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Very Much On A Budget...
My Fiance & I are paying for our own wedding. We would like to hopefully have our wedding for $2000 and under. The problem is when we wrote down all the necessary essentials for our wedding, the total price was quite overwhelming. The Venue, the dress, the invitations! I am very stressed at this moment. If any of you bride to be's have any websites or stores that have amazing deals, please let us know.
Thanks,
Bankrupt.
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Re: Very Much On A Budget...
Venue - $1,000+
Dress - $300+
Flowers - $500+
Cake - $300+
Music - $300+
Food - $1,000+
Photography - $1,000+
Bridesmaid Dresses - ?
Gifts - ?
Transportation - ?
You can easy spend $2,000 on any one of these items.
Anyone that tells you what you should spend on things either has ulterior motives (they want to sell you something) or they are caught in the materialistic mindset of thinking that you need all the trappings of a "traditional" wedding to prove your love and commitment.
I wouldn't worry about trying to make it look fancier than what you can afford. Just focus on what is important to you. The people that love you want to see you just being happy.
Being a gracious hostess and caring about the guests at your party are more important than hiring the right photographer or wearing a designer dress.
Weekday weddings are much cheaper than weekend weddings
The Pierre Lasonde House at Fort Douglas is small but is only $500 to rent for the entire day. The larger Commander's House is $1000 for the whole day.
For Centerpieces, the biggest thing is to cut down the amount of flowers you are using. Have you checked out submersed flower centerpieces? Google it and see what you think. I bought 12" vases at the dollar store, clear stones at Michael's for $1.99 on sale, and submersible LED tealights for the bottom for $2.19 each @:
http://www.100candles.com. Then you just buy a few flower stems for each and you're done. They were uplit from the LED underneath and then you can put a floating candle on top.
For catering, breakfast is the cheapest meal to serve. I went to a breakfust/brunch wedding at Memorial House a few months ago and it was a very nice change!
If you are going for a dinner meal, Good Day Catering had the most reasonable prices and their food is absolutely delicious! Their website is www.gooddaycatering.com
For a wedding dress, I lucked out at David's Bridal. I went in just to look one day and the very first dress I tried on I fell in love with but it had a price tag of $1000. The consultant then told me it was on sale for $199! Score! I think if you go and really spend some time searching you'll come across a good deal too. KSL.com's classified also has TONS of wedding dresses for sale at a discounted price.
To DIY Invitations, http://www.cardsandpockets.com/ has great specials and prices. I bought my pocketfolds and envelopes there and found them to be the most reasonable. I am having a friend with Adobe Illustrator design the invitations and printing them myself.
The biggest thing though that has really helped was planning a year in advance. This has made it so my fiance and I have been able to spread out the cost. We put down our deposit on our reception venue first and then the other half isn't due until the wedding. Then a few months later we booked our photographer, and then the caterer, putting down half and then paying the rest before the wedding. We've been able to pay for everything in cash using this method and it has been much less of a financial drain on us.
Firehouse Floral is also a gem in Salt Lake City. They do not have a website or anything but they are very reasonable for flowers and do beautiful work! OH! And if you need table linen http://www.tableclothsfactory.com/ is also very reasonable.
Good Luck!
Breakfast sounds so great! Those were amazing ideas Lyndsy.
Also, what about not doing actual flowers for a centerpiece. There are lots of ideas that could be cheaper, like fruit in a container.
Choose your top priorities, and choose what you are willing to skimp on. I didn't have an enormous budget - definitely nowhere near the supposed "20,000" brides are spending. I knew I wanted a great photographer and nice pictures. I knew I wanted some good food. I prioritized my budget that way, so I felt really satisfied with the things that were most important to me.
Good luck!
I am also making many things myself, or with help, like the invitations and favors.
Also I went to a second hand store for my wedding dress and was able to find a really nice one that fit's me perfectly for less than $200. Most people only ever wear a wedding dress once, so a second hand store can be a good place to find one in good condition for a small price, you just have to hope you can get lucky and find something great!
My last piece of advice is just to do a lot of research before you buy something so you know you are getting a good deal. I was surprised at how reasonably priced the craft store Michael's is for Wedding things. some things I could have gotten for about the same price online, but getting it at the store cut out the shipping charges.
You can get friends to do things like flowers, cakes, DIY invitations, sewing, photographs, hair & makeup (even someone that isnt trained but you might admire their makeup often!), the list goes on...
I've been to the weddings of friends who have been on small budgets, and the most common thing I found was that they held a simple dessert&dance later in the evening for their reception (at about 7pm - just make sure your guests are aware that its not a sit down dinner, you dont want them to turn up disappointed cos theyre hungry!). That way, you're not worrying about paying for meal courses and you dont even have to hire a DJ, you could do the music yourself by getting an iPod playlist together to last the duration of your celebration.
In between the ceremony and reception, the bride and groom had organized a dinner at a family members home for the close family (about 20 or so). This doesnt have to be extravagant either!
happy planning!