Recently finished my last wedding. I did the brides sister wedding 7 years ago!
I believe younger folks getting married gravitate toward younger photographers. For me, I was in my early 50's (2002) when I started a photography business full time. During my peak years I had around 30 weddings each year plus other gigs. Now I still make business portraits.
My career with weddings lasted as long as it did because of referrals. Had a bride & groom that I did the 4th wedding for their families!
Sales and marketing is really important today because there are a gadzillion photographers out there who have a DSLR, business cards, cheap prices and thats about it.
My best weddings were with "higher-end" clients who appreciated what I do and the photographs I make.
I always had an associate photographer and she was paid rather well but was worth every penny.
Where to begin? You need to figure out who will be your clients, how much you want to charge and what you have to offer. It's not really about equipment, much more important items people are looking for, like decent photographs that they can't make or don't want to make.
Perhaps find someone you could assist at a wedding or two. You could build a portfolio with your photographs to show prospective clients.
Find an experienced photographer to be your mentor, coach and friend; someone whose photographs mirror how you see the world. It could be a teacher or another experienced wedding photographer.
My coach, friend, teacher and mentor was Monte Zucker. Cancer took his life. I miss his friendship and advice.
I truly enjoy helping people with what they want for photography, no matter what the event. If a wedding came along I would probably take it and, besides Jean, I would have a young person who could haul my stuff around.
The wedding business is a lot of fun and hard work but I've enjoyed every minute of it! If I had to do it over I would have started at a younger age. But I did OK in my other life as a sales rep.
Best of luck!