How can I cut costs at my wedding? DIY?
Any tips and ideas would be greatly appreciated.
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One of the first things that you should do is cut the list of guests down to a minimum. Sometimes this is hard for people to do because they have such big families…
See if you can use someone’s nice house, backyard, etc. to have your ceremony and reception. Look into your state laws to see who can perform the marriage ceremony. You may know someone who will qualify to marry you…and that should cost you less.
If you don’t know anyone who is willing to let you use their house/backyard then go to your city’s webpage and look under Parks and Recreation. You can usually get a pretty good rental price for parks/halls in your area.
You can have an appetizer or a cake/punch reception. Having a full meal is going to cost you much more. Or, if you have the time and the help, you can try to cater it yourself.
Ask a friend to be the DJ/MC for the night.
Get bouquets for you and your bridesmaids, but if you want to keep the cost down skip the floral centerpieces. They can add up quickly. You can just do a few candles and rose petals on the table. It looks just as nice and most of the time people do not notice the difference. I couldn’t tell you what centerpieces people had at most of the weddings that I’ve been to.
You don’t need to do favors. They are usually a waste of money because people either leave them at the tables or throw them away.
Hope that this helps. Congratulations and best of luck to you
Cut the # of guests <–the quickest way
Have a Dry wedding (no alcohol)
Have a family friend fo photos…
Do what we did elope and save your money for a house.
Oh boy i have lots of suggestions! lol.. Here is what I did, I decided 2 factos that were important to me. They were 1. all my friends and family there (about 250) and 2. good food(as in yummy, not necissarily really high quality like fillets or anything). Then I realized how much money I had to spend between our savings and our parents and then i did TONS of research. Found the best deals on everything! Use the web, use friends, like I am making invites, decorating the facility myself, bringing in the alcohol. Email me if you need more info.
Here are a few as also mentioned by others:
1. Reduce the number of guests.
2. Reduce the number of bridal party members.
3. Have an afternoon wedding with luncheon reception.
4. Have a cake and punch reception in your church’s social hall.
5. Make your own floral arrangements from silks.
6. Keep the food simple if you decide to serve a meal and have it catered on trays buffet style from your favorite grocery store/deli.
7. Have a ceremony followed by a cocktail reception in the late evening (after the regular dinner hour).
8. Hire friends to act as photographers/DJs
Honestly, there are a variety of ways to have a lovely wedding without spending a fortune. You just need to decide what matters most to you and your family.
Best wishes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Cut your guest list.
Have a non-alcoholic reception.
Food and alcohol are your two biggest expenses when it comes to a wedding and reception.
Make your bouquet and your bridesmaids bouquets and the guys flowers and anyone else that will be wearing them.
Make your own centerpieces for the reception.
Use regular candles and candle holders for your unity candle ceremony if you have one.
Cut out the sand ceremony.
Make your own programs,.
Make your own save the date magnets or cards.
Scan your graphic from your invitation and reception card and use that for all the paper items you make.
Make your own thank you cards for gifts and vendors.
Have an afternoon wedding and serve finger foods, cake, punch and nonalcoholic beverages.
Use flowers that are in season.
Have the reception in a family member’s or friend’s backyard.
Have a casual rehearsal and rehearsal dinner.
The best rehearsal dinner we ever went to was at a pizza parlor. It was a blast!
Rent anything you can.
Network, network, network. Ask friends if they know anyone that could make the cake, take pictures, videotape it, do the flowers, etc.
Put vendor advertisements on the back of your program or a sheet inside the program and offer free advertising for vendors’ services.
Don’t invite your husbands family.
