Low Cost Options

JessicaJupiter

We don't have a very high budget for our wedding, it has been set at $2000. I plugged it into the budgeter on here and was told I should spend $600 on food... but the issue then is that it only gives me $100 for a venue, $40 for rings, $100 for my dress, $40 for the ceremony... and it just gets worse.

So I refuse to have the bulk of my budget spent on feeding my guests when everything else would be so disappointing that there probably wouldn't be enough money to use a table for the food and no one would want to hang around anyways. I've tried to research for having some finger foods and desserts but everyone says it is inappropriate and rude for a 5:00 wedding. They say I need to essentially feed each guest a full meal no matter what because I am depriving them of supper.

I am using the number of $200 for food, which in my head should be more than enough for 60 people. The cupcakes (about 2 per person) will be free as my mother is preparing them. Then I am planning on making my own punch and perhaps picking up some on sale cases of pops and water bottles. For food I was thinking of things like large bowls of salads, small sandwiches, cheese/cracker/meat tray, fruit and vegetable trays and maybe some macaroni salads. To me this seems like plenty as the ceremony and reception should be short and sweet so I am not keeping them there all night so they cannot go home to eat a full meal later. 

doeydo

You could have a brunch wedding or have it later at night as a dessert reception.  For a 5:00 wedding, people will be expecting a full meal and be starving if you only have these sort of "snack" foods.

manateehugger

Sorry, for a 5:00 wedding, you need to be providing a full meal. 

If you bump the reception up till 3:00 and go till 5:00 snack foods are fine. Or do an evening (after 7:30-8:00) reception with desserts like PP suggested. 

I'd say stick to either fully dessert or light apps. 

ETA: Your reception is about hosting and feeding your guests as a thank you for attending your ceremony. If you don't want to spend a whole lot, invite less people. 

You also don't have to follow exactly what The Knot tells you do with your budget. Find a free or cheap venue (like a public park) and move leftover money over to your food budget. It's about prioritization; figure out what is most important. For us, food ranked high on the list, so about 55-60% of our budget is going to food. 

allispain

JessicaJupiter said:

We don't have a very high budget for our wedding, it has been set at $2000. I plugged it into the budgeter on here and was told I should spend $600 on food... but the issue then is that it only gives me $100 for a venue, $40 for rings, $100 for my dress, $40 for the ceremony... and it just gets worse.

So I refuse to have the bulk of my budget spent on feeding my guests when everything else would be so disappointing that there probably wouldn't be enough money to use a table for the food and no one would want to hang around anyways. I've tried to research for having some finger foods and desserts but everyone says it is inappropriate and rude for a 5:00 wedding. They say I need to essentially feed each guest a full meal no matter what because I am depriving them of supper.

I am using the number of $200 for food, which in my head should be more than enough for 60 people. The cupcakes (about 2 per person) will be free as my mother is preparing them. Then I am planning on making my own punch and perhaps picking up some on sale cases of pops and water bottles. For food I was thinking of things like large bowls of salads, small sandwiches, cheese/cracker/meat tray, fruit and vegetable trays and maybe some macaroni salads. To me this seems like plenty as the ceremony and reception should be short and sweet so I am not keeping them there all night so they cannot go home to eat a full meal later. 

The first bolded is correct. If you are going to hold your reception during meal time, then you have to provide your guests with a full meal. This means enough food for them to not have to go home afterwards and have to eat more because they were not given enough at your reception.

If you don't have the money in your budget to host a full meal for your guests, you should move your ceremony and reception to an off-meal time. You have 2 options. You can have an afternoon reception (ceremony at 2:00 and reception immediately afterwards). With this option, you could host just some light appetizers, the drinks you had mentioned, and cake. Otherwise, you can have an evening reception (ceremony at 8:00 and reception immediately afterwards). This would be a dessert reception, in which you would only have to do cake and punch/drinks. You could add a little more food to that if you wanted to, but it wouldn't be required.

JessicaJupiter

To me it is hard to invite less people, 60 includes all of our friends and family so it is going to be hard to cut people out. 

Moving the ceremony is going to be very difficult. Our wedding is on a Wednesday, we had already considered a 3:00 ceremony but looked for feedback from some of our guests and they said that they may not be able to attend due to work. Many seemed more open to it started at 5:00. We expect an hour to get through our small ceremony and reception so would 4:00 be a more acceptable time to serve less food?

Perhaps do you have any suggestions of foods I could add that would perhaps be more filling but not bad on my budget. I have thought perhaps if I added some pasta, potatoes or chicken wings (as these can all be made in bulk for cheap) that it could make it more of a "supper" sort of thing. 

