

And how

many of you made it to? Okay. ⁓ okay.

Not enough. Only the ones in the US so

far. But Paris was going to be on the docket in 26, but a bunch of speaking engagements and stuff, you know, were definitive. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, I have so many friends that are going to Disneyland Paris and everyone

said it like people love it or they don't like it. They're all over the place. yeah, I think that's yeah.

Yeah, you have to like love it for what it is, right? Because like if you're a world person and you

turn the corner at land and you're like, where's the castle at? Right? You have to go with your, you know, the expectations of what the park is. But yeah, no, it's magical. We are now good friends if we are in the Disney, Disney cult together.

Yeah.

Yeah.

There you go.

are. Yeah, I got we have the pass. We're going in a couple of. Yeah, kids get out of school next week and we're headed to Disney. That's the first trip of the summer. Yeah. So we're well, I mean, it's more it's about it just creates a good family time. So that's what it's about. So anyway. All right, Ashley. Thanks. And thanks for everyone for hanging on to listen to us talk about Disney. But

I love it.

That's the dream.

I agree wholeheartedly.

us nerds.

Yeah, us nerds nerding

out. So, all right, folks, thank you for listening to another episode of Mind Your Wedding Business. We'll see you next time. Take care, guys.