Start a wedding planning business in Canada: no trade licence, a municipal business licence and home-occupation check, GST/HST at $30,000, liability and professional liability insurance, and the wedding-specific services — full-service, partial, and month-of coordination — that separate it from general event planning.
Applies in: across Canada
Wedding planning is a coordination business, not a licensed trade — and it is not the same business as general event planning. A general event planner sells across weddings, corporate events, and parties; a wedding planner sells one high-stakes, once-in-a-lifetime day, with a vendor team that runs to a dozen roles, a ceremony with legal parts, and a couple whose budget and emotions are both fully committed. There is no trade ticket to earn before you can call yourself a wedding planner in Canada. What you do need, before the first paid wedding, is the ordinary business paperwork (a registered name and a free CRA business number), a check of your city's business licence and home-occupation rules, a GST/HST plan for the $30,000 threshold, two kinds of liability insurance, and a written contract with a deposit. The wedding skill is the product; the paperwork is what lets you sell it without taking on someone else's risk.
Do not launch with "we plan everything, any budget, any size." Each tier is a different product.
Start with one tier. A planner selling full-service weddings and month-of coordination at the same time is running two sales conversations, two timelines, and two fee structures. Get one tier repeatable first — most new planners start with month-of, because one well-run wedding books the next.
The business paperwork follows the same shape as any service business:
There is no federal wedding planning licence to apply for. The local layer is where new planners get caught.
Check three things with your municipality before your first paid wedding:
Do this once, in writing where you can. A five-minute check now is cheaper than a bylaw complaint or a venue asking for a licence you do not have.
Planning fees are taxable supplies. The rule to watch:
You must register for GST/HST once your taxable supplies pass $30,000 in a single calendar quarter or over four consecutive calendar quarters.
It is revenue, not profit, and it is a rolling four quarters, not a calendar year. Under $30,000 you are a small supplier and registration is optional.
Two reasons planners often register before they have to. First, venues and corporate clients expect a GST/HST number on an invoice, and an unregistered supplier reads as a hobbyist to a procurement department. Second, registration lets you claim input tax credits and recover the GST/HST you paid on software, travel, and other business costs. If your clients are mostly couples paying out of pocket, the math is closer, because they cannot claim the tax back and your quoted fee has to absorb that comparison.
Once you register, charge the tax from your effective date, show it as a separate line on invoices with your business number, and keep the money aside. It was never your revenue.
A sole proprietor has no separation between the business and personal assets. If a couple claims your mistake cost them money, or a guest is injured at a wedding you ran, that claim lands on you.
Talk to a broker who handles event businesses about these two policies:
Also confirm these three points with the broker: whether your policy covers weddings you plan but do not attend in person, whether day-of assistants you bring are covered, and whether each vendor's own certificate of insurance is still required (it is — your policy does not cover a vendor's work).
A wedding's vendor list is longer than any other event's, and two of its roles carry legal edges the planner does not hold.
Confirm everything in writing. Verbal vendor bookings fail exactly when they matter most.
Never plan a wedding on a handshake, even for a friend. A signed agreement, before any vendor is booked, should cover:
Send the contract, get the signature, take the deposit — in that order, every time.
Weddings are won or lost on the timeline, not on the decor.
Quote a fee for a defined scope. Set that fee from your own numbers:
Published ranges are orientation, not quotes: the Wedding Planners Institute of Canada's 2026 starting rates put month-of coordination at roughly $1,000 to $3,500 by city and full-service planning at a flat $4,500 to $12,000 or more, or 10 to 18 percent of the total wedding budget. If the market in your area will not pay the fee your hours require, the fix is not to work for free. The fix is a tighter scope (month-of instead of full-service), a minimum fee that makes small weddings worth the calendar space, or a different market. Put extras in writing before the wedding: additional planning meetings, extra venues, or a second day are chargeable changes, not favours.
Your first weddings will probably come from trust, not advertising.
There is no trade licence to hold. Wedding planning is not a Red Seal trade, and no province issues a wedding-planner licence: the paperwork is the ordinary business kind — provincial business name registration if you trade under a name other than your own, a free CRA business number, and your municipality's business licence and home-occupation rules, checked through BizPaL and confirmed with the city. Voluntary certification exists (the Wedding Planners Institute of Canada certifies planners), but it is a credential you choose, not a licence the law requires before you can plan weddings. Do not confuse it with the two things that are licensed at a wedding: the officiant, who must be authorized to solemnize marriages in the province, and the liquor service, which the licensed venue or provider holds — neither is the planner's licence.
No. The marriage licence is the couple's document, obtained from the municipality or province where the wedding takes place, and the planner does not issue it or stand in for it. What a planner does is keep the licence on the timeline: remind the couple when to apply, confirm the licence is in hand before the rehearsal, and make sure the officiant receives it in time for the ceremony. If a couple asks you to 'sort out the licence,' the correct answer is a reminder and a pointer to the issuing office, not a promise to obtain it for them.
