Question 1

Why does my hourly rate matter if I charge by the package?

Accepted Answer

Because packages hide time. Two planners can both charge $3,500, but if one spends 50 hours per wedding and the other spends 90, they are running very different businesses at very different real wages. Knowing your effective hourly rate tells you whether to raise prices, trim scope, or systematize the hours that don't need to be manual, and it's the number you need before deciding whether an associate or assistant pays for itself.

Question 2

What counts as an hour I should track?

Accepted Answer

Everything that only happens because this wedding exists: consults, site visits, every email and text, timeline revisions, vendor calls, culling and editing, gallery delivery, and the full wedding day including travel. The biggest under-count for most wedding pros is email and admin time — for planners it's routinely 15–25 hours per wedding, and almost nobody prices for it.

Question 3

What's a healthy effective hourly rate for a wedding planner or photographer?

Accepted Answer

There's no single number, but a useful floor: take the annual income you need, add taxes and business overhead, and divide by the client-facing hours you can realistically sell in a year (usually 1,000–1,400, not 2,000). Most established pros land somewhere between $75 and $200+ per effective hour. If this calculator shows you below your floor, the levers are price, hours, or costs — usually in that order.

Question 4

How do I raise my effective rate without raising prices?

Accepted Answer

Cut the hours that don't create client value. Templated email responses, a standard planning timeline, automated invoicing and contract reminders, and a client portal that answers 'what's next?' questions before they become emails. That's a big part of what Colara automates — most planners recover several hours per wedding from admin alone.

Question 5

Should second shooter or assistant pay count as an expense?

Accepted Answer

Yes — anything you pay out per wedding comes off the top before your time earns anything. Same for travel, meals, per-wedding software share, gear depreciation, and insurance. If you're not sure how to allocate an annual cost like insurance, divide it by the number of weddings you take per year.

Question 6

Is this calculator really free?

Accepted Answer

Yes. No account, no credit card. Adjust the numbers, print the worksheet, and revisit it whenever you change your packages. It works for planners, photographers, and any wedding pro who sells their time by the package.

Wedding Pro Hourly Rate Calculator