The way I am trying to think of it is that each person should be able to fill their plate with food once plus dessert.

hyechica81

never heard of a wens wedding. you need to have more filling foods switch over to pasta salad meat balls and do like a thing of veggies make one kind of pasta offer 2 sauces one with meat and one without meat offer a thing of some hearty veggies do a big toss salad greens cucumbers onions and tomatos keep it simple, put some dressings on the table you could do just italian or balsamic vin or you could do a balsamic or italian style and one creamy such as ranch blu cheese cesar etc, your cupcakes and a your cake if your having one. 

on drinks figure at least 2 drinks per person water and or soda. i would get more water than soda and make sure you have a variety of soda. the worst thing would be to have all regular soda and half your wedding guest only drink diet get a few cokes, some diet, and do a sprite. you can get them in bulk at bjs sams or costco. 

you can also get all your food from any of those places 2 in bulk its better to have some left over drinks and food than to run out of food. 

hope this helps. 

allispain

Well, if you're looking for inexpensive food options, the easiest ways to go are Mexican and Italian.

Mexican: tacos (chicken and vegetarian), quesadillas (again a meat and a vegetarian version), rice, beans, salsa, guacamole, etc.

Italian: one or two different pasta shapes (think a long one like spaghetti and a short one like rotini), a meat sauce, a cream sauce, some steamed or sauteed vegetables, bread, salad, etc.

Are you planning on making food yourself? Having someone else make it for you? Check with local Mexican and Italian restaurants and see if any of them do catering - it'll be much cheaper than your typical wedding food but will (hopefully) still be good quality and you won't have to worry about all the logistics (like how to keep the food at the proper temperature).

grumbledore

JessicaJupiter said:

We don't have a very high budget for our wedding, it has been set at $2000. I plugged it into the budgeter on here and was told I should spend $600 on food... but the issue then is that it only gives me $100 for a venue, $40 for rings, $100 for my dress, $40 for the ceremony... and it just gets worse.

So I refuse to have the bulk of my budget spent on feeding my guests when everything else would be so disappointing that there probably wouldn't be enough money to use a table for the food and no one would want to hang around anyways. I've tried to research for having some finger foods and desserts but everyone says it is inappropriate and rude for a 5:00 wedding. They say I need to essentially feed each guest a full meal no matter what because I am depriving them of supper.

I am using the number of $200 for food, which in my head should be more than enough for 60 people. The cupcakes (about 2 per person) will be free as my mother is preparing them. Then I am planning on making my own punch and perhaps picking up some on sale cases of pops and water bottles. For food I was thinking of things like large bowls of salads, small sandwiches, cheese/cracker/meat tray, fruit and vegetable trays and maybe some macaroni salads. To me this seems like plenty as the ceremony and reception should be short and sweet so I am not keeping them there all night so they cannot go home to eat a full meal later. 

There's nothing wrong with having a small budget, but you have to adjust your priorities.  Feeding your guests should be your primary cost, especially with a small budget.  You could do a dessert/light app only reception, but it can't be for a 5:00 PM wedding - you have to avoid mealtimes.

I would have no problem with light foods at a reception if it were not at dinner time.

I have found a few caterers in my area that can do a full meal for around $10 per person - so it's not impossible - you just have to do your homework.

tjhartle

We had a friend offer to prepare our meat (brisket and pulled pork) as our wedding present and our mom's are provding the rest of the meal.  Pastas are filling and inexpensive.  Lasagna, alfredo, etc.  with salads.

JessicaJupiter

tjhartle said:

We had a friend offer to prepare our meat (brisket and pulled pork) as our wedding present and our mom's are provding the rest of the meal.  Pastas are filling and inexpensive.  Lasagna, alfredo, etc.  with salads.

I hadn't even thought of using lasagna, my mother had only recently taught me to make lasagna and it would not be too expensive to make enough for 60 people. I am also thinking that spaghetti could work as we'd just need to pick up the pasta and a bunch of sauce when on sale and have it heated for the reception...

I think my guests would love to have lasagna and spaghetti as an option for the wedding, it even fits with us as I am in love with spaghetti and my fiance can't get enough of lasagna. 

cowgirl8238

An Italian Food Style reception sounds perfect for a budget friendly wedding.  I have heard on the boards here that you can often find college age students who are studying the culinary arts and hire them for weddings for much less than a venue/catering company would charge.  I would definitly look around and do lots of google/bing searches on budget friendly weddings. 

I know by mean BJ's (discount club) often gives out trial memberships so you can do all your bulk foods shopping at the big discount store without paying any membership fees! 

southernbelle0915

Have your wedding at a non meal time - start at 2pm, end the reception by 5pm. Or start at 8pm and end the reception later. That way, you CAN do your dessert and finger foods option. 