Full-service planning runs from the first venue search to the last dance: venue and vendor sourcing, budget management, design coordination, timelines, rehearsal, and day-of management. Partial planning covers agreed pieces of that list — venue selection, say, or vendor coordination — while the couple handles the rest. Month-of coordination (also sold as day-of coordination) starts 4 to 8 weeks before the wedding: the couple planned it, and you take over final confirmations, build the timeline, run the rehearsal, and manage the day itself. The tiers differ in price, in how many weddings you can carry at once, and in how much of the couple's risk you hold — full-service holds the most of all three, which is why it costs the most and why its contract matters most.
Three pricing shapes dominate, and most planners use one of them. The Wedding Planners Institute of Canada's 2026 published starting rates put month-of coordination at roughly $1,000 to $3,500 depending on city — Toronto and the GTA and Vancouver at the top of that range, smaller cities lower — and full-service planning at a flat fee typically $4,500 to $12,000 or more, or 10 to 18 percent of the total wedding budget. Hourly consulting sits alongside those tiers for couples who want advice, not execution. Treat every published range as a starting point, not a quote: multi-location weddings, cultural ceremonies, and extra staffing push quotes higher, and your own fee must come from your hours and costs, not from a range you read. If a vendor pays you a commission, disclose it to the couple rather than letting them discover it.
Planning fees are taxable supplies, so they count toward the $30,000 threshold. You must register for GST/HST once your taxable supplies pass $30,000 in a single calendar quarter or over four consecutive calendar quarters. Below that you are a small supplier and registration is optional. Many planners register early anyway, because venues and corporate clients expect a GST/HST number on an invoice and registration lets you claim input tax credits on business costs. If your clients are mostly couples paying out of pocket, the math is closer, because they cannot claim the tax back and your quoted fee has to absorb that comparison.
Two policies cover the two different risks. Commercial general liability covers claims for third-party injury and property damage connected to your work, and venues commonly require proof of it, sometimes with the venue named as an additional insured. Professional liability (errors and omissions) covers claims that a mistake, oversight, or error in judgment in your professional work caused a couple financial loss, including legal defence costs — the missed vendor booking, the wrong guest count committed to a venue, the timeline error that cost the couple money. Your policy does not cover your vendors: ask each vendor for a certificate of insurance before the wedding, and check that the venue's requirements are met by the vendor who actually does the work.
Usually yes, and most solo planners do. The check is municipal, not federal: some cities license home-based businesses and some do not, and zoning bylaws may set limits where clients visit your home, staff report to your home, or you put up signage. Use BizPaL, the federal-provincial-municipal permit lookup, to generate the list for your city and business type, and confirm it with the city before your first paid wedding. A home office does not remove the municipal licence requirement where one applies.
The permits follow the location, not the planner's title. A park ceremony may need a municipal park permit, a tent may need a building or fire review depending on size, amplified music runs into municipal noise bylaws, and fireworks or open flame need their own approvals. Alcohol at an outdoor or private-venue event runs through the provincial liquor regulator's permit for that occasion, held by the host or the licensed provider — not by the planner. Check each item with the municipality and the venue before you promise the couple an outdoor ceremony, and put any permit the couple must obtain on the timeline with a named owner and a deadline.
Scope, money, and who pays whom — in writing, before any vendor is booked. Name exactly what you will plan and what you will not, the planning fee and how it is charged, the deposit and the payment schedule, the cancellation terms for both sides, and whether vendors are paid by the couple directly or through you. If money passes through you, say so explicitly, keep it identifiable, and never use one couple's deposit to pay another wedding's vendors. Add the wedding-specific clauses: what happens if the date moves, if the guest count changes, or if a vendor cancels; who owns the timeline decisions on the day; and a deadline by which the couple must give you final numbers — guest count, dietary needs, seating plan — so a late answer is their delay, not your failure.
Sell the smallest commitment first, and borrow other people's trust until you have your own. Month-of coordination is the usual entry point: it is a smaller yes for a couple, it puts you inside real weddings quickly, and it builds the vendor list and the portfolio that full-service clients want to see. Introduce yourself to venues — venue managers recommend planners they trust, and a venue that has seen you run a smooth wedding will send you the next inquiry. Assist an established planner for a season, and with permission photograph the room, the table, and the timeline working — future couples buy the feeling that the day will run smoothly, and a run-of-show that held is the proof. Set up a free Google Business Profile with your service area and photos you have permission to use, and ask every finished couple for a review and a referral.
Licence rules and registration fees change, and they vary by province and city. Confirm your provincial fee and your city's licence rules before you file or pay.