Bryony Morganna is marrying her boyfriend Simon Harvey next September, and thanks to her love for food, they’ve saved up £15,000 for the big day.
The 28-year-old started an Instagram page in 2016, posting pictures of food she liked, but now she has such a huge fanbase, she makes between £400 and £2,000 per post – cash that has helped her and her ship broker fiancé, Simon, 30, pay for their September 2021 wedding.
She has nearly 20,000 followers and now she is invited to dine at some of London’s swankiest eateries for free.
Bryony, of Guildford, Surrey, who also works full-time as a personal assistant, said: ‘My Instagram page has turned out to be a good little money earner.
‘When I started out sharing pictures of food, I did it because I love food – not because I thought I could make money out of it. It was only in the summer of last year that I started getting paid for my posts.
‘The money side of things has come as a nice surprise – not only do I get to try amazing food all the time, but I’ve managed to save £15,000 for my wedding.
‘The big day will cost about £30,000 – but so far my Instagram is paying for at least half.’
She started out with a Youtube channel in 2016, but when, after two years of regularly posting content, Bryony’s YouTube had not taken off in the way she hoped, she decided to focus her efforts on Instagram instead.
‘I’d been posting pictures of food on Instagram since 2016 – when the craze to post about what you were eating was first a thing – while I focused on my YouTube,’ she continued. ‘But in 2018, I started taking my Instagram more seriously.
‘The thing is with Instagram, it’s easier and quicker to engage with your audience than it is on YouTube so you can build a following a bit more easily.’
In 2019, she switched to a business account and soon she was approached by brands about making posts.
‘Brands started approaching me and asking if I could create content using their food – either in pictures or a short video,’ she explained.
‘The prices for working with brands can vary but my base fee is about £400, which would include one post on my grid, three Instagram stories and a swipe up link to the product website.
‘Sometimes, if I agree to work exclusively with a brand for a period of time, I can charge up to £1,000. Or, if I get asked to work on a longer project over a few months, which will include something like six pictures and multiple bits of video content, I can charge up to £2,000.
‘As much as I’m working for the brand, it’s also providing content for my page, so I tend to go above and beyond what’s been agreed.
‘I’m always happy to have a bit of a haggle or negotiate though – none of my fees are set in stone. I’m a firm believer in, ‘You don’t ask you don’t get’.’
Until recent events, she would go out to dinner at least three times a week, usually dining for free.
‘I get to go for a free meal and in return I post about the experience on my page,” she said.
‘Before my Instagram took off, on a weekday, I’d go to work and come back home again and not do too much else.
‘Now, I get to go to amazing places, and the benefit of having a plus one, means I can invite my friends along too.
‘I have a running list of friends that I like to invite but if burgers, steak or sushi is on the menu then Simon always has to have first dibs.’
The majority of the cash she has made so far is going towards her wedding day, after Simon proposed during a spontaneous mid-week trip to Lulworth Cove, Dorset, in November 2018.
Wanting to go ‘all-out’ to celebrate, the happy couple set aside a budget of £30,000 – half of which has come from Bryony’s Instagram earnings.
They had planned to get married this September but have now postponed the wedding until next year.
‘I’m a big believer in ‘Go big or go home’,’ Bryony said. ‘Even though we’ve had to postpone our wedding, when it does finally come around, we want it to be a huge party with all our family and friends.
‘We’re planning to have around 200 guests – and feeding 200 people doesn’t come cheap.
‘I’ve managed to save all the money I’ve made from Instagram for the wedding. I’m lucky because it’s not my full-time job, so I can put away all the extra money I make from it.’
You can follow her on Instagram @brymorganna.
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