Celebrities are rarely shy about cashing in on the happiest days of their lives.
Over the past thirty years, everyone from A-listers to soap stars have found ways to partner with brands and media outlets to easily turn a profit from their weddings.
David and Victoria Beckham pioneered this trend when they sold the exclusive photo rights to their elaborate wedding in 1999 to OK! magazine. The then-record £1 million deal helped fund the lavish event in an Irish castle.
Six years later, Katie Price and Peter Andre financed their lavish £1 million wedding at Highclere Castle – the main filming location for Downton Abbey – by also signing an exclusive deal with OK! magazine.
But such deals didn’t always go in the stars’ favor. Former Blue Peter and GMTV presenter Anthea Turner faced a huge backlash for posing with a white chocolate Cadbury’s Snowflake bar at her wedding to Grant Bovey in 2000 amid claims it was ‘tacky’ and too commercial.
However, more than 25 years later, there are no concerns about such dealings between celebrities and the glossier part of the media.
Today’s new wave of stars showing off products at their weddings are not doing so on the pages of magazines, but on their own social media pages.
Post-nuptial Instagram posts, which once featured just the bride and groom, are now full of influencer-style tags plugging brands that celebrities ‘collaborated’ with for their ‘big day’.
Katie Price and Peter Andre financed their lavish £1million wedding at Highclere Castle by signing an exclusive deal with OK! magazine
From paid posts where stars make money by tagging brands, to items being ‘gifted’ for free in exchange for exposure, the ability to capitalize on life’s biggest moments has become easier than ever.
And celebrities can pocket huge amounts of money. Payments for promotional content can range from tens of thousands of dollars to millions, depending on the brand and the number of followers a celebrity has.
It means that spending an extra twenty minutes or so taking photos on your wedding day could mean thousands more in profits for celebrities smart enough to form commercial partnerships in advance.
And while some may have simply tagged the brands for no financial gain, this seems unlikely in the current influencer climate of lucrative brand deals.
So which recently married stars benefited the most from the happiest day of their lives? Our wedding snitch reveals all…
Emily Atack
First up is Rivals star Emily Atack. The actress, 36, married Dr. Alistair Gardner, her step-cousin, and celebrated at their home in Bedfordshire.
Despite being worth an estimated £1.5million, several elements of her big day appear to have been gifts – including, most notably, a personalized McDonald’s van that provided the catering, complete with a Mr and Mrs Gardner McFlurry sign.
As my mole says to me, “When McDonald’s shows up, you know the couple is saying yes to brands offering freebies for exposure.
“But a freebie deal kind of takes up the day because you have to fulfill your duty of taking social shots for it.”
Emily Atack’s wedding to Alistair Gardner featured a personalized McDonald’s van catering, complete with a Mr and Mrs Gardner McFlurry sign
And the happy couple has the substance to prove it. Emily posted photos of herself and her new husband posing in front of the van to her Instagram stories, captioning it: ‘Gift the most amazing van of the day. Let’s be honest. That’s all you want after about 23 glasses of champagne.’
The shameless plugging didn’t stop there. Two months earlier, Emily – who plays outspoken Sarah Stratton in the Disney+ series – had a raucous bachelorette party in Cannes with 20 friends. There she thanked drinks brand Lady A – the £20-a-pop rosé created by Soho House owner Nick Jones for Meghan Markle’s friend Markus Anderson – for supplying enough alcohol ‘to last a lifetime’.
During the weekend away, she also tagged a spray tan company in an Instagram story with ‘keeping me glowing’.
After all this fame, brands will no doubt be clamoring to gift her goodies as she continues her wedding celebrations with a three-day Spanish extravaganza scheduled for later this month.
Jack Whitehall and Roxy Horner
Next on the list are comedian Jack Whitehall and his wife, Victoria’s Secret model Roxy Horner, who married in a country ceremony at Euridge Manor in Wiltshire in April.
The couple, who have a daughter, Elsie, are estimated to be worth a combined £18million and yet – despite this and Jack’s comfortable middle-class upbringing – they are also guilty of cashing in on their fame for a freebie.
Roxy Horner collaborated with US jewelery brand Brilliant Earth to advertise wedding rings for her wedding to Jack Whitehall
She posted some photos of the ring from the couple’s big day
Roxy, 35, worked with US jewelery brand Brilliant Earth to promote wedding rings.
