Wedding budgeting is the first and arguably most important step of wedding planning. It will set the tone for the rest of your planning and also keep your mind at east as you go through the wedding planning process. Budgeting can be stressful, but it doesn’t have to be. In this post, I will give you some tips and tricks on setting your wedding budget and making sure you have the wedding of your dreams, but within your means.
The first step of wedding budgeting is listing out all of the details that you will need to plan for – start with the following:
- Venue (will you have one venue, or will you have separate venues for the ceremony and reception?)
- If your venue doesn’t include catering, also consider prices for food and drinks
- Wedding planning services
- Florist
- Reception music (band or DJ?)
- Ceremony music
- Wedding dress
- Wedding accessories (shoes, veil, jewelry)
- Hair and makeup for the bride and bridesmaids
- Invitations (as well as save the dates, thank you notes, and any other paper goods you might want)
- Officiant
- Wedding cake
- Wedding favors or welcome bags
That is a lot to start with, but that will give you a great starting point for your budgeting. There may be some other expenses that may be unique to your wedding that you will also need to plan for. For example, perhaps you want to have special place cards or you want a unique guest book – these will be additional expenses that you will need to plan for.
Once you have your full list of your wedding details, you will want to do two things: research and prioritize. The first is research – in order to budget, you need to understand what things cost in your area. The budget for a wedding in New York City might look a lot different than a budget for a wedding in a more suburban area because naturally things are more expensive in New York City. It is important to understand the range of costs for each item before you start budgeting. It is important to remember that the ranges are WIDE so don’t get too tripped up on either end of the spectrum. A wedding at the Plaza Hotel in New York City will cost a lot more than a wedding somewhere else – but neither is better than the other. The second part is prioritizing. It’s important to understand what is most important to you and your partner for your wedding day. For Jared and I, it was the food. (Oh and most importantly the ability to have sushi – I was willing to sacrifice anything I needed to be able to have sushi on our wedding day). Because of this, we only looked at venues known for their food. So we were willing to pay a little bit more to make sure our food was amazing, but we’ll save on something that was less important to us like invitations. You will want to prioritize these details so you know where to spend a little bit more and where to hold back – this will help make sure you have the wedding that you are envisioning, without skimping on any details.
Once you have prioritized your items, its good to know where you can save some money. Here are a few tips:
- Season: Think about the timing of your wedding – are you set on May or September? If you can be flexible, you can save big. Weddings in non-peak months (winter especially) don’t have the same premium costs as those in the spring. If you are able to be flexible on your timing, this is a great way to save costs.
- Date: Another place to be flexible is the day of the week. Saturday night is the most popular time for a wedding, but if you are flexible, this is another huge place to save. Friday nights and Sunday afternoons are still great times to get married and are still pretty convenient for guests – and it will save you a lot of money to have a wedding on one of those days. If you can push to another weekday, you’ll save even bigger.
- Wedding planner: Do you need a wedding planner? Forgoing a wedding planner can save you a lot of money. If you have the time to plan your own wedding (remember that you need to have a wedding vision and be organized to be able to do this on your own), then you should definitely do that. A lot of venues will provide a day-of coordinator and even someone to help you in the month before your big day. This way, if you are planning your own wedding you don’t need to worry about logistics day of. If your venue doesn’t offer that type of service, you may want to still get a day-of coordinator or ask a family member or bridesmaid to take on that duty.
- Invitations: If invitations are not as high on your priority list, opt out of a traditional hand-engraved or custom made invitation. Sites like Minted have great invitations that you can customize for your style that can look just as amazing as a class hand-engraved invitation. And if you don’t see something that you want on the site, you can work with a Minted designer to make your own invitation. Even using their custom design services will save you some money!
- Music: Music is another place to cut down on costs. For some couples, having a live band is a non-negotiable. But if you want to jam out to some of the greatest hits, while saving your wallet, a DJ is a great way to go. Another popular option is a smaller band and DJ combo. If you don’t want to give up the element of live music, but want to save a bit on costs, this is another great alternative.
- The dress: I think the wedding dress is pretty high on a lot of priority lists – but that doesn’t mean you need to blow your budget on the dress. There are so many beautiful dresses that are available in every price range. If you want a designer dress but want to save costs, used dresses or bridal outlets are other great options. Bridal outlets and sample sales provide designer dresses at a fraction of the cost. At these stores, you will need to buy the dress off the rack and get your own tailoring. But it’s still possible to save money buying a dress this way. But don’t feel like you have to only focus on the discount stores, even at larger bridal stores and boutiques, there are a wide range of dress prices. Most stores will tell you up front what their price range is, so make sure you have that discussion before you book a fitting. My biggest recommendation here is to only try on dresses you can afford – you don’t want to try on a $14,000 Elie Saab wedding dress if you know you won’t be able to spend that kind of money. Admire those dresses from afar, so you aren’t thinking about a dress you can’t have when you are trying on ones you can.
- Flowers: Another place to cut costs is flowers. One thing that you probably aren’t expecting is how freaking expensive flowers are – it is actually insane. That is one thing that really caught me off guard, so remember to do your research! Flowers are beautiful, but remember that you are only using them for a few hours, they cannot be recycled, and they will only show up in a few photos – so if you are willing to cut back on your floral dreams, its a huge cost savings. First off – flower type matters. For example, peonies, orchids and roses are very expensive flowers (especially out of season). So consider different flower options like lilies, tulips and carnations, which are generally less expensive. This will already shave some dollars off of your floral expenses. The items that will increase your costs for flowers are table arrangements, a chuppah (if it’s a Jewish wedding), and bridesmaids bouquets depending on what you want and how many you need. The biggest expense will most likely be your table arrangements just because of how many you need. So it’s a great place to try and cut back. Instead of larger arrangements, maybe go with smaller ones. Change up the flowers, or maybe do whimsical and use more branches and candles to keep a romantic vibe but cut down significantly on costs. You can make these same changes for the chuppah by changing the flower type or even by considering something with more organza fabric and less flowers. The same goes for the bridesmaids bouquets – if you need a lot of these, ask for smaller bouquets with less expensive flowers. These changes have the opportunity to save you thousands of dollars and your wedding will still be as beautiful as you can imagine.
Wedding budgeting can be hard, but it’s an important first step in planning the rest of your wedding. By setting your budget up front, it will make planning so much easier in the long run. If you see something out of your budget, skip over it. Don’t entertain ideas that bring you outside of the budget that you are comfortable with. But remember that your budget does not need to be totally rigid. If you decide to go a little over on the dress, cut back on flowers a bit more, or maybe don’t buy that piece of jewelry you have been eyeing for your big day. There are places to make concessions and to go big, so remember to prioritize. And once you get budgeting out of the way, all of the fun things come next! Next in our wedding planning series, we will be talking about picking your venue, which is the first stop in wedding planning fun!