However, if you decide to have your wedding overlap meal time, then you need to serve a meal. It doesn't need to be fancy at all - you can do burgers and brats on the grill with potato salad, fruit salad and a grocery store cake served with paper plates and plastic silverware and an iPod for music. For 60 people, I bet you'd spend about $200 on a reception like that and it'd be etiquette kosher.

doeydo

What about having your wedding later then?  Starting around 7:30 or so.  

JessicaJupiter

doeydo said:

What about having your wedding later then?  Starting around 7:30 or so.  

With that it then becomes an issue for his grandparents who are driving in out of town. They would want to stay for at least a good portion of the reception and would only end up leaving at 8:30 for a few hour drive. It also gets very dark here earlier in the evenings in October so it'd squash all chances of having outdoor photography. 

It seemed simple enough to say we wanted a Wednesday wedding until we have to start working around things for the guests.

allispain

JessicaJupiter said:

doeydo said:

What about having your wedding later then?  Starting around 7:30 or so.  

With that it then becomes an issue for his grandparents who are driving in out of town. They would want to stay for at least a good portion of the reception and would only end up leaving at 8:30 for a few hour drive. It also gets very dark here earlier in the evenings in October so it'd squash all chances of having outdoor photography. 

It seemed simple enough to say we wanted a Wednesday wedding until we have to start working around things for the guests.

Well, this is the downside of having your wedding on a day that is not Saturday. You have a higher chance of a) having a higher decline rate because many of your guests cannot take off work to be there or b) having to make changes to what you originally envisioned so that you can accommodate your guests' schedules and needs. It sucks that this is the case, but it does tend to happen on weekday weddings.

For example, I have a friend who got married on a Friday at 4 pm. It was a Catholic mass and her church only allows those to happened at specific times - 4 pm was the latest in the day. Only about 1/3 of her guests came to the ceremony - most showed up for cocktail hour and then everyone was there by the reception.

doeydo

What if they stayed at a hotel?

JessicaJupiter

doeydo said:

What if they stayed at a hotel?

That is where it becomes tricky. In my town it would be about $150 for them to stay in a hotel for the night, they aren't that well off and would just stay home to avoid the additional costs and we don't have the money to do that for them... and then it opens it up to some other members of his family coming in who'd want us to pay for the hotel they'd be paying for anyways.

It is frustrating that the only time convenient for those important to us to actually be able to attend is the only time slot that has expectation of a full meal! I cannot wait for the irony to appear when either those we are accommodating can't even make it or only half the people RSVP and food wouldn't be an issue anyways.

OliveOilsMom

Does your ceremony have to be on a Wednesday?  Could you have it on a Saturday or Sunday and then have everything at a non-meal time?

JessicaJupiter

OliveOilsMom said:

Does your ceremony have to be on a Wednesday?  Could you have it on a Saturday or Sunday and then have everything at a non-meal time?

We have selected a Wednesday because it marks our 5 year anniversary, we've seriously considered other dates but we only get to do this once and it is just too perfect a date to pass up even if on a Wednesday. We had originally only considered weekend dates from May - October but none of them really seemed right.

We had originally thought of having a private ceremony at the courthouse then maybe going to dinner with our parents but as time approached we decided that we want to have a somewhat traditional wedding, as again, we only get this once. 

JaneAustensGhost

I'm having a Wednesday wedding.  That doesn't really change the etiquette of anything.   You need to feed your guests; that's the bottom line. 

NantucketBride12

You definitely need more food if people are coming straight from work.  I'd imagine they won't have eaten since lunch and not everyone squeezes in a lunch break.  You'll have some starving people there... salads (pasta or lettuce) and a few chicken wings does not a dinner make.

JessicaJupiter

NantucketBride12 said:

You definitely need more food if people are coming straight from work.  I'd imagine they won't have eaten since lunch and not everyone squeezes in a lunch break.  You'll have some starving people there... salads (pasta or lettuce) and a few chicken wings does not a dinner make.

As I have already mentioned above I have changed my mind and want to go with lasagna and spaghetti served with some salad. In my mind a plate of spaghetti and lasagna should constitute a supper.

arrippa

What about having the reception at a restaurant? I am sure you can find an affordable place so you can combine the venue and food money together.

JessicaJupiter

moemacWed30594 said:

What about having the reception at a restaurant? I am sure you can find an affordable place so you can combine the venue and food money together.

I already hope to combine the venue so I can have both the ceremony and reception there already, which saves me more money than trying to combine the venue and food.