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Help! My sis's wedding budget is a joke...
Ok, so I am over the initial excitement of my sis announcing that she's getting hitched. She is one of those girls who knows what she wants but has NO CLUE how to go about it. So, we've settled on wedding colours, and that's about it.
Her budget is $5000. Not a bad budget...but she wants to have a sit down dinner for 130 people! Ugh, no way jose. Not on that budget! She even thinks that she can, somehow, have an open bar! lol As if! I am at a loss here ladies. My wedding budget topped $30k so I didn't have these issues to deal with.
I have tried talking her into having a cocktail-type reception with a subsidized bar, and an evening ceremony. She's not biting.
Please share with me your budget saving wedding ideas. I need to find a way to maximize this cash.
Re: Help! My sis's wedding budget is a joke...
A potluck? lol.
No, seriously though, there are a lot of great ways to save money. I think the biggest is to get out of the "wedding" mindset. All vendors up their price a ton when they hear the word "wedding".
She could consider non-traditional venues, including a relative's property, if you have anyone with a very large yard. Contact caterers and see if you can get away with not mentioning that it's a wedding. Have a barbecue
Have family members and friends take pictures, get a dress on sale/used/that is not a "wedding" dress. Have her do her own hair, her own make up. Don't get flowers.
I think our open bar alone for our 145 person cocktail reception was $3k. There goes half her budget without any food...
annabelle had some really great ideas. Holding it at someones house will cut down on a lot of costs, but bear in mind that that usually means more rentals.
She might be able to get away with a buffet style, if close family and friends pitch in to help prepare food.
She needs to start pricing things out and come back down to planet earth!
We'll just not tell H about this little fact, m'kay?
Is this budget including her dress? She might be in for a bit of a shock unless she can get a great dress she really loves off the rack.
DH and I paid for the wedding ourselves and we tried to keep it fairly reasonable. Our final total not including the liquor since my dad took care of that was still $12K.
Our dinner alone for 100 buffet style was $3K so that is almost her entire budget.
I second the having it at a relatives or even considering a different day of the week, Sunday or a Friday. There are lots of other ways to cut costs, making invites, decorations, favors all yourself, but it still cost money to get the supplies for this sort of stuff.
Best of luck Mel
Thankfully, my parents are paying for this.
I guess just to get her out pricing venues as soon as possible so she see how much stuff can really cost.
I found a nice venue that didn't need extra decorating so I saved money there.
Made my own centerpieces with stuff found at Walmart and Michaels (on sale or with their coupons), candles in a dish surrounded by gems/rock things.
Not using real flowers (I had mine made at Michael's and they actually looked really good, photographed well). Then I had vases on the head table for our bouquets and used our flowers as head table decorations.
My venue also included a wedding cake that we decided was good enough for us, wedding cake can be expensive. We didn't have it served until a bit later in the evening so we put it out with a few extra dessert type foods. Less cake left over, people had variety, we didn't pay for cake AND dessert.
The open bar will kill her, suggest wine on the tables, coffee, tea and pop are free after dinner? Then she's served SOME alcohol. But again, just let her see for herself how much this stuff actually costs, maybe she'll change her mind.
5k is tough if they want a full sit down and open bar.
have they considered having the wedding in the off season? I think it is much cheaper to get married in the winter vs. the summer.
What about using a restaurant instead of a hall - save on the cost of decor. not sure how much of a savings that is but I know a few people have done that and it is always nice.
We ended up saving a lot of money by taking one of the last dates the winery had available for that year. We had originally planned on getting married in the spring of 09 but the winery said they would give us 25% off if we picked November 1st, 08 so we did. We only had 6 months to plan, but everything worked out great.
In the end I was happy that I wasn't able to spend a year planning, I would have gone way over budget if I had a whole year.
We also only had beer and wine, (it's California state law that wineries can't serve hard liquor) which saved a lot of money. I was worried that people wouldn't have a good time but it was no issue at all!
She definitely needs to get out and start seeing the prices of venues. A friend of mine is getting married on Friday and they found a place that had an all inclusive package for $9,000 but you have to bring your own alcohol for the bartender to serve.
