It is very easy for you and your fiancée to get caught up in the excitement of planning a wedding. Before long, you have spent more than you could possibly imagine, financial stress hits home and you find yourselves in a constant state of arguing.
With the average wedding costing approximately $45000, wedding budget blues are a common occurrence for once blissfully happy couples. The good news is that there are several steps you can take to avoid blowing out the wedding budget.
Communication
Too many couples jump straight into wedding planning without any understanding of their partner's expectations. It sounds simple, but you and your fiancée need to sit down and talk about the type of wedding you envisage. This includes discussing the number of guests, the location and the style of wedding you would both like - i.e. casual or formal. All these things have a significant impact on the overall cost of the wedding.
Prioritize
Work out with your fiancée what the most important aspects of the wedding are. You may wish to spend more on photography and videography or the bridal gown or the hired cars. Once you work out where you want to spend the most money, you are in a better position to cut down on costs in other areas, such as the stationary or the flowers.
Finances
As awkward as it may be, you also need to talk about finances. Yes, this is unromantic, but absolutely necessary so as to avoid misunderstandings. After all, even less romantic than talking about money is actually arguing over money!
You need to work out who will be paying for what. Often this issue also involves other family members, so clear boundaries need to be set early on. If the parents of the bride and groom are going to chip in, you need to agree on the amount, and make it fair and equal.
It is also a good idea to establish a spreadsheet so that you can easily see how much you have spent and how much more you need to spend on particular items. Categorising expenses makes it easier to see where your money is going, in turn enabling you to budget more effectively.
Make sure you cast the net wide and consider all wedding costs - everything from dresses, suits, photography, transportation, flowers and cake to invitations, menus and bonbonniere should be included on your spreadsheet.
Quotations
When planning a wedding, it is so important to get quotes for everything! Quotations make budgeting so much easier as you will be able to make a more informed choice about which companies and services to use.
When consulting with wedding reception venues, but sure to ask them what exactly is included in the packages they offer. At some venues, things like the DJ and dance floor, table cloths and napkins will be included in the price. At other places, you may find this is not the case. So to avoid any nasty surprises, always seek clarification.
10 Tips for Keeping Costs Down
- Cut back your guest list. There is no need to invite absolutely everyone you know - be realistic and invite only those people closest to you.
- Reduce the size of your bridal party. Instead of having 10 people in the bridal party, try to keep it to 4 or 6. This will reduce the amount you spend on outfits, gifts for the bridesmaids and groomsmen, flowers and car hire.
- Avoid getting married in peak seasons. Although getting married in spring and summer is tempting, you will find that you can get a much more reasonable wedding package during the autumn and winter months, when reception venues are not as busy.
- Avoid getting married on a Saturday. Again, this is a peak time for wedding reception venues and will be very costly for you. It is worth considering a weekday wedding or a Sunday wedding to reduce the cost of the reception.
- Consider having a cocktail style reception, rather than a formal sit-down, three course meal
- Restrict your open bar to beer and a select number of wines. Avoid including spirits on the alcohol list as these add considerably to the cost.
- Use your social and family networks to your advantage. If you have friends or family members that are photographers, hairdressers, florists, makeup artists or dressmakers than ask them to provide these services for you. You may find you get a much better price.
- Consider hiring the bridal gown and men's suits instead of buying them
- Use your own music at the reception instead of hiring a DJ. With the advent of the ipod and MP3 music players it is so easy to create your own wedding play list of music. Using Apple i-tunes, you can put together hours of your preferred music, hook your laptop up to speakers and an amplifier and you're set for the whole night.
- Create your own invitations. This will take you a bit of extra time, but wedding stationary is very expensive. There are many DIY stationary kits available that allow you to design amazing invitations, menus and thank you cards for your wedding. It is well worth looking into.
Above all, there is no substitute for communicating, budgeting and compromising! If you and your fiancée achieve these three things, you can organise a spectacular wedding that doesn't blow the budget.
