A French groom who described himself as "completely broke" paid for his wedding by convincing more than 20 tech startups to sponsor his suit jacket, according to People magazine. The companies had their logos printed on the garment.
Dagobert Renouf told People last fall that he asked for help from his entrepreneur community on social media. "Someone joked he would give me €500 [$580] if he put his logo on my suit," Renouf said. "Then it caught on and other people said they would do it as well."
Comp AI, one of the sponsoring companies, offered him a job after seeing how many firms he partnered with, People reported. Renouf is now an account executive at the New York-based startup, which builds AI agents for compliance management automation, his LinkedIn profile shows.
"I’ve been absolutely killing it and enjoying it since then," he told People. "I found my dream job thanks to this."
Renouf, who calls himself an "entrepreneur turned salesman," was nearing homelessness while preparing to marry his then-fiancee, marketing manager Anna Plynina, People reported.
He began tweeting requests for company sponsorships last July. "My wife didn’t like the idea at first, but then we started focusing on really using the opportunity to bring all of my entrepreneurship community I had built along the years alongside us on this special day," Renouf told People. "Then we started taking it seriously."
Plynina agreed after requesting a pair of Prada pumps as part of the deal and asking that Renouf only partner with "indie /indie friendly products," he said on X. "Because putting huge soul-less brands doesn't match with my values," Renouf said in his post. "That is so smart and beautiful, I think she's the one right?"
Twenty-six companies paid between $300 and $2,000 for a spot on the jacket, depending on logo placement, People said. Renouf earned about $10,000 from the advertisements but kept about $2,000 after wedding expenses and taxes.
"Our guests actually loved it, including my wife’s mom," he told People. "She thought it was a fun idea from ‘people in marketing,’ since we both work in that domain."