I hope she can find something that works for her!
we did just about double her budget, Saturday in May, sit down meal, 104 guests, open bar (one brand of beer, one mix drink, white & red wine).
If I cut out photography, flowers and gifts for attendants it would go down quite a bit.?
you could do a grocery store cake
make your own bouquets from flowers at Costco
Our church was really pretty, so the aisle runner, pew decor were a waste of money IMHO.
print your own wedding invites
She could try and find a venue that will let her bring in her own booze. My sister did this and it saved a ton of cash. If this is not an option then I would limit the booze, I am not sure I would pick wine though as it tends to be the most expensive booze to serve (we had local wines and the venue charged use $36/bottle (plus tax) when they cost $16 each at the liquor store).
Check out the Budget Brides bio on the knot for great tips on cutting costs.
I would have it on a friday or sunday, do in season flowers - you can get a good deal at the grocery store, make your own cake/cupcakes (we made our own cupcakes and the total cost for 6 dozen was under $20), DIY all paper goods and centerpieces, email/phone RSVP.
Really look at food options and waht is cheapest. We found that plated was way cheaper than buffet and the most expensive was doing something like a cocktail hour (apps were crazy expensive). Now if she made her own apps then that could be really affordable.
Check out the local schools for photographers and even chefs who could cater.
We had a formal, traditional wedding for 125 people, open bar and everything and our budget for the entire wedding was only 12K. It is possible to have a nice wedding for less than say 20K, but you have to make sacrifices.
We had a Friday wedding. Some people don't like that, but we wanted a traditional wedding and that is what we had to do to make that happen. Having a Friday/Sunday or non-peak (ie Winter) wedding is a quick way to reduce the overall cost by almost 30%.
My DH wanted pocketfold invites which are incredibly expensive. To make that happen I spent many an hour folding and gluing invites. If she wants the wedding of her dreams she will have to do alot of legwork and cost comparisons, and be prepared to make some sacrifices.
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Yikes. I spent about $5,000 on my wedding, but it was nothing like what she wants. I got married at city hall, had 50 guests for a buffet dinner in a private room at a cool restaurant, and provided wine at the tables. I didn't have a professional photographer, a DJ, or a traditional wedding cake. My wedding dress was actually a bridesmaid's dress, which totally confused the dress shop but saved me a bunch of money.
The good thing about the restaurant venue was that I didn't have to decorate it -- it was nice enough as it was -- so no flowers, either. The food was really good, too.
Good luck! As others said, just get her out pricing things so she can get a better grasp on what she can reasonably afford ASAP.
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Some ideas to save:
Is there a local college with culinary program? They're usually really good and quite affordable... same lines with the cake- look into a baking/pastry arts program locally. My sister was in one and she made my cake and I LOVED it.
I would like to think we had a pretty awesome/fancy wedding. Ours was $13,000. I made my own invites (less than $100 for 100 wedding invites, envelopes, rsvp envelopes, and all my thank you cards &envelopes) My centrepieces were from the dollar store (but didn't really look like it.), we didn't have an open bar, we bought our own wine and served it at dinner. we got a fantastic deal on our meal, we rented a hall that is similar to the legion (ie you need membership) and got the hall for $200 then the food for $15/plate. That was our most expensive thing, that was just over $2,000. I got my dress off the rack for $700. I made the bridal party gifts (under $100 for 6 people, crocheted queen size blankets for all of them, made re-usable tote bags, bought cheap flasks ($6 each) and for the girls bought rhinestones from the dollar store and decorated them.) We went with a pretty minimal amount of flowers and paid I think $600 for everything.
If she can get pretty creative and crafty she might be able to do it. She might have to aim a little higher though. Good luck!
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Wow. That's going to be hard.
My 16th birthday cost 6000$ and that was only like 80 people. LOL! Open bar though.
I think she needs to begin pricing things and then get realistic. Realize it will cost more but that you can budget savvy. Personally, I dont have tips because I always overspend.
GL!