Inexpensive, Nice Weddings - is it possible

In My Humble Opinion
82

This +1.

The truth is that beyond a certain number, most people at a wedding are there because they feel they have to be. A judicious hand on the guest list isn’t just a relief on your wallet, it’s a relief to a lot of the people who aren’t invited. I’ve been to a lot of weddings, and to be honest the ones with a huge guest list simply weren’t fun for the “outer ring” of guests. A wedding of 60-90 guests is more than big enough to be a hoot.

A lot of good advice so far but I’ll echo what some others have mentioned; you may want to save a lot on many things to ensure you can hire a real photographer. There absolutely IS a difference between the crap most people shoot and what a real photographer does.

83

My husband and I were planning to have a very small wedding and then take our parents and grandparents to a restaurant for dinner. My MIL thought that we would really regret not having our friends there and volunteered her back yard. She and both SIL’s decorated the yard and made food. They were also going to stock a bar but we put our feet down and bought wine and beer ourselves. We ended up with about 30 friends and family in a lovely little city hall chapel followed by the reception in the yard. I don’t know what it cost them, they never would tell us but I do know they put it all together in a couple of weeks.

My wedding dress was my friends dress. It was a fitting connection as we had hosted their wedding reception in our apartment only a few months earlier.

84

I have been to ‘destination’ weddings [I know people don’t consider Hartford CT much of a destination, but we didn’t want to party and then look at a 50 mile drive home so we got a room in the hotel next door to the banquet facility.] One was a gala blow out at a honeymoon/resort sort of place in the Pokonos with about three hundred people, a huge elaborate hors d’oeuvres buffet followed by a sit down banquet, and one was a reasonably intimate [for an Italian wedding] of about 75 people. I will say that while the hundred thousand dollar banquet food was amazingly better [I loved the caviar and smoked salmon bar] the smaller more friendly buffet was immensely funner. Although the wedding couple picked out one of the buffet dishes specifically with me in mind :stuck_out_tongue: [a reasonably plain baked schrod in lemon parsley butter with cauliflower to balance out all the pasta based stuff the predominately italian families had as standard wedding buffet foods]

It also seemed that the music was not as deafening at the smaller wedding, and more people seemed to be having fun on the dance floor and circulating around to the tables - everybody tended to know more people, in the huge wedding the only people I knew were my BFs direct family and I had sort of vaguely met the bride and groom at the wedding rehearsal dinner, my BF was best man.

85

I don’t for a moment think that my wedding would suit everyone, but it was a perfect example of the description someone gave above - not a cheap version of a traditional wedding, but something different again. We didn’t go to the other extreme either - the couple of witnesses off the street and no guests idea.

We stripped away everything wedding related unless we really wanted it. So we had a great venue for the ceremony, I had a kick ass dress made for me, we had beautiful flowers (red roses and Calla lilies 2 weeks before Valentine’s Day, so you can believe THEY were pricey) and a proper photographer. Everything else we junked: we sent invites by email, the ceremony was an open invite and afterwards we paid for lunch for around 40 people at a restaurant we’d hired. No cake, no wedding cars (we drove together to the ceremony), no wedding party, no presents, no dancing, no speeches, no table plan. Just a lovely, long, relaxed lunch with the people that we love. It could not have been more perfect - for us, anyway.

I acknowledge that for some people it wouldn’t have worked. I just wanted to reiterate that if you want to keep costs down it doesn’t leave you just with a cheaper version of a ‘traditional’ wedding, or the stripped down semi-elopement that some people choose, if neither of those are what you really want. You can easily make a wedding special to you if you decide to.

86

We had our wedding floral done by the local community college’s flower arrangement “department” (I think they’re technically part of the botany/hort dept). The department head took on a few jobs per semester and used them as opportunities for the students. She obviously oversaw the work so you weren’t getting half-assed arrangements. Price was the wholesale cost of flowers plus a reasonable donation to the department ($200 I think?). Her and my wife got along swimmingly and planned some very unique arrangements which my wife loved.

