Saving money at your wedding - cheap wedding ideas
Are you planning a wedding on a budget and need to save some cash? Here are a few ideas to help you save a little while planning your big day!
- Try scheduling your wedding in off-peak months. May, June, September, and October are the most popular months for weddings. Avoiding these 4 months can save you some $$$.
- Schedule your wedding on a day other than Saturday. You can often get a cheaper rate on a Sunday or even during the week if you are so inclined.
- Consider getting married at a free location such as a friend’s house, a state park, the beach, or even your own backyard.
- Get married on a cruise. My fiance and I are considering getting married while taking a cruise. The problem that we encountered was that you have to be in the Bahamas for at least 20 hours before a marriage was legal. We planned to circumvent this problem by getting married at The Justice of the Peace here in the USA before heading out on the cruise. The ceremony on the beach will be for us and family/friends and will be more “ceremonial” in nature as we already made it official back here in the states. The cruise ship wants too much for us to afford to have the ceremony on the boat, so we plan on hiring a local officiant on the island.
- Get married in the early afternoon or late morning. Often times, a venue will give you a break on price for off-peak hours.
- Have a potluck instead of having to pay for catering
- Provide your own liquor. A keg or two of beer can go a long way especially if you purchase it yourself and hire friends to bartend.
- Buy a used wedding dress. There are lots of places that sell once worn wedding dresses. When you are finished, you can even sell it again and almost break even. There are many places where you can rent a dress too.
- Use less flowers and more greenery. You can skip the flowers altogether. I have seen people make flowers out of burlap or tissue paper and use them as centerpieces when combined with some ribbon.
- Use candles as centerpieces instead of flowers.
- Have heavy appetizers in place of a full meal
- Send out electronic invitations and save-the-dates instead of printed ones
- Get a cake made at a chain store. Often times grocery stores can provide great looking cakes at a cheap price.
- Ask a friend to shoot the wedding. High quality cameras can be rented for cheaper than you think. A good old iphone does an excellent job too if you are on a budget. Have everyone take pictures and then upload them by using a hashtag on your favorite internet site.
- Hire a DJ to do your ceremony music as well as your reception music
- Use a venue that will let you hire your own vendors (i.e. friends and family)
- Rent a house on a website such as Airbnb to save money on the ceremony and reception. Just make sure that you are allowed to do that sort of thing ahead of time.
- Get married at the courthouse and then have a small reception afterward
- Cook a hog. Especially in southern states, it is very common to cook a hog on the grill and have a “pig pickin’.” A hog can feed a lot of people and pulled pork tastes great!
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- Have a small wedding cake with sheet cake in the back. Once the small cake has been cut, it can be taken into the back and sheet cake can be cut up and served to your guests on plates. They’ll never know.
- Make cupcakes instead of having a cake.
- Go garage saleing or go to Goodwill to find cheap decorations
- Use an ipad or an old iphone for a photobooth. There are actually photobooth apps that you can purchase and you will save a fortune. Get props at a local Halloween or party store.
- Sell anything that can be sold after the wedding that is still in good shape.
- Buy appetizers at places like Costco or Sams
- Have your friends do your hair and makeup
- Reduce the guest list to only close friends and family. Don’t invite your Cousin Sal if you haven’t heard from him in ten years.
- Rent a speaker system and setup your own playlist for music.
- Use your own car as a get-away-car instead of using a limo
- Skip the champagne toast
- Decorate your own reception
- Hire students from a music school if you need strings for the ceremony
- Remember…DJs are cheaper than live bands
- Etsy is a great place to find wedding accessories for a greatly discounted price
- Buy a white bridesmaid’s dress. You can save hundreds and even thousands of dollars by going this route.
- Buy flowers that are in season.
Well, we hope that you got a few ideas on how to save some money at your wedding. Now get out there and start saving some hard earned dough!!!
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