My fiance and I booked the venue of our dreams in February after deciding the fairly pricey cost per head was worth it for what we were getting, even though it was at the top end of our budget.
The contract we signed mandated that we had to use one of four approved florists for our wedding. Ok, no problem, as neither my fiance nor I is much of a fan of flowers. She planned to have a bouquet and that was it. Candles for the tables. Done. We set aside $2000 for decor and forgot about it.
Fast forward to today, and the coordinator casually mentions that we should have no problem "hitting the $5000 minimum for floral" with our guest list and that she imagines the floral/decor cost will come to $75+/person. She also mentioned that the florist cost will need to include all linens, as apparently the venue tables come undressed and the plated dinner/silver/china/etc. included in our venue fee does not include napkins.
No where in our contract nor on any of the four florist sites is a minimum mentioned, so you can imagine that we're frankly shocked to learn that even if we wanted no flowers or lighting at all, we'd be obligated to spend a minimum of $5000 on what I can only imagine must be diamond-studded napkins and tablecloths alone.
We feel/(felt?) fortunate that we were able to book our dream venue, but we are not so well off that we can casually spend an estimated $8350, or even the minimum $5000, on something we absolutely don't want or need.
We have already contacted the coordinator and related as much, but we're curious if anyone has had an experience like this and what they did.
Any suggestions?