She mentioned that the slots filled up very quickly. But it might be worth checking if any local schools offer the same opportunity.

87

Reported post by KathyinSC as spam.

88

First, you need to limit your guest list. No getting around that.

Secondly, if your theme is something casual, you are going to spend a lot less money. For example, our theme was Texas Hill Country. We got married in a historical church which did not need decorating, and we had our reception at a nearby natural area meeting space which had this beautiful stone patio with trees draped over it. It needed little or no decorating. Buffet was catered by a local BBQ joint that everyone loves and we served only local wines that we bought at the grocery store. Our cheapness looked purposeful. In other words, a super rich couple might have had the same wedding because the theme was so cool.

For a dress, we went to the working class Hispanic part of town and hit the dress shops there. You can find incredible bargains compared to the suburban dress shops. For the record, I am a Hispanic person and I am referring to my old neighborhood. Just brush up on your Spanish before you go! : )

We made a playlist and had my nephew dj, it was easy and fun and people had a good time.

With the cake, photographer, limo and bouquet- we shopped around and paid retail. It wasn’t too bad.

89

4 should be easy after 3b and 3c. I don’t imagine too many people wanting to go to a wedding with no food or booze.

90

Sometimes you are SO East Coast :smiley:

91

For my second marriage, we pulled off a smallish wedding for under 3K, including rings. Top savings:
–Outdoor wedding in a state park, in a gorgeous ampitheater overlooking the hills.
–Friends performed the ceremony, sang, and did the poetry reading. We paid out maybe $150 total as thank you gestures.
–Bridesmaids picked their own dresses. The guys wore rented tuxes (they paid for them) but only because they all wanted to.
–We asked a few close friends/family members to contribute to a pitch-in for the reception meal. The reception was held in a local park shelter; I think it cost $35 to rent.
–Got all supplies/paper goods at a discount party supply place. Made our own invitations.
–HUGE savings: Ordered all flowers from a local grocery store (Marsh). I got my huge bouquet, smaller ones for 2 bridesmaids, flowers for both moms, lapel flowers for the guys, and fresh small bouquets for the table–under $300. And they were gorgeous.
Of course, you have to hope for good weather. We got lucky. It was really the prettiest wedding I’ve ever attended, and I say that even AFTER I divorced the groom. :slight_smile:

92

Depending on what you and your S.O. consider to be Inexpensive. When my Dearly Beloved™ and I were planning, we knew several things:

  1. We pay 100 % ourselves. I was late 40’s, she was already 50. We pay our own expenses in life.

  2. The lowest possible costs we could manage, with one caveat: This was her first wedding. We both approached this in a logical cost-conscious manner but I said if there was one thing she INSISTED be done " in style ", we do it. All things being reasonable of course. She did. She wanted to have a killer wedding cake. Not huge, not obnoxiously pricey- but a truly delicious exceptional cake. We drove to the area months before, and spent an entire day driving from baker to baker, cake-testing. After 9 hours we were completely stoned on sugar. And we had our baker chosen. She was a bit high-strung and pushy, but when it came to it, she delivered and was perfectly professional as was her wing gal. I think the cake was… $ 400?

With that in mind, here’s what we did:

Wedding in an Episcopal Church near her family.

A) Bought our own liquor. Bought too much, we still have bottles left unopened.

B) Interviewed local restaurants that did catering. Found one that actually could do very different menus for our two events.

C) Did a light foods reception for all who attended the wedding. We did it IN the Parish Hall, down the hall from the church itself. It was free to use to us. A few different hot finger foods. Soda, wine, water. This was for everyone who came. Quite a few folks couldn’t say through into the evening for the larger After-Party.

D) Photos by our dear friend. She’s NOT a pro. Has a great eye, used my DSLR. We have a surfeit of great images. Free. ( And I returned the favor 2 years later by shooting HER wedding. :smiley: )

E) Same restaurant was able to really pull out all the stops with a killer BBQ dinner. Both meals were buffet.

