diff --git a/booking.helper.inc b/booking.helper.inc
index e7ee29b..fa01792 100644
--- a/booking.helper.inc
+++ b/booking.helper.inc
@@ -1,5 +1,12 @@
 <?php
-// $Id: booking.helper.inc,v 0.1 2011/07/12
+
+/**
+ * Helper function to strip emoji characters from input text
+ * Taken from https://www.drupal.org/node/2043439#comment-8213973
+ */
+function _booking_remove_emoji($text){
+  return preg_replace('/([0-9|#][\x{20E3}])|[\x{00ae}|\x{00a9}|\x{203C}|\x{2047}|\x{2048}|\x{2049}|\x{3030}|\x{303D}|\x{2139}|\x{2122}|\x{3297}|\x{3299}][\x{FE00}-\x{FEFF}]?|[\x{2190}-\x{21FF}][\x{FE00}-\x{FEFF}]?|[\x{2300}-\x{23FF}][\x{FE00}-\x{FEFF}]?|[\x{2460}-\x{24FF}][\x{FE00}-\x{FEFF}]?|[\x{25A0}-\x{25FF}][\x{FE00}-\x{FEFF}]?|[\x{2600}-\x{27BF}][\x{FE00}-\x{FEFF}]?|[\x{2900}-\x{297F}][\x{FE00}-\x{FEFF}]?|[\x{2B00}-\x{2BF0}][\x{FE00}-\x{FEFF}]?|[\x{1F000}-\x{1F6FF}][\x{FE00}-\x{FEFF}]?/u', '', $text);
+}
 
 /**
  * Helper function to perform some validity checking of email addresses
diff --git a/booking.regn_node.inc b/booking.regn_node.inc
index 2877283..21155ba 100644
--- a/booking.regn_node.inc
+++ b/booking.regn_node.inc
@@ -291,7 +291,7 @@ function booking_insert($node) {
 	foreach ($node as $key => $value) {
 		//check if the key is a field that belongs in the database
 		if ((strpos($key, "booking_") === 0) || $key === "nid") {
-			$data[$key] = $value;
+			$data[$key] = _booking_remove_emoji($value);
 		}
 	}
 	watchdog('booking_debug', "<pre>Inserting node:\n@info</pre>", array('@info' => print_r($data, TRUE)));