Posted on: December 27, 2023, 11:20h.
Last updated on: December 27, 2023, 12:17h.
No U.S. city’s economy relies more on magical thinking about numbers than Las Vegas. And the magic number Sin City is banking on now is 12/31/23. Its repeating “1-2-3-1-2-3” pattern made the town’s wedding industry declare it a “specialty” wedding date.
Its last one, 7/7/07, or “Lucky 7’s Day,” set the record for most Las Vegas marriages in a single day at 4,492. And Las Vegas wedding chapels hope this New Year’s Eve will top even that.
The icing on the cake? This specialty date falls on a holiday already known for higher-than-average knot-tying. Las Vegas has had about 500 ceremonies every New Year’s Eve Vegas since 2018, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, about twice the wedding business it does on an average night.
It’s a double whammy,” Melody Willis-Williams, president of venue operator Vegas Weddings, told the R-J. “Anytime you get these specialty dates, they’re always hugely popular. But tie that in with New Year’s Eve and it’s a showstopper.”
Willis-Williams said her company alone expects to wed more than 120 couples this coming Sunday night at its dozen area venues, most as close to midnight as possible without slipping into 1/01/24.
Only five couples snagged one of Vegas Weddings’ $2K packages guaranteeing a ceremony during the actual countdown.
Even if this New Year’s Eve doesn’t top 7/7/07 — after all, 1-2-3-1-2-3 doesn’t really occur to anyone unless they think about it for a second — it’s expected to land somewhere on the charts. According to the Clark County Marriage Bureau, No. 2 was 11/11/11, with 3,125 ceremonies, and No. 3 was 10/10/10 with 2,700.
To handle overflow from last-minute deciders who aren’t dreaming of a glamorous affair, Clark County has created a pop-up marriage license bureau at Harry Reid Airport, from now through December 31.
It’s open daily from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. — sorry, not midnight! — near the glamorous baggage claim at Terminal 1.
Oh, and shhh! Nobody tell any of these couples that New Year’s Eve really falls on 1-2-3-1-2-0-2-3.