F) Rented tables and chairs locally, picked them up myself in the van. This was the one 100% waste. We were going to have BBQ on the back lawn of my BIL and SIL. Aside from the 40 minutes or so when we were taking photos post-wedding, it rained ALL DAY and ALL NIGHT. The tables and chairs sat in the garage dry and untouched. When I returned them the next morning, the fellow believed me, saw they were completely dry and had no grass stuck to them and credited me back 75% of the rental. Nice !

G) Flowers. We both detested the idea of cut flowers. Immense cost, they’re dead and stinky in 3 days. Instead, we worked with the lovely and wonderful church Priest and his amazing sweet wife. She’s a gardener. We proposed doing all living plants and donating all of them to her for the church/ rectory gardens. They both went plant shopping with us the weekend before the wedding. One Arbor Vitae died. Otherwise, all plants lived. Four rose plants/bushes, other plants, etc. All still living in the churchyard. In the aggregate, cheaper than big cut flowers arrangements. She did carry a very small simple spray of flowers, I had one flower on my jacket.

H) No rented tux. New suit, which I needed anyway. She had zero interest in a “wedding dress”. Not her style. She found what was apparently a bridesmaids dress. When I saw her in it, I started crying. So, she chose wisely :smiley:

I) No limo. I drove the van, she got a ride with her family.

J) The Priest refused a fee of any kind for personal reasons. We did feel strongly about making a gift to the parish. They are small and poor, the church small and in need of so many things. They wanted to encourage others to have weddings there. There’d been one about 2 years before ours, and before that there hadn’t been a wedding in that church for over 25 years. We gave them a huge crystal punchbowl, cups and saucers and coffee cups/saucers and cake plates. Plain enough that outside stuff could be mixed in with it.

K) About $ 600 to fly her parents round trip in for the wedding.

L) Rings. Hmm. Her engagement ring was my Grandmother’s engagement ring. 1920’s Deco design. Platinum. Priceless of course… Her wedding ring was about 200, she wanted small and simple. Mine is stainless steel. 79.00.

M) Paper goods, etc. We bought ALL of that at BJ’s. Caterer was told that we would not be renting ANYTHING from her. She wanted our business, that was the deal. She agreed.

Everyone enjoyed the reception post-wedding. It was formal, about what we wanted, but not stuffy. The cake was unbelievable. The after-party was terrific despite the drenching rain. BBQ handled under a large EZ-UP tent I bought that morning in anticipation of rain on the cooks, food served inside the house. Many folks out on the covered porch, etc. A blast.

We budgeted, kept a spreadsheet and compared our final costs to what we thought we’d hit. We were quite close. We did the entire weekend for under $ 5,000.00.

To us, that was a reasonably priced wedding with everyone there that we wanted to have there.

ETA: NO VIDEO !!. We both work in the film/ television business. Cameras? Nooooooo wayyyyyyyyy. :smiley:

93

Have you suggested making it a double wedding? One ceremony, one venue, one guest list, etc.

94

My daughter married 8 years ago and she and her husband paid for it themselves (they were in their 30s). Dress was casual. She wore a pretty dress and the men wore ordinary suits. There were just two attendants, one for each. They rented a restaurant a couple blocks from their apartment that they had often eaten in a liked. The wedding was during the dead spot in the middle of the afternoon. They served a meal with wine, no hard liquor. They got a wedding cake, made of marzipan, from their favorite bakery (marzipan cakes and cupcakes their specialty). They got a minister from something like Ethical Culture (it wasn’t that, but I have forgotten what it was). There were maybe 50 people there and it was beautiful. I don’t know what it cost, but must have been somewhere between 1 and 2K.

My son married the daughter of a car dealer, who used the occasion to invite dozens of business associates. Country club, band, the works. I am sure it cost tens of thousands. I don’t know that it was any nicer than my daughter’s. I had to rent a tux for the occasion.