Gay Marriage Can Fill Coffers
Philadelphia Metro
by Amy Zimmer
June 14, 2009

The menu featured lobster salad, followed by rack of lamb and a decadent cake with hazelnut crème filling. Guests nibbled on pieces of chocolate shaped like the happy couple’s cat and dog.

“It was extremely extravagant,” said Harriet Rose Katz, whose Gourmet Advisory Services catered the recent wedding between two high-profile New York City men in Massachusetts.

If their home state sanctioned same-sex marriage, she said, “They would do it over again.” And it would not only be a boon for her business, but for wedding planners, florists, bands and the hotels their guests stay in.

Same-sex marriage has generated roughly $111 million for Massachusetts’ economy since legalization five years ago, according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law. It calculated, conservatively, that a gay or lesbian couple spent an average of $7,400 on their weddings and averaged 16 out-of-state guests.

Katz already caters commitment ceremonies for same-sex couples in New York City’s top hotels like the Pierre, St. Regis and Waldorf-Astoria, but she knows couples who are biding their time, hoping New York follows the Bay State, as well as Maine, Connecticut, Vermont, Iowa and New Hampshire.

New York could reap $210 million over three years following the legalization of same-sex marriage if the destination wedding market stays strong, according to New York City Comptroller William Thompson.

“A lot of people want to wait and have been putting off doing this elsewhere,” Katz said. “All these people are held in abeyance. It’s very joyful to see the same-sex couples who have been together for a number of years because it was frowned upon for so long.”

The ‘Creative’ Class
Massachusetts gained a competitive edge in attracting young, highly educated professionals who are in same-sex couples, according to a Williams Institute study released last month. Its author, Gary Gates, said the real test will be to see what happens in Iowa in five years.