Tips for Budget wedding???

smellymm83

Does anyone have ideas for saving money??

I find that everything is way more than I feel itshould be... maybe I'm just cheap. Any help?

4eversmiling

What kind of wedding are you doing?

For my flowers, I think that I will be getting them from The Great Canadian Store rather than a florist. They have nice flowers, and it'll be quite a bit cheaper than going to a florist. Oh, and having seasonal flowers is a lot better! For example, the other day i picked up a dozen gerbera daisies at the grocery store for 7$ so if you have a simple boquet or know someone who knows how to put flowers together, you might be able to do something like that. Or, if you have a friend who loves gardening maybe they can give you some flowers, I know thats what one of my friends did, and it was gorgeous!

What kind of centerpieces are you having? I am having glass vases with gerbera flowers. I bought a bunch of vases (all different shapes and sizes) at GoodWill for 50-99 cents. So that was pretty good! 

There is a lady that goes to our church who does GORGEOUS wedding cakes! She loves spending her summers doing cakes, and she is going to do ours. She just charges for the cost of the supplies, although i think we will pay her something for doing the cake. 

For our late night snack we are making some of our own snacks. We have a big family that enjoyes helping out with things, so i think we are going to spend a couple days baking and then freezing them. 

Our caterer also has her own dishes and silverware to use. I got really worried when i saw how much it cost to rent dishes and silverware. So i was soooo thankful when the caterer said she has her own supplies, and didn't charge extra for them. Definitely look into that!!

What kind of wedding dress are you getting? I set a budget of 500$ for my dress, and was able to get my dress for under that, and it is GORGEOUS!! I bought it at Balletts near Yorkdale Mall. Definitely see where you can find a dress thats reasonable. I definitley didn't want to pay thousands of dollars for a dress i am only wearing once. I don't plan on keeping my dress either, and think that i will sell it after the wedding. So that might be a thought.

So there are a few things that helped cut the cost of our wedding! Hope that helps!

Lana Joy

ancavaz

You can have DYI invitations and email Save the dates. We got our invitation at Kid Icarus in Kensington, they were really nice and willing to work within a budget. You can probably figure out a way to save money on favours too.

I agree about saving money on the flowers, I think you can get nice vases pretty cheap maybe even try ikea for this. One thing I would be careful with is where you buy the flowers from, especially if you're  buying them 1-2 days before the wedding. Florists have better quality product and a lot of them guarantee the flowers to last at least a week. If you go to a grocery store you never know how old the flowers are, and sometimes they can go bad really quickly, like overnight. I recomend trying an actual flower shop which sells bulk, there are some good ones at Avenue and Davenport, and they won't be more expensive than a grocery store.

Try not to stress over it, set a budget for everythings and stick with it.
Happy planning!

mcrotondo

My tip is to invite fewer people.  That will save you a lot of money.

angelofmusic_613

Do it yourself is the key.  Anything you can make yourself (or know someone who can) will save you money.  Also Kijiji is a great source to pick up stuff a little cheaper.  My favourite site through all of this though has been ebay.ca  I have found so many things from dresses, purses, decorations, etc. that were a lot less than we would have paid in town.  Good luck.

sarahtisme

I will share a few ways we are saving money. We wanted to do cupcakes instead of a cake so we bought some adorable cake stands which will display our cupcakes in the centre of each table.
This is going to save us huge money as not only is it our cake but it's also our dessert and our centerpiece.
We also found these cute little paper chairs that act as place card holders and gift boxes for candy, we are thinking monogramed m&m's.
I also found some cool old frames that I am going to paint silver and stick a chalkboard inside, We are going to use one on a stand to display our seating chart and another for the menu beside the buffet.
We also bought some DIY invitations at Micheals craft store on sale for $36.99.

bwinter03

I am trying to do as much as possible myself to save

For our centrepieces I am using empty wine bottles (with the lable saked off) and putting in a gerber daisy; it looks really nice and I only have to buy 1 flower per table

For our gifts for the guests I saved up airmiles do I can buy the mini bamboo from Metro and I bought sht glasses, rocks and paper from the dollar store; I am putting the bamboo in the shot glass with the rocks and writing a cute little tag and attaching it. They are really nice and the price point is very low

I am also making my own invites; i bought the paper from staples  - its not in a wedding pack but the paper is already in the right size and has a bumpy edge

The more you can do yourself the better

Good luck

Spazdoodles

I think that Michaels is a great place to buy invites, center pieces, etc  Their weekly flyers always have coupons (usually 40% off one item). Usually once a month on a Saturday you can go in between 9-1pm and get 20-30% off your entire purchase. If you start buying things far enough in advance you should never have to pay full price for anything. Just buy one thing each week! Good Luck!

suellenslater

We are forgoing real flowers and making paper ones, they are beautiful and we are all having fun making them.  I have been taking cake decorating classes for awhile now and am practicing so I can make our wedding cake, For our give away I am making sugar cookies in the shape of wedding cakes.\
We haven;t decided what to do with invites yet.
I just keep trying to keep it all in perspective, it is only one day!!! Its what comes after that is important ....... but it is so hard not to get caught up in it all!!

reason00

For the flowers for my centerpieces, I'm actually buying them from Costco. They have 24 roses for $20. Just dropping a few in each centerpiece My wedding will be after Mother's day next year, so I can get the cheaper ones after the rush.

Making your own invites helps a lot. I have a bit of connections with that, so I only pay for the cost of supplies.

I find that Michaels is way more expensive than a lot of online stores. I bought a feather pen at Party Packagers for $12. Same one at Michaels was $30. And the cost of their fake flowers on sale is still more than real ones.

I'm making my own pomander balls for ceremony decor from styrofoam and tissue paper with some dollar store rose heads in between.

mattycam

1. you can email save the dates rather than order them
2. check on ebay for sales. People tend to sell a lot of wedding stuff because after the day, what are they going to do with them?
3. My FI and I have been very blessed by searching online/bridal shows and finding people who do their business out of their home. It makes a BIG difference to work with someone who doesn't have a store because their prices are lower and you are not paying for the service AND their expenses
4. Find our if you have any family or friends that are talented in anything ex. music, decor, food etc.

I know the biggest way to keep your cost down is to invite less people but I know for me, it is not easy (we are looking at about 170 guests which might I add has been scaled down drastically)! Unless you have a small circle of friends and family, you have to be creative and find other ways to save!

Happy wedding planning!