Wedding-planning giant Knot Worldwide cut about 4% of its global workforce this week as part of an internal restructuring, according to information obtained by The Washington Post.
About 100 employees in The Knot’s sales and marketing departments have been laid off, according to a person familiar with the matter. The company began notifying affected employees on Tuesday.
A spokesperson for The Knot confirmed the cuts and said the move is not a sign of financial difficulties for the privately held company, but is part of an effort to shift resources to key business priorities, including supporting the wedding industry vendor community.
“Over the past few months, we have taken meaningful steps to better understand our customers’ needs and thoroughly evaluate our business,” a spokesperson said in a statement Friday. “It is clear that to drive value for our users, vendors and partners, we need to innovate even faster.”
“As a result, we are making aggressive changes to our sales and marketing department to better align our business model with the small businesses we serve,” the spokesperson added.
The cuts come as The Knot, whose network of businesses includes WeddingWire, WeddingPro, Hitched and The Bump, is trying to repair relationships with disgruntled vendors after allegations emerged last year that it used shady sales techniques to secure advertising dollars from companies that had no choice but to promote their own services, The Washington Post reported.
The company said affected workers received severance pay and were given access to outplacement services.
“While we know change is difficult, we believe these transformations will create new opportunities to improve our platform and enhance the benefits we provide to our users, vendors and partners,” the spokesperson said.
The spokesperson added that The Knot plans to roll out a number of new products for users and local independent wedding vendors by the first quarter of 2025, including the launch of free and low-cost advertising plans for small businesses.
Last month, The Knot Worldwide unveiled a revamped platform for vendors such as cake bakers, celebrants, photographers and videographers.
The company touted upgrades such as “AI-powered storefront enhancements” that help small business owners select photos and generate text summaries that they can use to attract users.
It remains to be seen whether the upgrades will satisfy wedding industry professionals, who make up a large part of the company’s business.
As The Washington Post exclusively reported last month, The Knot’s quiet acquisition of boutique wedding booking platform Simply Eloped earlier this year raised concerns among some business owners that the controversial company had too much control over the wedding planning industry.
“They’re trying to buy up as much of our industry as they can,” a concerned wedding industry consultant and former Knot advertiser said at the time. “It’s like they want to control public opinion, and that always scares me.”
