Via ShutterstockSame-sex couples will be able to marry in Maryland in just a few days, and even though the granting of equal rights to all couples means good fortune for the wedding business, one Annapolis businessman is willing to kill his business rather than cater to gay couples.
The Baltimore Sun reports that Discover Annapolis Tours, a trolley tour company in the Maryland capital, is shutting down its $50,000-a-year wedding business because its owner, Matt Grubbs, opposes Maryland’s approval of same-sex marriage. Rather than see that figure grow—with some in the wedding industry expecting their revenues to grow by as much as 50 percent—Discover Annapolis Tours is giving up the whole thing instead of Grubbs “compromising his Christian convictions.”
Curiously enough, the Sun reports, the unprofitable motive was discovered not by a gay or lesbian couple, but by a straight groom who approached Discover Annapolis Tours for his wedding but was put off after encountering what he termed “repressive bigotry.” Had the trolley company attempted to keep its wedding business going without doing business to same-sex couples, though, it might have found itself in more trouble than lost revenue:
Wedding vendors elsewhere who refused to accommodate same-sex couples have faced discrimination lawsuits and lost. Legal experts said Discover Annapolis Tours sidesteps legal trouble by avoiding all weddings.
“If they’re providing services to the public, they can’t discriminate who they provide their services to,” said Glendora Hughes, general counsel for the Maryland Commission on Civil Rights. The commission enforces public accommodation laws that prohibit businesses from discriminating on the basis of race, sexual orientation and other characteristics.
Discover Annapolis Tours’ website now reads: “Sorry, but we are no longer taking reservations for wedding transportation.” It also states that a longer explanation is forthcoming.
In the mean time, Annapolis has plenty of other trolley companies ready to step in for Grubbs’ company, and on an equitable basis. “Fifty percent of the weddings I do in Annapolis have a trolley. … Someone else will come in and fill that niche,” a wedding photographer told the Sun.