I don’t know the details of your wedding, but I cut costs by finding the caterer that offered the most for the least money. A lot of cateres don’t include plates napkins utinsils, cups tablecloths or anything, and you may THINK your getting a deal til you add that up. I addressed invitations myself, saved lots there. I actually went to a store called dirt cheap thats kindof a rummage store, and i found little favor boxes with printable tags AND invitations that I took to a local printer at a discount and ended up getting ALL my invities and 300 favors boxes for less than 100 bucks. Then it was just another 140 to have the invitations, response cards, envelopes and returns envelopes addressed. We ordered a very simple cake from a local bake shop for 175 bucks that will feel almost 300 people. Do horderves instead of a sit down. Dont have alcohol. Do a dj instead of a band. You can go to your local college and get some photography students to do your pictures because they usually have the equipment and are MUCH cheaper. Plus its good networking for them. Borrow your dress or rent one. Buy local flowers. Don’t order any african lillies or ridic stuff like that. you can do it. I’ve managed to cut mine by about 6000 dollars by doing things myself. borrowing jewelry, using local vendors and such. Good luck!!! Its daunting but it can be done!!
Indeed, DIY will help. Try the following ideas (at my wedding works): go with your wife and buy with your own hand, avoiding as possible, the use of service or catering companies. Buy the stuff directly from distributors, asking every time for discounts.
Eventually, you will need to spend som money, anyway… but a 10%…20% on costs you may cut. But, keep in mind that you may want to make your wedding THE wedding… after all you done it once in a life time. Have a nice wedding!
There are several ways:
1. Have a small wedding, with only those you and your fiance’ are closest to as guests.
2. If you have friends or family who are good cooks, as them to help you cater the wedding, buffet style.
3. Do your own bouquets and arrangements. You can get great deals from places like http://flowerexchange.com
4. Selects locations that is free (i.e. public park or family property) or rather inexpensive like town centers, art galleries, or libraries.
5. Have a two-tier cake to serve to yourselves, wedding party, and immediate families, but a cupcake tower for the guests.
6. Go to http://www.craigslist.com for photographers or other such vendors. My photographer is $600.
7. Get your wedding gown from eBay, David’s Bridal, or GroupUSA.
8. Make your own invitations or get affordable ones from http://invitationsbydawn.com/
9. If a DJ is out of your price range, burn premade CDs, and have a friend man the CD player.
obviously keeping the guest list down helps a great deal. but so does keeping your wedding fairly low key and simple. don’t have an over the top bridezilla kind of wedding - honestly - no one needs to have a half dozen bridesmaids, flowers girls, ring bearers, and maid of honor so keep your attendants down to a minimum. don’t spend a huge amount of money on your gown and accessories. you can find very pretty dresses at very reasonable prices. if you don’t have a backyard of your own, perhaps a friend or family member does and you could have a garden wedding.
instead of ordering bouquets through a florist make your own, you can make a lovely bouquet easily - you could carry an arm of fresh cut flowers tied with ribbon. i’m horrid at making the darned boutonnieres so i always order those, but you can order a simple carnation boutonniere for your groom and his attendants.
keep your reception simple. don’t have a huge sit down meal, have a small buffet with finger foods and appies. don’t do the big wedding cake, go to costco and order several of their slab cakes, they are relatively inexpensive, taste as good as a bakery shop, and you can have them decorated quite nicely.
as for drinks: buy a bottle of champagne for the toast and then serve wine. you can even go so far as to make your own wine for less than five bucks a bottle! then have soft drinks, coffee, tea, etc. you could do a nice punch quite reasonably as well.
there are lots of ways to cut costs, you just have to decide to do it, stick with it, and not let anyone else tell you that you need to do bigger! bigger doesn’t make better sweetie and whether you spend a thousand or fifty thousand on a wedding at the end of the day the results are the same - you are married! have a grand wedding! i shall be watching for questions from you in the future!
edit: as for invitations - make your own, don’t worry about programs or save the date cards or anything more than invitations and thank you cards! thats pretty much all you need!
I saved lots of money at the site of the reception.
The trend is to go to a big place with horses and stuff. I asked around. People don’t care. Mostly they sit, eat and dance and talk. They see the place outside only during pictures, and nothing else.
So I rented a big hall next to church. Much cheaper and it has better facilities than some of the trendy places, made to be money mines. It has restrooms, a big kitchen, place for music, it’s enormous and quite new!
Also there is a beautifully garden nearby, with no buildings and with wonderfully views, good for pictures. I invested in the food.
With this I’m saving lots of money on the location and in cars as everything is nearby.
I’m also doing my centerpieces and the invitations!