Gays and lesbians are not the only ones celebrating the recent passage of same-sex marriage legislation in New York.
Companies big and small are gearing up to what they hope is going to be a bonanza in new business from the expected deluge of gay and lesbian wedding ceremonies once it becomes legal.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg -- always the businessman -- announced Monday a splashy ad campaign promoting New York as a great place for gay and lesbian couples to get married.
The soon-to-be-launched ad campaign called ''NYC I Do'' will be put out by the city's tourism agency NYC & Company.
The campaign ''will create hundreds of millions of dollars'' for New York City, said an NYC & Company spokesperson.
Indeed. An updated impact study by former Comptroller William Thompson in May 2009 said that same-sex weddings could bring the city as much as $210 million in three years.
Another study by Senate Democrats said the same-sex wedding industry could bring in as much as $500 million statewide, according to The New York Daily News.
"It's hard to know how big the market will grow,'' said Kathryn Hamm, president of gayweddings.com, a national website catering to same-sex couples looking to marry. "We just hope that it is as big as some of the projections we have been hearing.''
Gayweddings.com is one of several small businesses featured here that are expected to benefit from the burgeoning gay and lesbian wedding industry.
