ORANGE CITY, Iowa (KCAU) – Couples across the nation are rushing to the altar, as pandemic restrictions continue to relax. Many Siouxland couples were forced to cancel or postpone their wedding plans when the pandemic began. Now, some Siouxland venues are booking out as far out as 2023.

“Sheer craziness, this past year has not been like any other year,” said Justin Schrock, the co-owner of The Triple Box.

The boom in the wedding industry nationwide also seen here in Siouxland, as venues are struggling to keep up.

“I feel like our wedding season has gone a lot later this year. We’re a lot busier going more into the fall season, not just the summer months,” said the Terrace View Event Center General Manager Kelly De Haan.

“We definitely say the pandemic increased the volume of inquiries. We’ve had more and more people, as soon as they find out there’s availability, are wanting to book their venue and their spot. I think this past year sadly, we’ve had to turn away more people than accept people,” said Schrock.

Meaning the slowdown they usually see weekends, in the fall, is non-existent.

“Maybe one or two here and there, but most of them are double booked Friday and Saturday weddings. So I would say we are sitting at about 50 weddings this year, which is on the high end of what we normally have,” said De Haan.

“So we do about 130 events a year, and within that, I’d say probably about 30 of them are weddings. This past year we’ve had about 65 inquiries for weddings here in our venue,” Schrock said.

And, couples are tying the knot a lot sooner than expected.

“We’ve seen a lot of shorter engagements where they’re like hey, this is our window, let’s go ahead and get it done,” De Haan said.

“Previously we’d seen probably about a year to year and a half of booking ahead of time. We’re seeing as soon as four months to about six or eight months out is when people are booking,” said Schrock.