Alongside a slew of photos posted to Instagram from their big day, the couple poses with the rings alongside the caption, clearly marked as an advertisement: ‘It wasn’t that long ago that we flew to New York to pick out our wedding rings at @brilliantearth and now we get to wear them forever. AD #brilliantearthpartner.”
As one industry insider told me, “That wedding was branded down to the last detail. You can’t move without a paid partnership or a tagged brand in their wedding posts. Their official post reads more like a love letter to companies that gave them things than to each other.”
There were 19 plugs in their Instagram wedding post, including one thanking their luxury venue – which costs £42,000 to rent for the weekend.
Two months after the wedding (featured in Vogue), Roxy was still finding ways to plug brands. On June 30, she posted a promotional Instagram carousel with eight photos and videos of her custom-made Omnipod glucose monitor, which she uses to manage her diabetes.
What Jack’s old classmates from £65,000-a-year Marlborough College would think of such a shameless plug-in remains to be seen.
Mel C and Chris Dingwall
If you want to be her lover, you have to deal with her tags… When former Spice Girl Mel C married Australian model and actor Chris Dingwall in Cumbria in July, numerous companies were mentioned alongside the photos she posted on social media of the happy occasion.
On Instagram she tagged the venue, The Country House Cumbria, a host of event organisers, wedding cake maker Sally Jean Wedding Cakes, her entire glam crew and musicians Morassi Quartet, Natalie Williams and Tough Love.
Melanie C has tagged her wedding venue, wedding cake maker and musicians for her wedding to Chris Dingwall in Cumbria in July
Although Mel, 52, is worth £22million, she also appears to have called in a few favors from her A-list pals.
My source tells me that her Victoria Beckham dress was “lent” to her by her former bandmate, and that “DJ Chris Moyles hosted the event.”
Sporty Spice spoke at length in a Vogue interview about how her Victoria had stepped in at the last minute to supply a white slip dress with lace trim from her own wardrobe (and label) for the couple’s Australian wedding. Victoria, 52, also designed and created a bespoke white dress for her friend, inspired by the original slip dress, for the subsequent British celebrations.
Olly Murs
The Troublemaker singer, 40, married his bodybuilder partner Amelia Tank during a multi-day party called ‘Murs Fest’ on Osea Island in Essex in July 2023.
Like Atack, X-Factor star Olly and his partner had a personalized McDonald’s truck, which they posed next to while eating chicken nuggets and fries.
My spy reveals: ‘At the time, a source conveniently told the papers that “Olly and Amelia had a McDonald’s food truck that served all the classics, including McNuggets. They loved it.” If that’s not a PR plug, I don’t know what is.’
Like Emily Atack, Olly Murs had a personalized McDonald’s truck for his wedding to Amelia Tank
On Instagram, Murs wrote: ‘Not every day you marry the 3 things you love most! McNuggets, McFried and McMurs.” He also thanked the company for their food truck.
Murs may be worth an estimated £13.5 million, but he also posted a promotion thanking The Grooms Room for providing suits for his groomsmen.
In addition, the couple’s wedding appeared as a cover story in Hello! magazine, making sure to mention Australian Pallas Couture, the designer behind Amelia’s wedding dress.
Sophie Habboo and Jamie Laing
Former Made In Chelsea stars Sophie Habboo and Jamie Laing are veterans at seizing life’s most intimate moments.
After meeting on the show in 2017, the reality stars married six years later, first in an intimate ceremony in West London, followed by a bigger celebration in Sotogrande, a luxury community in Spain.
Jamie Laing and Sophie Habboo… her Instagram page tagged a bridal accessories brand and also posted pictures of goodie bags from her hen party
Sophie’s Instagram page repeatedly tagged bridal and bachelorette accessories brand Gigi & Olive.
“I’m sure she was reluctant to stoop to the level of tagging brands in her chic social coverage of weddings,” my spy tells me. “But the founder, Georgie Le Roux, is best friends with Jamie. But still, it doesn’t look great because it lumps her in with the rest of the pluggers.’
Sophie was also sure to promote her husband’s company, Candy Kittens, by posting photos of goodie bags from her hen party in London, filled with the brand’s sweets and various Gigi & Olive items.
The brand-busting continued at pre-wedding celebrations with friends in Paris, wearing sparkling branded cowboy hats. And who was at the party? Madame Le Roux herself.
