Weddingbee boards

Ladies I’ve been doing some research. This thread really made me wonder how often bee’s stop their recaps half way through or never begin their recaps at all. So, due to my curiosity, I have spent the last 3 nights combing Weddingbee and making myself a spreadsheet of married bee’s and their recapping consistencies or inconsistencies.

As I went through the archives I tallied how often a bee never began their recaps, had yet to start their recaps, are midst recapping, stopped writing their recaps half way through or completely finished their recaps. This was very subjective and based upon what my criteria were. I will explain my criteria and release my findings.

-Never began recapping: Either no recaps were written, 1 post was written or posts about the week before the wedding were written, which I didn’t really consider to be recapping the wedding.  There was also a significant gap between the last post they wrote and the present, showing that they don’t plan to return to recap.

- Yet to start recapping: Bloggers who have recently been married within the last year, have continued to post, have stated they are waiting on their pro pics or that they do plan to start recaps soon, fall into this category.

- Midst recapping: A blogger who is currently recapping their wedding.

- Stopped recapping half way through:  Bee’s who have begun recapping and have stopped after, say the ceremony, or who hint at the end of a post what to expect next but have not posted in 3 months or more, would have been considered to have stopped posting.

-Completely finished: A bee would have either signed off wishing us farewell or they would have posted about their reception or dancing and I felt they showed the majority of their wedding to us.

Something else to consider as well, is that recaps have advanced over the course of the Bee. When Mrs. Bee and the first generation of Bee’s were around, typically they made 3 or 4 posts with a multitude of photos to show you their day. Now, the Bee’s post a multitude of posts with a more concentrated theme to each post and they seem to be writing around 10 to 15 posts. Bee’s are also signing off in a way or letting the readers know when they have reached the end of their recaps. This research was also not to hurt any bee’s feeling or to judge them for why they may have taken a hiatus from the bee.  It was more for a factual representation of how often life gets in the way for some and how blogging on the bee has changed over the course of the website.

Also:
2 bees ( Cream puff and Hummingbird) both left Weddingbee due to the EHarmony buyout.
The Link to Mrs. Radish leads you to Mrs. Ramen (This one is mostly for Mr. Bee)

On to the statistics…

There are 190 married bees.
84 of those bees finished their recaps
40 of those bees stopped half way through their recaps
32 of those bees never began their recaps
23 of those bees are in the middle of completing their recaps
11 of those bees have yet to start their recaps

The percentage break down…
44% finished
21% stopped halfway
17% never began
12% are in the midst of recaps
6% have yet to start

I will say as an avid reader of the blog the fact that 38% of bees never finish writing their recaps is disheartening. The recaps are my favorite part of the blogging process and it is so wonderful to see so many beautiful real weddings grouped in one place. I found this to be amazingly fascinating and I hope a few other readers did too.

Thanks ladies. SO has been asking what I've been doing for the last couple of nights and I felt WAY to nerdy to tell him. :) I'm glad you all like it.

@kitzy - No not snowed in. I've been kind of bored with the boards lately so I decided to do this instead.

Holy moly! That's awesome!

I think that as far as the reader is concerned, the recap is the most important. YES, we do love seeing the process of planning, DIY and other wedding related tasks, but the most important is seeing the end result!

I feel bad for those girls that got turned down to be Bees, and see that other Bees have not done their duty of recapping!

Thank you for this @MsBrooklynA - this is fantastic!

@MsBrooklynA: This is really interesting, thanks for putting it together!

@jo.lee:Ah please do! haha that would be very cool.

I just want to say thanks for putting this together. I have a weird love for stats, so this was very interesting!

I do find it sad that so many bees don't recap. It's so much fun to follow a bee through their planning and to not see how it all comes together in the end makes me sad.

I know life gets busy and it's hard to find the time to come back and recap(I would be a terrible blogger because of this!), but so many people try so hard to become a bee and such a small percentage recap!

That being said, I read the original thread and I will do my best to comment more on the blogs, as I very rarely do. I don't blog, so I never realized how important the comments are!

you're my hero. i think after that thread, we were all suspecting, so it's awesome that you went to the trouble to flesh out an answer. with so many people vying to be Bees, it's pretty unacceptable to me that some just jump ship.

Hi all! I just wanted to pop in and say that it's impressive that you put this together!

I just wanted to throw in my perspective and hope that you guys get a little bit of insight about what it's like to be a bee. There's no pressure Weddingbee's end for bees to "fulfil" any sort of "duties"---the bees are volunteer bloggers and apply because they love sharing their weddings. We never make them feel nor want to make them feel like Weddingbee is a job.

I will say that I do take the time here and there to comb through the list of bees I know we haven't heard from in a while and shoot them an email to say that we miss them and would love to hear from them. There are so many reasons why bees can't finish their recaps...all legitimate. Unfortunately life is not always kind to all of us bees...I will say personally that I have been dealing with a lot of issues that have not allowed me to post on my personal blog (I've posted a mere 2 updates in the last 2 months I think!!!) so I know where they're coming from. Jobs get rough. Unemployment. Family illness. Some photographers don't even deliver their pro pics for 6 months to a year! And sometimes, to be honest, wedding days go horribly and it's hard for some people to revisit that fact. I completely understand. I hope you can, too!  

I will be better in the future about sending my "hey! We miss you! Let us know what you're up to!" emails but also know that you're always free to PM your favorite bee and let them know that you miss them, too :) You can contact the bees here: http://www.weddingbee.com/contact-a-bee/

And I'll take care of the wrong link (Radish-Ramen)---appreciate the heads up on that one! Doh! :)

I'll also add that "recapping" didn't really become a solid, consistant thing that bees did until later into the site's life. I mean, for instance, Mrs. Beetle was never a bee in the capacity that she was sharing her wedding (she gave advice). Recaps really became a "thing" right around when I started reading the site, in 2007. The site has obviously evolved over the years (and will continue to do so, of course!). Removing the bloggers that came before me, I wonder what the statistics would look like.

I guess it's because I can really only think of a few recent bees that haven't recapped...definitely less than 10. :)

ETA: I'll also say that no one ever said/says "This is how it works on Weddingbee---you must share all your wedding pictures in a series of posts. YOU MUST FOLLOW THIS FORMAT." There are no strict "rules" when it comes to blogging and how to blog for Weddingbee. I hope we can all take that into account :)

Let's see if my pie chart will post...

@penguin: Thank you for commenting on this and sharing your insite. I mean no harm in posting this but I obviously noticed the change in how recaps have been presented over the years. It is fun to see how the site has grown as well.

@coconutmellie: If only I knew nerds that looked like that ;)

@dachshund: I've been waiting for your recaps as well. Please come back!

@bellagio:If you look at the very bottom of the page you will see EHarmony Dating advice.

@bellagio:Nope. Purchased by. I had just been hearing a bit about it on the boards lately and then in my search through the archives found the bees who had left because of it.